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Return to Article: Lawmakers renew push to grant employees law officer benefits

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  After working the Mexico/U.S.A border for 10 years of enforcement as a legacy Customs officer I transfered to a small port. After a year I felt emotionally, physically and mentaly sick. I was overcome with chronic fatigue. I was diagnosed with PTSD due to the border environment and am currently on sick leave. 10 years of stress, constant exposures to reacting to constant dangers, smugglers, A & D persons, loud vehicular noises,port runners and hypervigilance changed my life forever. None of the beaurocrats seem to care what impact this has had on my health and I wouldn't have even known it had I not transfered out of there. Thank God for those doctors at the VA. They saved my life. I am currently on a treatment plan with a supporting doctor. They saved my life. Its funny how this agency will push Inspectors (for the sake of the border) around while 99% of all the administrators of this Homeland Security Department worry about their mortgages, retirements and lunch breaks. These are the same folks who you work for. YOU MUST ALWAYS take charge of your health and DOCUMENT everything. 6-C or not.

  ptsd Posted January 4, 2009 2:44 PM
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  I have been a law enforcement officer for 32 years, 9 with the state police and my last 23 with the Department of Veterans Affairs. As a VA police officer, I have faced more individuals with weapons in my first two years with the VA than my 9 nine years with the state. I have a bad back, popping knees and stiffness in my neck, all because of my 23 years of interactions with violent veterans. There is no excuse for excluding us from this retirement benefit.

  Charles G. Potts Posted January 14, 2008 8:05 PM
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  Everyday at airports those cbpo swiping passports, run into people wanted on NCIC and state warrants that are not happy to go to jail. At airports those cbpo seize drugs. Its no all swiping pp. There are physical standards for new hires. ICE does not even have them for thier DEO's CBPO need 6c and now we have it.

  Justice Posted December 27, 2007 2:22 AM
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  You work for an organization that is functions 365 days a year, 24 hours a day and depending on your location, exposes you to all kinds of weather from 125 degrees to minus 15, you WILL BE outside. Throw in your basic armed and dangerous person, your drunk, abusive, assaultive traveler, your 4000 pound charging vehicle, your constant exposure to toxic carbon dioxide exhaust fumes, your exposure to contagious disease, exposure to hazardous materials, you are under constant surveillance by crimminals, drug cartels having a bounty on your head, you protect the country against terroristic threats, you protect the country from radioactive material, you arrest and detain wanted crimminals, you will work rotating shifts around the clock, and you will deal with an irrate traveling public. These are JUST A FEW of the things that NEW HIRES quickly observe and decide that they WILL NOT be doing this line of work for 30 MONTHS much less 30 YEARS. I have witnessed many good CBPO's retire after thirty years then due to various health problems die shortly thereafter. It is sad but after 30 years of dedicated service, the CBPO's health is generally deteriorated. Thirty years is a long period of time by any standards. It is time that this 6c coverage is offered for the sake of moral and workforce retention. The CBPO workforce ranks dead last in moral. It is time to revamp the workforce and let those individuals who want to retire at twenty years of service do so, instead of having to work for thirty, then bacically in most cases, retire to die. Our ICE Agents are 6c and so are the Prosecution Officers, what makes these positions privileged? As long as the CBPO's are being streched for 30 years, the service will continue to experience enormous turn over rates to the all the other agencies who offer 20 year retirement...it's called an INCENTIVE...something Customs and Border Protection has forgotten about.

  GOVEXEC.COM READER Posted December 17, 2007 6:25 AM
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  I admire our law enforcement folks, and agree they need additional benefits, what about our National Guard and Reserve soldiers who still must wait until age 60 to draw a retirement? Are they not sacrificing for the defense of this country?

  CJ Posted December 12, 2007 7:50 AM
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  If Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) personnel are law enforcement personnel, them every federal employee should be. NRC OI employees have obtained criminal investigator job classifications which are not warranted by their positions, which involve only civil investigations of "wrongdoing," defined as an "intentional violation of regulatory requirements or a violation resulting from "careless disregard" of, or "reckless indifference" to, regulatory requirements. This was done through an eight-year (09/75 - 05/84) exchange of misleading letters with the Civil Service Commission and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). NRC Office of Investigations Special Agents' duties consist of non-custodial interviews with cooperative witnesses and document reviews of regulatory violations. For over nineteen years (1982-2001) they did not have criminal investigative authority, arrest powers or a need to carry weapons, and only one OI Special Agent was deputized. In March 2007, the OI Director admitted that OI personnel have never performed a single arrest. Due to their improper classification, GS-1811-12/13/14/15, they get premium pay, early retirement, 25% availability pay, and, consider the first two hours at home as their qualifying time for availability pay. "Never Before Have Federal Investigators Done So Little For So Much!" A very conservative analysis puts the value of these unjustified benefits at well over $700,000 per year; this has gone on for some 25 years ($17,500,000). The short story is that the NRC has misled OPM (and others) and the NRC Inspector General has allowed this to go on.

