ISP Presentations -
As 20yr+ TCP-2 I don't really have a problem with the benefits side of this action. As a person who would like to contribute to the security and science of the country I am very disappointed that it is happening. I think that you can find many reasonable people who believe the transition to LLNS was one of the top 10 worst ideas ever; and that it did not require a crystal ball to see that the costs would increase dramatically.
As to the plans for the 10+ years 200's, I am not seeing the 'dignity and respect' part.
The 'Resource Center' where 4 months will be spent by the most senior people will not even be on site. No access to LITE or LAPIS and it wasn't made clear what use the new badges would be. Are these people to be denied the access to the site that even the driver of the rental car shuttle has? These presentations are not being broadcast or recorded - I have heard people speculate as to the reason for this - mostly along the 'what are they trying to hide?' line.
Finally, how does keeping these people around (at least in the genral area) cost less than giving the pay in lieu of notice. They will have to provide the facilty, staff the facility, pay all benefits (401K). If someone has an idea of the reason DOE/NNSA/LLNS decided to spend more money to do things this way, I would like to hear it.
8 comments:
"Finally, how does keeping these people around (at least in the genral area) cost less than giving the pay in lieu of notice"
A number of us were trying to figure that out ... as ArtW indicated in his talk, if you 'quit' or 'resign' during the notice window, you forgo any future pay, and receive only your servance (LLNS save $ from lack of pay-in-lieu) Perhaps the Detention Camp (disguised as "Resource Center") have intolerable working condition that forces you to resign ...???
Of course it doesn't cost less to keep these folks on payroll. In addition to all the costs for the transition center, they also continue to earn vacation during that time, so a 20+ year employee will get 120 days pay AND earn 8 days of vacation during that time, so the total cost is 128 days.
What I understand is that DOE wouldn't allow any pay-in-lieu greater than 30 days as an allowable cost in the contract. Whether this is because of some federal acquisition regulation, or some low-level DOE bureaucrat's power trip, I don't know. Could be yet another issue in the long line of DOE gripes/jealousies over the national labs' pay and benefits.
The end result is the "cooler." Talk about a miserable thing to suffer through.
They should have given these people their 120 day notice and their 120 days pay (TAX FREE) and let them collect their unemployment. Oh well, another blunder on NNSA's behalf. I think this is more of a good gesture on behalf of NNSA than it is punishment but I surely wouldn't want to be the one in the cooler for that 120 days. No matter what they do it will not save the rest of us from next years shortfall and 2000 more down the road.
LLNS doesn't give a hoot about savings. They get their $M's of dollars by making it appears as if there's a savings. What they've done so far is gut people, reduce our computers, taken away services and next will be outsourcing to jobs to a private contract, which all leads back to riffing more people who once had jobs. On paper it looks good but as George said in his talk to the WAC which can be heard on the side bar he openly admits to the WAC that the taxes put onto each employee are higher as they lay off people NOT cheaper. So where's the savings and how does laying off people reduce our cost to anyone who would give any though to having work done on site. The answer is, IT doesn't. So knowing this fact I'd say the goal of laying off people has anything do to with saving money or reducing the cost of doing business is bogus BS. It has everything to do with reducing the foot print of the labs which will continue until the work force is reduce to a minimum crew require to keep a few facilities open. Want to bet we'll be under 4,500 people by 2012. I'm going to wager on 2000 to 3000 people mostly all contract and term with only the 200 to be FTE's and that's only if NIF is a major player in the survival of LLNL. As it has been said before. NO NIF, NO LLNL. That's a fact you can live with.
DOE is doing what it does best, being dumb.
"...120 days pay AND earn 8 days of vacation..."
plus Four days sick leave, paid medical, dental and vision, 1.8% of salary in employer retirement contribution as well a 2% employee match for a fireee who selected TCP-2 or up to 0.75% increase in retirement pension for fireee in TCP-1.
More evidence DOE doesn't think.
How the he*k did Bodman run a Fidelity fund?
Think about this:
There will be some people who will be there for the entire 120 day period. That means sometime in the middle of September 2008. And some of those people have been EBA since the day LLNS took over on October 1, 2007, and have not been allowed to do anything productive during that time. That means almost an entire year doing nothing. (Except, of course, trying to find a new position in a rapidly shrinking environment.) I'm not trying to say those employees are the ones that have done anything wrong, just that, as was stated above, NNSA and LLNS don't really want to save money. They want to punish LLNL employees. For what reason, I cannot fathom.
It seems obvious that the reason DOE did not approve pay in lieu of notice was because that would make the involuntary separation package more attractive (which it is) than the voluntary (VSSOP) package. In order to not appear to be foolish, DOE is being foolish.
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