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OUTSOURCING

Outsourcing is a word that we all will hear as long as the present Republican Government is in office. It is a BAD word!

The Department of Defense (DoD) was the first Federal Agency who has already used outsourcing in many areas with very drastic consequences.

Recently, you may have read about over 1 trillion dollars that could have been recovered from Access Property but did not happen according to the General Accounting Office (GAO) audit. Sophisticated military vehicles were sold for just a couple of dollars. Many high-end equipment costing thousands were sold for little or nothing.

What has this got to do with outsourcing? Outsourcing is substituting a model where lay persons who are NOT Federal employees do a job for a contract. These lay persons are not entitled to the benefits Federal Employees enjoy - such as retirement, standard workers compensation, quality training and so on.

The DoD has allowed thousands of Federal Workers to take Early Retirement and phased out thousands of others by other fair methods. The vacuum created has been outsourced to persons who are NOT Federal Workers and who deliver an inferior product. Under NO circumstances would the GAO find a 1 trillion-dollar deficit in collection of Access Property.

This is NOT to say that DoD and other Federal Agencies have not been audited before and found to be lacking in some areas. In some cases blatant over spending as in the famous case when thousands of dollars were used to buy a toilet seat. How ever by far and large there was some accountability.

The Department of Logistics within the DoD keeps inventory of trillions of dollars worth of supplies and equipment. Today, we have a method of keeping track of each and every single piece with sophisticated computer chips. However this demands training and state of the art equipment and tools - none of which outsourcing sources have the ability to do so.

This situation will be multiplied many times as thousands of Federal Workers are given Pink Slips mostly in the form of Early Retirement all over this Nation of ours. Most of the personnel, hard working ordinary Federal Workers committed to put bread and butter on the table.

Today, they are worried that they may lose their jobs and in these hard economic times left to fend in a sea of unemployment facing millions all over this Nation. The Republicans are in charge and the misery grows! .

Outsourcing brings with it an Inferior Product. In the National Park Service hundreds of NPS employees work long hours go out of their way to help tourists, provide a high quality service, often times making very little pay.

They do this because they love their jobs and they have one great benefit that they make a sacrifice for - the benefits like Retirement, Health, and friendship of their fellow workers committed to the Mission Objective of the NPS which is Protection and Preservation of our National Parks.

I have traveled all over this Nation and visited many National Parks. It is the ordinary Ranger, the Maintenance Worker, be she or he an Electrician, Gardener, Sanitary Engineer, Carpenter who are committed to the National Park and Service to those they come in contact with. OUTSOURCING will DESTROY all this.

I cannot frankly say that of the Mangers in the NPS. NPS managers tend to be all White and mostly belonging to a Club that needs drastic reform. One has just to review the pending Equal Employment Opportunity cases before the EEO and the Equal Opportunity Commission and the Merit System Board to fathom the reality of the matter at hand.

It is a shame that the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA) has not sided with the ordinary Federal Workers and sent the crooked Republican Government a strong message. The message should simply state that it does not agree to let go its Federal Workforce by substituting it with Outsourced Lay Persons who will find it hard to attain and maintain the Mission Objectives of the NPS.

At the GGNRA much long time lethargic and corrupt managers like Susan Hurst, Mai-Liis Bartling, Brian O'Neill, Leo Guillory could well deserve a Pink Slip. They have in all their years of service within the NPS system harmed many innocent NPS personnel. I remember Darlene Williams and Millie Bristow and could mention many more.

LIUNA 1140 the NPS Union has spoken but NOT loud enough for all of San Francisco and the extended Bay Area to hear. Here is San Francisco we can and should boycott the Republicans and send a strong signal to the Crooks in the White House who have wasted trillions of dollars trying to police the world.

Here at home millions do not have jobs. Millions do not have health insurance. Millions of our children will go to school and suffer from drastic budget cuts. Single mother cannot receive any help for programs like Day Care. The issues facing every day Americans are horrendous. Our National Parks need money for basic repairs and an understanding by those who know and work in them to provide quality service with a smile. Federal Workers have done just that and should be allowed to do so in the immediate and near future.

The filthy rich Republican could not care about the fate of the backbone workers of this country and among them high on the totem pole - many Federal workers who maintain our National Parks with integrity.

The newly formed Home Security Department should be revisited and salary of the majority of the newly formed Federal Workers capped to $50,000. The salary of those who head the various Departments within this newly formed organization to $60,000. Finally, the Public should be informed as to how much is it costing the Public to pay for this newly formed Federal Government Agency- which many Federal Workers feel do not warrant the numbers linked to the Quality Standard of Service delivered be they on the Home or International front.

The message to all Unions is very clear - time to kick out the Republicans get rid of all the newly formed Federal Departments formed during the last one year and six months. Starting September 2001.

The new future President of the United States, hopefully a WOMAN, having the deep interests of Federal Workers can then reorganize and restore the lost benefits of those Federal Workers who lost their jobs due to outsourcing - by off setting and giving Pink Slip to those newly formed Federal Organizations in the last one and half years, who are NOT delivering any Quality Service at Home and Abroad.

Outsourcing is the DEVIL a diabolic method to help certain Republican Businesses with links to people like Cheney and others like him - make trillions at the cost of the common tax payer.

See what is happening to Iraq? Days before the War ended - millions of dollars were outsourced to certain entities like BECHTEL that have close ties with the White House.

In any Democratic Setup there should be FAIR bidding. In fact the Federal Bidding Regulation knows as the FAR - mandates fair and equitable bidding for any contract.

It is very clear what the CROOKS have in mind. They want to privatize everything they can lay their hands on so that they can make money on the backs of every day POOR women and men who work hard for a living. The common Federal Workers work for a living. Their rights to work and earn should be protected at all costs.

This outsourcing must STOP!

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