EPA has laid out a staggered return-to-office plan for the agency’s staff and pulled back telework flexibilities, which could be challenged by its largest union.
On Wednesday, EPA employees received an email, seen by POLITICO’s E&E News, that said the agency determined staff should be “face-to-face” with their bosses, co-workers and the public “to the maximum extent possible.” In turn, most EPA employees will be expected back in the office in 12 days, with the last staffers filing in well into spring this year.
The agency’s push for in-person work is to meet President Donald Trump’s mandate he signed on his first day back in the White House. In addition, the return-to-office plan is seen as part of the administration’s overarching strategy to cull the federal workforce, believing staff would rather leave than go back to the worksite.
Under EPA’s in-person work plan, non-bargaining unit employees who telework will be in the office full time on Feb. 24, along with staffers represented by the National Treasury Employees Union, Engineers and Scientists of California, the National Association of Government Employees and the National Association of Independent Labor.
