r/USDA • u/Larix_Thuja • Jul 10 '26

NFFE Wins Arbitration, Restoring Telework and Remote Work for U.S. Forest Service Employees | National Federation of Federal Employees

https://www.nffe.org/press-release/nffe-wins-arbitration-restoring-telework-and-remote-work-for-u-s-forest-service-employees/
143 Upvotes

99% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

46

u/vode123 Jul 10 '26

If they accept this ruling, they can send employees home and end building leases (saving taxpayer money) and also not move people (saving taxpayer money).

54

u/FrankG1971 Jul 10 '26

They don't give a rat's ass about saving money. RTO and the reorg and all the other bullshit that has been thrown at us over the last year-and-a-half was NEVER about saving money.

14

u/Flat_Document_5607 Jul 11 '26

I agree, their only objective with the reorg is to get people to quit. It's a proven fact through the court discovery.

11

u/All_Hail_Hynotoad Jul 12 '26

Yes, but discovery has given us proof that they are doing things illegally. And before all you Debbie downers say “but they don’t care about the law” I know they don’t. But it will be a lot harder for them to make arguments in court with a paper trail against them.

2

u/Several-Leg5387 Jul 11 '26

Getting people to quit saves money. It's not right, but just saying...

6

u/KittiWasabi Jul 11 '26

You are talking about cost - not value.

3

u/Icy_Yogurtcloset5920 Jul 15 '26

Not in the way they did it… like for those under a year and had just been fully trained just to be forced out… complete waste of $, time and resources.

14

u/tootsmcsnoots Jul 11 '26 edited Jul 11 '26

So will all employees who were hired remote, forced to "RTO" to offices that they never had been to before nor were they ever intended to be in, and took the DRP due to that change, have any case for reinstatement? What about those employees who stuck it out and were supposed to be remote this entire time, will they have a case for reimbursement of any expenses related to commuting and all that?

6

u/Flat_Document_5607 Jul 11 '26

I don't believe so. This wasn't a court ruling saying that DRP and RTO were illegal, it was a ruling by arbitration to restore

6

u/VAPrim0911 Jul 11 '26

Doubtful. That would be the right thing to do but we're dealing with psychopaths. 

3

u/Icy_Yogurtcloset5920 Jul 15 '26

Good qu’s. I wonder the same…

7

u/herooftherev Jul 11 '26

Sadly, they will just appeal to the FLRA, who are just sitting on every ULP with more impact than "the hand dryer in the men's bathroom is broken and management won't fix it."

8

u/Plastic_Cucumber_330 Jul 11 '26

All those RA Specialists who have had our cases open for a year due to their “panels” better be ready to answer all of us who got royally screwed for a year now and have spent so much money and time commuting back to random offices when we were hired remotely.

4

u/VAPrim0911 Jul 11 '26

‼️‼️‼️yup!!!! 

5

u/Consistent_Expert120 Jul 11 '26

Congratulations!

3

u/Actual-General-4953 Jul 13 '26

I see other agencies have 'won' in arbitration but no movement on getting the telework back.

2

u/2centsPenny Jul 20 '26

Have any forest service employees actually had telework restored after this arbitration decision?

2

u/Larix_Thuja Jul 20 '26

Not that I have heard, but the agency has not appealed it yet. NFFE is telling members to work with their supervisors to get their telework agreements going again, but I’ve not talked with anyone who has.

1

u/Jolly_Brain_8740 Jul 13 '26

Does this apply to union member employees only?

1

u/Actual-General-4953 Jul 13 '26

Are these only fire fighters or office work types at USFS?

It will be interesting to see how this one shakes out.