Jay Inslee: Washington's 1st Congressional District
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Briefing on DOD Civilian Worker Regulations
15 February 2005
U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee held a briefing today with civilian defense employee representatives to discuss the Department of Defense's proposed changes to National Security Personnel System (NSPS) regulations. Inslee, other Members of Congress and congressional staff heard concerns about how the new rules, published on Monday and subject to a thirty day comment period, would affect the more than 750,000 federal defense workers in the country. Inslee's district is home to the Keyport and Bangor parts of Naval Base Kitsap, which employs thousands of civilian defense employees.
Inslee has expressed concern about the changes to the NSPS, because of its degradation of collective bargaining rights and other long-standing worker protections. Inslee offered an amendment to prevent the Department of Defense from weakening civilian defense personnel protections in June 2004, which was narrowly defeated on a mostly party line vote of 202 to 218 (H.R. 4613).
"These new defense personnel regulations are fundamentally unsound and we will look at every effort to change them," said Inslee. "The hard working civilian defense employees in Puget Sound are crucial to our success in the war against terrorism and they deserve better than these regulations that roll back worker protections."
Other attendees at the briefing included John Gage, President of American Federation of Government Employees, James B. Johnson, Vice President of International Association of Fire Fighters, Ron Ault, President of Metal Trades Department, AFL-CIO, Steve Lenkart, SEIU/NAGE, Mark Roth, American Federation of Government Employees, H.T. Nguyen, National Education Association (NEA), Rick Brown, National Federation of Federal Employees, and Michael Filler, International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
At the briefing Inslee spoke with Frank Carelli Jr., Director of the Government Employees Department for the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, Ron Ault, President of the Metal Trades Department of the AFL-CIO, and Michael Filler, Associate Director of the Education Department at the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
Byron Charlton of the AFL-CIO stands next to Inslee as he speaks at the briefing.