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More than 13,400 Bay Area Department of Energy laboratory workers — including 1,500 at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory — could miss out on back pay if the federal shutdown continues.
The workers are contractors for the government, not full-time employees, and they’re still working, despite the federal shutdown. But if deadlock in Congress continues, they may be furloughed without the ability to collect back pay, according to U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo.
Eshoo and a contingent of Bay Area representatives, including Reps. Eric Swalwell, Barbara Lee, and Zoe Lofgren are urging DOE Secretary Ernest Moniz to work with the White House to allow the national laboratories to provide the back pay once the federal government reopens.
The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed the Federal Employee Retroactive Pay Fairness Act, H.R. 3223, by a vote of 407-0. The bill compensates all federal employees who would not otherwise receive their full salaries due to the shutdown, but lab employees will not be compensated because they are not federal employees, Eshoo stated.
Swalwell represents Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories in Livermore. If the government shutdown continues, 7,500 government contractors at these labs will be furloughed without pay beginning October 18. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is located in Lee’s congressional district, and Lofgren has been a longtime supporter of national laboratories and fusion research conducted at the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore.
“They are our nation’s premier scientists and engineers who daily are engaged in cutting-edge research that is changing the world. To add insult to injury these employees are not entitled to back pay if they’re furloughed because they are employees of an operator of a federal facility, not the federal government.
“I urge Secretary Moniz to authorize Department of Energy funds for furloughed national lab employees to ensure that our nation’s brightest receive their pay, and that labs like SLAC can continue to recruit and retain the best minds in the world,” Eshoo stated.
In the past, the Department of Energy has treated lab employees the same as their federal counterparts. When Secretary Steven Chu instituted a DOE-wide pay freeze, lab employees were included along with federal workers, the representatives noted.
“Lab employees have expressed their concerns about the uncertainty they face and the economic hardship which would be caused by furloughs. Their mortgage payments, car payments, and other monthly bills will continue even though they will not be receiving a paycheck. Putting lab employees through this economic difficulty is neither right nor necessary,” the representatives stated in their letter.
Many others are also affected. SGI, in Fremont, issued a press release yesterday stating that the Company will miss its reveneu projections because federal orders have stopped coming in as of the shutdown. Lockheed Martin has made similar statements. Many government contractors and subcontractors will be forced to furlough employees. I am a lifelong Republican but am ashamed of what Republicans are doing in congress.
I am a furloughed federal worker, and of course I am upset at being told not to go to work. I am even more upset at the thought of paying people for not working! How can the fiscal conservatives, who are constantly running on about eliminating waste, justify voting for this? I do not deserve to be paid, and I will not accept any pay for the duration of the furlough.
Like Konrad M. Sosnow, “I am a lifelong Republican but am ashamed of what Republicans are doing in congress.”
Richard, a furlough is not like being laid off. Of course, you should not be paid if you have been laid off. But, as a former Civil Servant who accepted back pay each time I was furloughed, I look on that back pay as akin to being paid for administrative leave–for example, when I got a day or half-day off on December 24. I hope you will reconsider and accept your back pay.
The “fiscal conservatives, who are constantly running on about eliminating waste,” are, in my mind, the epitome of hypocrisy. The are perfectly content to spend big government bucks on things I consider wasteful, while complaining about money spent on things I consider essential.
Doug, it’s not that simple. I am working on a project that has a fixed budget. If everyone on the project takes pay for doing no work, then we will run out of money before we are able to complete the project. We would be sacrificing our success to line our own pockets, a very short-sighted approach. Our funding agency will understand if we are behind schedule due to the furloughs, but if we squander the money on non-productive expenses we will not get any more money from them (and rightfully so).