What We Do-We Represent Federal Bues with Respect to Contract Grievances, Changes in Working Conditions, Discrimination EEO Complaints, Lobbying, Unfair Labor Practices, Agency committees within organization, Collective Bargaining, Arbitration actions, Mediation actions, Alternate Dispute Resolution, Representing Union members in disability, fmla, workman’s comp, reasonable accommodation as the exclusive representative  

Mission Statement-Our mission is to Represent, Improve work conditions for, and Educate BUEs so that WE can have the highest quality of life. 

Who We Represent-We Represent Over 1500 DA Civilian Bargaining Unit Employees in El Paso, Texas

HISTORY OF UNION-1911 TRIANGLE FIRE                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

   The employees working in the factory were mostly immigrants, men and women who traveled to the United States looking for a better life for themselves and their families. They heard that despite the huge gap between the wealthy and the poor in cities like New York, the United States was a country where they could make good money. They believed it was a place in which they could pull themselves up by their bootstraps and make a life for themselves. Those workers clocked into work as early as 7 AM and stayed until 8 PM, with no weekends and no health care. They started their careers as early as 15 years old – much older than the workers at many other factories, where children as young as 5 clocked in every morning. They earned only $6 a week, and had to buy their own supplies to complete their work. They worked in cramped and unsafe quarters with little to no regulation or oversight. And most of the workers had no union or representation to stand up for their rights. The Triangle Factory Fire was an unspeakable tragedy, but something good did come out of it. After the fire, the Ladies Garment Workers Union (LGWU) led a protest for higher wages, shorter hours and extra pay for overtime. They called for better safety conditions, like sprinkler systems in the factories and adequate fire escapes. And despite the protests of business and the imprisonment of many of the strikers, the unions won. These protests, followed by hundreds of others, led to the 40-hour work week, the sick leave, the health benefits, the safety precautions and the child labor laws that we know and love today.

A brief history of our American Federation of Government Employees

Born in the depths of the Great Depression, AFGE formed in 1932 at one of the most uncertain periods in our nation’s history. AFGE Local 2516 was chartered in 1965.  Elected officials had crippled the civil service, wage cuts and furloughs were on the rise, and promotions and leave privileges were hard to come by. Back then, federal employees lacked many of the basic rights they enjoy today; like health insurance, overtime pay, and weekends without work. Over the next two decades, new chapters began to pop up across the country, bringing with it greater leverage to represent their members. In 1945, after years of pay freezes, AFGE secured a near-16 percent pay increase with the passage of the Federal Pay Act – the largest single pay increase before or since. In the 1950s, AFGE fought for and won the introduction of within-grade pay increases, transportation allowances for transferred workers, and payment for accrued annual leave, overtime, and night and holiday work. But even up to the 1960s, AFGE didn’t have true bargaining rights. After years of work, President Kennedy in 1962 proclaimed that “the right of Federal employees to deal collectively with the Federal departments and agencies in which they are employed should be protected” in Executive Order 10988, which established for the first time the right of federal employees to exercise their voice in the workplace. In the half-century since winning real bargaining rights, AFGE has extended the dignity of a union contract to more than 700,000 government employees in thousands of federal and DC government facilities across the country. Today, AFGE stands as one of the largest and most influential forces for worker, civil, and human rights in the world. Our union began with a simple belief—that together, government employees from all across America can build a better workplace and country. AFGE’s story is America’s story, and the next chapter will be written by all of us.