STRENGTHENING WAGNER-PEYSER PROTECTIONS

WHEREAS, state employees provide valuable federally funded services to the American taxpayers; and

WHEREAS, many of the staff positions in said federally funded programs are protected by merit staff language found in the Wagner-Peyser Act of 1933; and

WHEREAS, AFT unions in the public sector workplace without collective bargaining depend on said federal protections for equal and fair treatment; and

WHEREAS, when the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) was legislatively eliminated and replaced by the Workforce Investment Act (WIA), merit staffing protections of public employees who provide these services were put at considerable risk:

RESOLVED, that the AFT actively work to enforce the Wagner-Peyser provisions that demand that merit employees provide public services; and

RESOLVED, that the AFT support federal legislation and regulations that ensure that the federal definition of merit protection is enforced throughout the United States at the state level.