United States of America

BEFORE THE FEDERAL SERVICE IMPASSES PANEL

 

In the Matter of

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY

U.S. ARMY FINANCE AND

ACCOUNTING CENTER

INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA

and 

LOCAL 1411, AMERICAN FEDERATION OF

GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, AFL-CIO

Case No. 90 FSIP 108

 

DECISION AND ORDER

Local 1411, American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO (Union), filed a request for assistance with the Federal Service Impasses Panel (Panel) to consider a negotiation impasse under section 7119 of the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute (Statute) between it and the Department of the Army, U.S. Army Finance and Accounting Center (USAFAC), Indianapolis, Indiana (Employer).

After investigation of the request for assistance, the Panel determined that the dispute should be resolved through an informal conference by telephone between Staff Associate Joseph Schimansky and the parties. If there were no settlement, he was to notify the Panel of the status of the dispute, including the parties' final offers and his recommendations for resolving the matter. Following consideration of this information, the Panel would take whatever action it deemed appropriate to resolve the impasse.

Mr. Schimansky conducted a telephone conference call with the parties on May 9, 1990, but three of the issues at impasse were not resolved. Mr. Schimansky reported to the Panel based on the record developed by the parties, and the Panel has now considered the entire record, including his recommendations for settlement.

BACKGROUND

The mission of the Employer primarily is to administer the U.S. Army's military payroll. The bargaining unit consists of approximately 2,230 General Schedule employees in a wide variety of administrative and technical occupations. The parties are currently negotiating an agreement to succeed the one which expired in January 1989.

ISSUES AT IMPASSE

The parties' dispute arose over a proposed change in the Employer's parking policy which would allow reserved parking permit holders to park in adjacent lots when the reserved lot is full. The issues at impasse involve whether: (1) the change should be implemented at all; (2) the overall number of reserved parking permits should be reduced; and (3) documents published by the Employer in connection with the policy should contain wording indicating that it was negotiated with the Union.

1. The Union's Position

The Union basically proposes that: (1) there be no change in the policy, in effect since 1985, which prohibits reserved permit holders from parking in the east and west lots when their area is full; (2) the Employer decrease the number of "executive reserve yellow permits" not to "exceed 5 percent of the total parking spaces adjacent to Building 1 or under the control of USAFAC;" and (3) all Employer documents published concerning the policy contain a paragraph indicating that its provisions "have been negotiated with AFGE Local 1411."

The Employer has issued many more reserved parking permits than there are spaces in the reserved lot. This has exacerbated a bad parking situation; numerous tickets recently have been issued, and numerous cars towed for lack of adequate parking space. The problem which the Employer is attempting to address by its proposed policy change is one of its own making, and employees without reserved parking permits should not be inconvenienced as a result. Moreover, requiring that no more than 5 percent of all parking spaces be reserved merely would make the Employer's parking policy consistent with the Department of the Army's parking regulations. Finally, the Employer has included wording similar to what the Union is proposing concerning its involvement in negotiations over parking policy in the recent past. The inclusion of such wording in future documents concerning the policy would serve to heighten employees' understanding of the role the Union plays in their affairs.

2. The Employer's Position

The Employer proposes that reserved parking permit holders be allowed to "park in open parking, i.e., east and west parking lots, when the reserved parking spaces in the south center lot are full," and that the Union be ordered to withdraw its other proposals. The effects of the proposed change on the bargaining unit would be minimal, and occur only on those rare days when all permit holders are at the facility at the same time. Even then, there are more than enough open parking spaces in the adjacent lots to accommodate the overflow. In this regard, additional parking spaces recently have been added, so the Union's contention that there is a general parking problem at the facility is without merit. Concerning the other aspects of the dispute, although the Employer denies it is in violation of Army parking regulations, the proper forum for resolution of this issue is under the parties' grievance procedure and not before the Panel. There is no need for the additional wording proposed by the Union to be included in documents published by the Employer concerning the parking policy.

CONCLUSIONS

Having considered the evidence and arguments in this case, we shall order that the parties adopt the Employer's position to resolve their dispute. The proposed change in policy would appear to have little or no impact on employees restricted to open parking spaces, while a continuation of the current policy would force overflow reserved parking permit holders either to park illegally, or in other areas not in the immediate vicinity of the facility. Moreover, the Union's attempt to reduce the total number of reserved parking permits issued by the Employer is a matter which should be pursued under the parties' negotiated grievance procedure, or during the negotiations currently under way concerning their successor agreement. Finally, in the circumstances of this case we see no reason to require that all Employer documents published concerning the parking policy indicate that its provisions have been negotiated with the Union.

ORDER

Pursuant to the authority vested in it by section 7119 of the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute and because of the failure of the parties to resolve their dispute during the course of proceedings instituted pursuant to section 2471.6(a)(2) of the Panel's regulations, the Federal Service Impasses Panel under section 2471.11(a) of its regulations hereby orders the following:

The parties shall adopt the Employer's

 

By direction of the Panel.

Linda A. Lafferty

Executive Director

June 22, l990

Washington, D.C.