Re:  LLNL, NIF, LANL  --    Some food for thought:

DOE ORDER 350.1c3 (2/23/2010) states at III.3 that:

a.       In compliance with Section 3161 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1993 and Secretarial policy, a work force restructuring plan at defense nuclear facilities and other DOE facilities shall be prepared whenever the DOE determines that a change in the work force is necessary. Plans may be developed for multiple years, but the requirement for a plan is triggered when the planned change affects 100 or more employees at a site within a 12-month period, or when the Head of the Field Element determines that a change in the work force ill significantly affect the community. In instances where fewer than 100 employees are affected, the objectives of section 3161 shall be applied as feasible.

b. Work force restructuring plans shall be prepared in accordance with “Interim Planning Guidance for Contractor Work Force Restructuring,” published in the Federal Register Vol. 61, No. 44, dated March 5, 1996, as amended from time to time (Attachment 2).

And the Interim Planning Guidance states the following:

B.  Stakeholder Input to Plans:   Consultation with local, state, and national stakeholders is an essential element of the work force restructuring process. Special attention should be given to consultation with the existing work force, their representatives, and local communities. Input should be solicited and considered at appropriate points throughout the development of plans for implementing work force restructuring. In order to facilitate participation by stakeholders, the Office has made this Final Planning Guidance available through the Federal Register and through electronic means.  

Anybody at LLNL, NIF or LANS seen the plan or been asked for input?????

LLNL SUIT:  EXCEPT FROM 3/12 Comment:
Hello everyone, I am the lead attorney representing 130 plaintiffs in an age discrimination case against LLNL. We have gathered 300,000 documents as well as formal depositions of top managers and reached the conclusion that the Laboratory had dishonestly claimed to be forced into layoffs by budget shortfalls. We will be publishing some of these findings and similar criticisms by experts familiar with budget and policy issues relating to nuclear weapons on our blog. You might find this information helpful to your situation. http://gwilliamlawfirm.com/. In the meantime, take a look at what the lead plaintiffs are saying about their wrongful terminations. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5xc2TGJkX0 on

V-day + 3; THE BEACHHEAD IS ESTABLISHED.

GROUNDS FOR COMMENTS:    If one reads through the articles on the Web site posted above by attorney Gary Gwilliam concerning the ongoing suit against LLNL, you will find the eleven causes of action in that case.  Since LLNS and LANS can be considered the same “actors” it is apparent that LANS has attempted to learn a lesson from the 2008 LLNL layoffs.

It would appear obvious that the VSP is structured to avoid the issues raised in the LLNL suit.  (Although the same ones may be faced in the event of an involuntary layoff at LANL).  As has been stated here before, the LANS attorneys appear to have done their homework, and that They feel VSP will avoid most of the issues raised in the LLNL suit. 

In discussing the legal issues of the LANL layoffs, most of us would agree that LANS can make an “offer” of severance pay to anyone they choose in the normal course of business.  Since there is no Laboratory Policy to cover a voluntary layoff or separation, LANS is apparently free to structure the program however they choose.  

However, in reviewing the eleven causes of action in the LLNL case, there would appear to be two causes of action that may remain.  That of Breach of Express or Implied Contract  and Breach of covenant of good faith and fair dealing.  Additionally, it is a well established matter of law that a public entity making an offer may not exclude consideration or acceptance of that offer by unfair discrimination or exclusion of any class of potential participants.  (e.g. housing law)  

Most of the affected employees posting to this blog feel that exclusion of certain job classifications is arbitrary and unfair, in that LANS had not made any case what-so-ever to justify the exclusions.  Additionally, many of these individuals feel the exclusion is unfair since they were transferred into their current “excluded” positions from similar positions in groups or divisions where their contemporaries, with similar training, education, and experience, are free to take the VSP.  