  James E. Foster Posted December 5, 2007 8:27 PM
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  If you think that anyone cares about the federal employee's your in a dream world. I found 11 keys of ecstasy and got a pocket knife. I guess it's better than a coffee cup! No one really cares about anything anymore or at least where I work. Between the last 20 shift changes, the scheduling overtime three days in advance so you never get a day off and the constant if you don't like it here there's 150,000 willing to take your place. Most of the officer's see no light at the end of the tunnel. About 6 years ago I told my supervisor I'd do my job for free. If DHS offered me a covered GS-13 with a 7 hour lunch break out of an 8 hour day I'd still leave. Remember that coverage will cost money and currently at my agency the bottom line is everything.

  Slave #14222 Posted November 18, 2007 10:29 PM
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  CBP officers working a land border have an extremely dangerous job. I made more arrests, and was in more fights as an inspector (now called CBP Officer)in El Paso, Texas than I have ever been in as an ICE Special Agent. Miami Airport Immigratin and Customs Inspectors (now CBP Officers) could have arrested Mohammed Atta if they could have been provided CIA/FBI information about his terrorist ties. Are you telling me that would not have been a worthy arrest? That would be far more dangerous than having 10 ICE guys with M-4 machine guns arresting one fat, over weight 60 year old computer geek downloading kiddy porn on his laptop in his apartment. CBP is the front line. After they seize 200 keys of cocaine or marijuana from a truck and arrest the smuggler, they then call ICE Office of Investigation Special Agents, who have 6c retirement, to come clean up the mess and do the paperwork. So, they need and deserve 6c law enforcement coverage!

  Jeff Posted June 28, 2007 2:41 AM
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  As a police officer with the department of Vet affairs, we deserve to have the retirement and pay. We have pulled our guns out on offenders that are threatening another person, we deal with drunks like on the city streets, respond to domestic disturbances', write speeding tickets, arrest drunk drives, investigate all kinds of crime. Good officers leave this agency to go to a city or county department so they can get the retirement. That is sad because we are left with officers that cannot get a job in the local sector.

  Ronald Keith Posted May 17, 2007 1:24 AM
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  Federal agents who make arrests, execute search warrants, seize evidence, undergo significant hazards, carry firearms and work in rigorous positions definitely deserve law enforcement status. Some investigators do not meet the above criteria, and already get law enforcement status, early retirement, and 25% availability pay (counting two hours at home as qualifying). A comprehensive review should be performed of every law enforcement position in the government and the inequities removed.

  James Foster Posted February 27, 2007 9:44 PM
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  In many ways this is a bunch of garbage. How about the airline pilot who now carries a weapon? First, let's find out how many Customs agents are killed in the line of duty. Then, let's take a closer look at their current benefits. We do this all of the time with the military and their life is on the line 24 hours a day. Why do we need someone with a gun sitting at a social security office in a town of 2,500 people or so? All they do is sit on their butts. This whole homeland security business has been out of control since its inception. How many VA guards with a gun have been killed in the past 20 years? This whole thing is ridiculous.

  Charlie Posted February 27, 2007 5:31 PM
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  Sorry, Senior Guy, DHS, I posted my remarks before checking yours. While I agree with 98 percent of your comments, having been there, that's still no reason to deny LEO benefits to federal officers. As we both know, these officers have federal police powers, including carrying a weapon, arrest authority, and all the others as well. It's simple -- set up a deadline for the oldsters, let them go with their present pensions, and then only hire younger officers under the same provisions used by the special agents when hiring. Within probably five to seven years the transition could be made via this method. In the mean time, hang in there, because retirement is still better than work.

  GovExec.com reader Posted February 27, 2007 10:56 AM
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  I sure hope they get it this time! I've heard all the nonsensical arguments against it; let's hope that this time Congress can do the right thing. Otherwise, those officers should simply turn in their weapons, refuse to detain and arrest suspects, and let others do their current jobs!

  GovExec.com reader Posted February 27, 2007 6:55 AM
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  Checking passports at the airport is a really dangerous job worthy of law enforcement status and early retirement! Just think of all those line of duty injuries, such as hemorrhoids from sitting in those booths all day long, or paper cuts. All kidding aside, the real problem is that CBP, to look at one of the jobs proposed for LEO status, has too many variables. Depending on where you work, you may function as an LEO, boarding ships, working at a land border, searching for narcotics, etc. Or you may be at desk full-time, punching names into a computer, or swiping passports. Not to mention that there are no age or physical fitness requirements, so you see officers over 70 still on the job, as well as ones over 300 lbs. That is why this is such an emotional issue, and a dilemma as well. I guess the old saying is true; one size does not fit all!

  GovExec.com reader Posted February 26, 2007 9:55 PM