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This grievance board for federal workers has one person left -- and he's about to leave
David Fahrenthold RetweetedNEW: A little federal agency that acts as a personnel court for federal workers has only one person to hear its nearly 2,000 cases – and he’s about to leave. And the agency could be operating illegally.
Link to tweet
Politics
This grievance board for federal workers has one person left — and he’s about to leave
By Lisa Rein
February 12 at 12:22 PM
Mark Robbins soon will pack up his belongings from his sixth-floor corner office, ride the elevator to the lobby on M Street in downtown Washington for the last time, and leave behind 240 employees and a federal agency that could be leaderless.
His departure as acting chairman of the Merit Systems Protection Board, which serves as a personnel court for federal employees, raises an existential question: Can the board still live and function with no one at the top? The answer could determine whether thousands of federal workers will have their grievances heard.
Two of the board’s three seats have been vacant for the entire Trump administration. President Trump didn’t nominate a new board for more than a year — and then a Senate committee deadlocked last year on his picks. Now, the third seat could be empty, too, unless the Senate can confirm the same three people.
Experts say they’ve never heard of a similar case. At midnight on Feb. 28 — when a one-year extension of Robbins’s seven-year term expires — the board could enter uncertain legal territory. Justice Department attorneys have told Robbins that once he leaves, the office could be operating illegally.
....
Lisa Rein covers federal agencies and the management of government in the Trump adminstration. At The Washington Post, she has written about the federal workforce; state politics and government in Annapolis, and in Richmond; local government in Fairfax County, Va. and the redevelopment of Washington and its neighborhoods. Follow https://twitter.com/Reinlwapo
This grievance board for federal workers has one person left — and he’s about to leave
By Lisa Rein
February 12 at 12:22 PM
Mark Robbins soon will pack up his belongings from his sixth-floor corner office, ride the elevator to the lobby on M Street in downtown Washington for the last time, and leave behind 240 employees and a federal agency that could be leaderless.
His departure as acting chairman of the Merit Systems Protection Board, which serves as a personnel court for federal employees, raises an existential question: Can the board still live and function with no one at the top? The answer could determine whether thousands of federal workers will have their grievances heard.
Two of the board’s three seats have been vacant for the entire Trump administration. President Trump didn’t nominate a new board for more than a year — and then a Senate committee deadlocked last year on his picks. Now, the third seat could be empty, too, unless the Senate can confirm the same three people.
Experts say they’ve never heard of a similar case. At midnight on Feb. 28 — when a one-year extension of Robbins’s seven-year term expires — the board could enter uncertain legal territory. Justice Department attorneys have told Robbins that once he leaves, the office could be operating illegally.
....
Lisa Rein covers federal agencies and the management of government in the Trump adminstration. At The Washington Post, she has written about the federal workforce; state politics and government in Annapolis, and in Richmond; local government in Fairfax County, Va. and the redevelopment of Washington and its neighborhoods. Follow https://twitter.com/Reinlwapo