On the theory of  “if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is probably a duck,” we maintain that if something looks unfair, and feels unfair, than in most case a legal basis for that unfairness can be established.   We would therefore like to start off the listing of why exclusion of certain job categories without consideration of the impacts and disparities such exclusion may create on individual employees is a breach of the covenant of fair dealing. E.G.

1. The laboratory has made no case for why any of the excluded job categories should or need to be so excluded.  If They had made a case for exclusion of say Weapons Engineers due to national security issues, one might have granted Them the benefit of the doubt.  However, the Laboratory has stated in several places that it is at Their sole discretion to decide to whom to offer the VSP and to decide whom they wish to exclude.
2. However, in some cases, particularly that of system engineers, the Laboratory has made no great effort over the last several years to “staff up” in that area.  To the contrary, Their recent policies have contributed to a rapidly aging population in that classification.  Therefore, can they really show that excluding this classification, for example, is justified?
3. The laboratory has consistently favored recruitment of post docs and scientists in their recruiting efforts over other fields.   There has been an apparent lack of emphasis in recruiting engineering and other skilled technical support.  Again, can They justify exclusion of the system engineering career field, or any other field, based upon Their lack of due diligence to replace the existing members.
4. The laboratory has maintained a nearly complete hiring freeze over the last two years that has, in at least one documented case, prevented the hiring of replacement engineers to replace individuals planning on retiring.  Therefore their alleged “shortage” in this area is due to Their own actions, not those of the employees.
5. In the case of several system engineers, personnel were transferred into their current (excluded) positions by the Laboratory, ostensibly to “help the lab out” with their difficulties in filling the SE positions.  Now, due to actions by the Laboratory, and no fault or decision of their own, the same group of personnel is excluded from taking advantage of a significant inducement to retire.  Where is the fairness in that?
6. Again in the case of system engineers, there are many project engineers and design engineers (who are not excluded) who have been transferred into and out of system engineering positions.  This would tend to indicate that the skill set of system engineers is not all that special and that any experienced engineer could perform well in the position.  Again, where is the justification for excluding one Group of engineers by job description and not excluding engineers with similar degrees and training in other Groups when the skills are virtually interchangeable?
7. In most cases, managers from the affected job classifications were not excluded.  If the career field and the function are so important to the Laboratory, why is it willing to allow the managers in each field to retire?   This of course could present the Lab with the case of having to promote an excluded engineer or scientist into a position vacated by a retiring manager—that engineer would then be a manager who would have been allowed to take the VSP had he/she currently been a manager.   How does that make any sense?
8. If the Laboratory does have to move to involuntary layoffs, how will They justify to those who face the involuntary layoff that a significant number of employees who wished to take the VSP were excluded from accepting the offer? 

Additional comments and examples, particularly parallel examples from other job classifications would be greatly appreciated.

Guy

V Day + 0  THE BATTLE BEGINS

Deadline for volunteers to submit an application was 5:00 p.m. today. [Wed. 3/14] As soon as we hear any numbers for how many have submitted, we will post them here.

Quite a few of us Excludables must have been submitting applications, since when we attempted to submit ours, the clerk had to run and get her "verbage" to write on the bottom of the application why They were declining to accept the form.

Omaha Beach, D-day, 6 Jun 1944

If you feel you wish to pursue this matter, PLEASE submit your name and PII to the website's email so that we can get an accurate count of the number of folks affected.

The attorney who is representing the LLNL workers who were RIFed in 2008 has placed a post on our site.   We will attempt to contact him tomorrow about a further plan of action.

(As an afterthought, if any of you in the affected group are Vets, please let us know.)

GUY

LANL LAYOFFS 2012 --

THE NEW STORY --

What LANL is not telling you about the VOLUNTARY SEPARATION PROGRAM (VSP)

   

 FEELING EXCLUDED? 

• ON THE R.I.F. LIST BEFORE (1995?-2008?) ------BUT CAN'T GET ON IT NOW WHEN YOU WANT TO BE? 

