Summer 2005

Contents:

• Presidents Corner
• E-Mail Address
• Director's Memo on Exchange Time and Flex Scheduling
• Periodic Increment Date
• Treasurer's Report
• Legal Report
• Calling for Volunteers!
• New Faces
• Name Change

President’s Corner

By Steve Bell

At the Special Meeting on July 12, a member observed the irony of a union fighting for longer hours without cash compensation. If this were any other discipline the members would be calling for my resignation instead of sending words of support. As you know, we are not slackers. You are the most dedicated professionals I have ever had the honor of working with.

We’re underpaid, underappreciated and understaffed with a Director who apparently doesn’t think very highly of us. To be fair, why should he? How often does he hear praise from the thousands of people we help versus the handful of disgruntled but vocal people? After so many years of hearing only complaints it’s only natural his impression be skewed.

So why do we do it? Why do we stay? Why aren’t we satisfied putting in our 40 hours and calling it good? Time and time again you have demonstrated through your actions that it’s all about the resource. Other entities pay more yet we stay because our positions are consistent with our ethics. We stay because our coworkers are among the foremost experts in the northwest if not the world. We stay because the fish, wildlife and their habitats need us.

If there is a conflict we must wrestle with it is between our dedication to our work and responsibilities to our families. Since so much of our work is cyclical exchange time has been a vital tool for striking that balance. In order to meet the needs of the public and the resource, we sometimes spend long hours (sometimes days) away from our homes during busy periods to get the work done.

Employees in the Fish Program and Wildlife Program must adjust their hours to accommodate various survey seasons that are driven by the biology of the species. Some biologists in the Wildlife Program must respond to dangerous and/or injured wildlife to protect the public outside of
normal work hours. Marine Resource employees often need to work low tides to gather shellfish data required for public health reasons, treaties and other laws. Habitat Program employees invariably work long hours during construction or logging seasons to meet the demand for permits and technical assistance and during annual flooding events to respond to emergencies. The Oil Spill Team provides on-site support to protect important habitats at any given moment of the day or night warning. The legislative session creates its own special peak season at the NRB.

No one questions the value of good supervision, management or public accountability but I think we all recognize the memos failed to accomplish those ends while severely hampering our ability to work efficiently. The directive that we would all work 8-5, M-F, with one hour for lunch, as you know, is not viable - not if we going to do our jobs right.

One member with 25+ years of experience with WDFW said, “I have watched field morale decline under this Director to the lowest point I have ever observed in WDFW. This move by the Director just put the final nail in the coffin of morale.” As disappointed as we all are in the Director’s lack
of confidence in us we must remember the reasons we entered this discipline and rededicate ourselves to that purpose.

(disregard the email address shown here)

Director’s Memos on Exchange Time and Flex Scheduling

By Bryan Murphie and Adam Couto

Unless you’ve been on annual leave on Antarctica for the past month, you are probably aware of Director Koening’s memos of June 24th and July 11th, which effectively eliminated exchange time and flex scheduling. The good news is things have changed since those first memos, and the bad news is the changes are not being implemented uniformly for all programs. Here are some highlights that we hope will explain to you what happened, why it happened, and what we can and are going about it.

Contract Language

During the contract negotiation an agreement on exchange time was not reached until the last day. The agreement was that any time worked in excess of 40 hours would be considered exchange time. The intentionally vague language “excessive hours” was used in the contract as
the state was concerned about potential lawsuits stemming from more specific language. However, all negotiating parties agreed at the time that any hours worked over 40 would be exchange time.

At a June 8, 2005 meeting with WDFW Personnel staff it was understood by both parties that our members would not nickel and dime the agency for a few minutes worked here and there, while exchange time accrual would continue as past practices; meaning the status quo of exchange time accrual would be maintained. However, the Director interpreted the contract strictly and in contradiction with the intent of the negotiating parties that he could determine what excessive meant. We are confident that we will prevail and the intent of the negotiating parties will be implemented.

Current Situation

Implementation of the Director’s memos has been a mess, and several changes to the original intent of the memos have come down through the chain-of-command verbally. Unfortunately these changes are not being implemented uniformly from Program to Program, and different members’ experiences are often different from one another. Some members have been told that balancing their timesheet monthly is now OK. Other members have been told that flex scheduling or exchange time accruals for personal reasons will now be accepted. Again, these interpretations are occurring in some Programs and not others, making for tremendous confusion.

Union Response

We filed two Demands to Bargain and two Grievances regarding exchange time and flex scheduling. We have a meeting with the Director on August 24th to discuss our grievances. If we are unable to reach an agreement, the next step per our new contract is binding arbitration. We feel confident we will prevail on the exchange time issue due to our contract language, and on the flex scheduling issue due to agency policy and existing WAC and RCW language.

Member Response

We encourage members to use whichever process is required by their chain of command to request exchange time accrual and flex scheduling. Please forward all denials to Rhonda Fenrich at rhonda@ggfm.com. And please be patient – we are working toward a solution and hope to have one in the near future.

