On February 27, 2025, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issued a memorandum requiring agencies to compile and report information regarding union official time usage and other issues at each agency.
Under the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute, 5 U.S.C. § 7131, federal employees who are union officers or stewards are authorized to receive “official time” (a form of paid time) to participate in negotiation of collective bargaining agreements with their agencies. The same statute also permits unions to collectively bargain with agencies for additional amounts of official time to be allotted for other union representational activities (which can include official time for representing employees in grievances, Weingarten interviews or the like). However, any time spent on the internal management of the union is not eligible for official time and has to occur when the union officers are in non-duty status.
The new OPM memorandum requires agencies to compile and report data on how much official time was used and for which purposes in FY 2024. The information is to be compiled not only as aggregate data (including reporting the size of each bargaining unit, to permit calculation of per-bargaining-unit-member expenditure), but also breaking out information employee-by-employee who received official time (including the job title, position description and salary of each employee receiving official time). Agencies were also required to report any permitted union use of agency property or facilities, and whether the union had provided any reimbursement for such use. Agencies were also required to report how much telework or remote work each union representative receiving official time was authorized to perform. Agencies were further required to report if the expenses or amount of official time had increased between FY 2023 and FY 2024, and if so why. These reporting requirements have similarities to previous reporting requirements which were imposed in the first Trump Administration under E.O. 13837 (May 25, 2018), Sections 6-7, which had been rescinded by E.O. 14003 (January 22. 2021). Following on the present Administration’s rescission of E.O. 14003, OPM in a February, 7, 2025 memorandum directed agencies to begin reinstatement of Trump Administration policies rescinded by E.O. 14003, although OPM did clarify that “The revocation of Executive Order 14003 order does not immediately reinstate those orders” rescinded by E.O. 14003. Notably, some aspects of the information reporting (for example, the requirement to provide information about union representatives’ telework or remote work) are new and were not part of the reporting required in 2018-2021.
If you are a federal employee or federal sector union and wish to seek advice concerning your rights in relation to this new policy, consider contacting Gilbert Employment Law to request an initial consultation.