• DO YOU WANT TO RETIRE BUT YOUR "FUNCTIONAL AREA" HAS BEEN IDENTIFIED AS "CRITICAL"? 

• HAVE YOU BEEN BEEN COMMITTED TO THE LABORATORY AND DOING A GOOD JOB FOR 10 OR 20 YEARS OR MORE AND NOW YOU'RE "EXCLUDED" BECAUSE YOU ARE "MISSION CRITICAL"? 

• YOUR MANAGER AND/OR YOUR SUBORDINATES CAN TAKE THE VSP, BUT YOU CAN'T? 

• DO YOU STAND TO BE DAMAGED TO THE TUNE OF $50K TO $100K? 

• DO YOU FEEL THAT WE ARE BEING RAILROADED BY THE LAB'S PUBLISHED SCHEDULE, WITH NO OPPORTUNITY TO SPEAK OUT ABOUT THE UNFAIRNESS OF THE PROGRAM?

Those of us on the "Excluded" list are potentially getting screwed.  However there is hope.  There may be actionable grounds against the Laboratory due to the fact that it has unilaterally and arbitrarily excluded certain classes of workers from being eligible for the VSP Offer. This may result in significant lost opportunity costs (damages) for many us. 

The selection of excluded "functional areas" was done solely in the interests of the Laboratory and the DOE without regard to the disparate impact it creates between similar members of the work force.  This would appear to be particularly true for older workers, who perhaps were not ready to retire at the time of the 2008 "self selection", but who now ARE ready to retire.  Because some of these employees are now on the "excluded" list, they now cannot now take advantage of the significant severance that is being offered by the Laboratory.  However, other like situated employees can do so.

Those of us who will be significantly impacted will most likely be loyal, long term employees of the Laboratory.  Most likely there will be no union representatives looking out for us.  Let's at least start a conversation to see how many of us are impacted in this way.  

The DOE has not had much luck with layoffs in the past and previously lost a law suit over the 1995  LANL Layoffs. They are currently involved in a suit in California over the 2008 LLNL Layoffs.  We most likely have actionable grounds on this issue.  What we need is a larger "class".

If you are in this position, please post here or send an email to lanllayoff2012@gmail.com. 

Guy Oldfahrt


Note:  Please keep comments positive and on point. This Blog WILL be edited to delete rude, spurious, and unhelpful comments.  The only purpose here is to investigate the possibility & probability of legal or other actions to assure the rights of those affected by the VSP or their exclusion from participation in it.  Extraneous and unprofessional comments concerning the DOE, NNSA, management, the weapons program, etc. will be edited.  Remember to only post from your own personal computer and email account.

Keyword trailer:  RIF, VSP, LANL, DOE, NNSA, Los Alamos, Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico, Voluntary Separation Program, functional area, layoff, layoffs, Reduction in force. 

To suggest a new topic or contribute a new post, use the comment button on this topic below to write your post and give it a title.  Once your post has been screened for content, it will be published.
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We are hereby proposing the following plan of action based upon advice received earlier:

1. Establish Grounds and Standing for legal action:  Each employee who is unhappy with being on the excluded list needs to do the following two tasks before the application closure date of March 14 

• Access the sample letter on this web site and prepare a personalized letter (Preferably hard copy or PDF) stating your reasons for requesting removal from the exception list.  This letter should be mailed to your Division Leader or AD.  Valid reasons might be:  That you are not a "systems engineer" or "Scientist 3" or any other such designation by training. Those designations were created by the Lab and we were assigned to them at the Labs discretion;   that you have worked for multiple lab organizations, some of which may not be excluded; Your skills are not that unique and replacements could easily be found if the Lab made appropriate effort, particularly in today's job market; while you may be assigned to an exempt organization or job category, you are not performing functions as a  "systems engineer" or "scientist 3" or whatever.  Keep all correspondence civil and professional.  Request a signed written response to your letter.
• Submitt your application for the VSP Program.  You will not be able to do this online since the online system will not accept Z numbers from us lepers.  You must download the form and submit it by fax per the following instruction:  

  Hardcopy application

  Employees may submit a hardcopy of their Voluntary Separation Program Application form as follows:
1. Submit a Voluntary Separation Program Application form (pdf) in person at the HR Front Desk, Otowi building, 2nd floor, north wing, or
2. Fax (505-606-5901) a Voluntary Separation Program Application form (pdf).