Periodic Increment Date

By Adam Couto

As a state employee, you have a Periodic Increment Date, or PID. Prior to July 1, 2005, your PID was established by WAC; now it is established by our new Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) language. In order to minimize problems, we used the old WAC language in our new
CBA, and therefore assumed that PIDs would remain the same.

As many of you know by now, the Department of Personnel (DOP) decided to interpret the language in our contract different from the old WAC language, even though they are the exact same language. Their contention is that the WAC language was interpreted improperly before and now they want to correct the interpretation. Our contention is that they are legally required to interpret the language as they always have.

Some employees are benefiting from the new interpretation by receiving their step increase earlier than they would have, while other employees are having their step increase delayed, in some cases by up to a year. In order to be fair, we are asking that the previous interpretation be reinstated, or at least that staff expecting their increase earlier be grandfathered. We have filed a class-action grievance and will be discussing this issue, along with other grievances filed, with the Director on August 24, 2005.

Treasurer's Report
 

Account Balances as reported by bookkeeper Renee Welsh at the July 12, 2005 Executive Board Meeting.

Legal Report

If you use an Agency vehicle read this!

By Rhonda Fenrich

If you use a state vehicle please read the following case study and note the outcome. WDFW vehicles can only be used for “official state business” and cannot be use for commuting or transporting unauthorized persons. The following is an excerpt of an event that demonstrates the high stakes of unwittingly misusing a State vehicle.

A DSHS employee was investigated for using a state vehicle to commute from his residence to his official duty station and transporting unauthorized passengers. Unauthorized passengers can include, but are not limited to, family members, relatives, friends, and pets. In addition to various DSHS and OFM policies, he was accused of violating RCW 42.52.160(1) Use of persons, money, or property for private gain.

During the investigation, OFM reviewed mileage logs, motor pool reports, personnel files, travel documents, and leave records.

This employee is the Branch Administrator for the Forks Community Service Office and was the Social Service Supervisor for the Port Angeles office. The administrator’s work schedule and his official duty station on Monday, Wednesday and Friday was Port Angeles. His official duty station on Tuesday and Thursday was Forks. The administrator lives in Neah Bay. The mileage from Neah Bay to Forks is 49 miles one way; the distance from Neah Bay to Port Angeles is 81 miles one way.

From March 24, 2003 to August 30, 2004, the administrator, two days a week, used a state vehicle to travel from Neah Bay to Forks and three days a week used a state vehicle to travel from Neah Bay to Port Angeles.

A state employee cannot use a state vehicle to travel from his residence to his official duty station. The employee did not request or receive authorization to use a state vehicle for commuting. The employee ceased using the state vehicle to commute from Neah Bay to Forks or Port Angeles on December 6, 2004 when his acting supervisor informed him this use was
not allowed.

The employee commuted 26,274 miles in a state-owned vehicle at a cost to the state of $9,852.75. Additionally, the personal use of a state-owned vehicle is a taxable fringe benefit and is subject to payroll withholding taxes. When the employee was on annual or sick leave, the state vehicle would be parked at his residence in Neah Bay and therefore unavailable for use by other agency employees of the Forks office.

This assertion was substantiated. The employee will receive a letter of reprimand. He will be required to repay $9,852.75. In addition, the employee will be required to review the appropriate policies and sign that they understand the policies.

Calling for Volunteers!

By Adam Couto

The WAFWP Executive Board needs your help to determine the direction of our union. We are looking for volunteers to serve on three subcommittees. The first is a Platform Subcommittee, which will be tasked with developing a legislative and political agenda for the union. The second is a Legislative Subcommittee, which will track bills, help determine the union’s position on legislation, testify on bills, and help develop relationships with legislators. The second is an Issues Subcommittee, which will function much like a Steering Committee, but only on specific issues identified by the Executive Board. If interested in any of these subcommittees, please contact any one of the Executive Board members.

New Faces

By Adam Couto

The WAPB Annual Meeting was held on May 18, 2005, at the Summit Lodge at Snoqualmie Pass. An election to make minor changes to the by-laws was adopted, along with a name change (see article on Page 3), and several board positions were filled.

The pilot VP positions, one each for Habitat, Wildlife, and Fish Program, have become program specific positions and have been added to the board permanently through a by-laws revision. We would like to welcome Pamela Erstad (Reg 4) onto the Executive Board as our new Habitat Program representative. Pam joins former WAPB President Pat Miller (Reg 5), who had been serving as pilot VP for Wildlife and continues as the new Wildlife Program Rep.

In other election news, Steve Bell (Habitat, Reg 5) and Bryan Murphie (Wildlife, Reg 6) were re-elected as board President and Secretary, respectively, and Camille Speck (Fish, Reg 6) was elected to the Member-at-Large position she had previously been appointed to. New job representatives are Terry Jackson (Habitat, Reg 6) and former WAPB President Ruth Milner (Wildlife, Reg 4).

Name Change

Lost in all the hoopla surrounding the Director’s exchange time and flex scheduling memos is the fact that we have a new name. The Washington Association of Professional Biologists is now the Washington Association of Fish and Wildlife Professionals (WAFWP). The name change was necessary to reflect the new job class (Scientific Technicians, ITAS, and Research Scientists) that we now represent.
 

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