[Note: We have been advised that these two activities would be "official business" and that they can be done on Laboratory time and Laboratory Equipment.]


2.  Establish a more formal organizational structure for the "Class";  This would most likely mean:

•  "Organizing" a leadership team in the form of an advisory council or board of directors.
• Some kind of formal membership or sign up.
• Adopting a name and mission statement along with short term goals.
• Establishing a "war chest" for necessary actions be it websites, mailings, or legal action.
• Get an attorney on retainer.

3.  Change the Laboratory's current course of action by:

• Submitting appropriate requests as outlined above.
• Negotiation with Management
• Filing of a Legal Injunction to stay the action before the "Mandatory Separation" date of April 5, 2012

Comments or suggestions on this plan would be GREATLY APPRECIATED.

REMINDER:  If you plan on fighting your ineligible designation, please remember to submit a letter to your Division DO or AD, and to submit an application form to HR by fax or in person NLT March 14.  It might be smart to do this in person, and to include an endorsement at the bottom of a copy you keep which can be signed by the person to whom you submit the application.    Even though these applications will most likely be rejected, this needs to be done to show intent to accept and to establish grounds for further action.

Our legal adviser has also suggested that we submit a formal Laboratory Complaint Resolution action. We have looked at P-791, and it appears this policy would not apply to our situation since the VSP does not appear to be in violation of any existing policy--since there are none on this issue.  The VSP also does not fit the two other criteria in the policy, which are a complaint over any form of official discipline or over involuntary separation.  However, if any of you smart folks can figure out whether or not The VSP and its attendant rules violate any existing policies, than we should submit the grievances.  This can and should occur after denial of any application submitted.

GUY..

OUR LOGO:  You engineers that are reading this post probably recognize our logo as a group of High Strength Structural Steel Bolts.  We all know that using the right fastener is important in any engineering application.  In the case of the VSP, it appears that They have tried to use some cheap, Chinese made, wood screws in putting this plan together.  We, on the other hand, will form a properly patterned group of High Strength Members that will support the design load and then some.    Hard hat stickers available on request.

LOST SOME STEAM? 


Excerpt  from  "AnonymousMar 8, 2012 05:08 PMKudos to the person(s...": "Continuing the math:........ I, for one, would like to call them on it! If we're going to get 'organized' and do something, it's going to have to be SOON. After an encouraging start, this Blog seems to have lost some steam: I hope this is only temporary since this is such an important issue. "


GUY:  Lost some steam? Lost some Steam!  Hey at our age its hard enough to get up a head of steam in the first place.  Put if someone stokes the boiler enough we can get up quite a head of steam and get this old Locomotive moving pretty fast.  If F=MA, we might have quite a sizable force at the end of the line.  Lets hope we just don't burst one of these old seams along the way. 


PLEDGE DRIVE?


More emails with personal information are coming in directly and we are starting to get a feel for the size and inclinations of the group.   If you are reading this blog, and are at all interested in joining forces, please post here and/or send your PII directly to the email.    We will avoid  posting PII on the Blog to avoid anyone figuring out who is who.    By Sunday afternoon, we will post a statistical analysis of the participants (Age, yrs of service, Organization, etc.)
One of the Anons who has responded has suggested that we start a pledge drive for contributions to a legal "offense" fund.  No cash yet, just pledges.   Between those of us working on the site we, already have a pledge of $1000.00.   Please comment here with your general feelings about this concept.  Pledges can go direct to the email.