Request for Decision Regarding Construction Pay Rates

A joint request was made to GAO to determine whether the Water and Power Resources Service's Grand Coulee Project Office may pay construction rates of pay, rather than operation and maintenance rates, to temporary blue collar employees in the occupations listed in the negotiated labor-management agreement. The record showed that the request was directed by the arbitrator's opinion and award in the matter of the arbitration between the Columbia Basin Trades Council and all of its constituent unions and the Grand Coulee Project Office. GAO held that, since the arbitrator ordered the union and management jointly to seek a decision from GAO on the legality of the disputed language in the labor-management agreement, it would consider the matter as a joint request of the parties and issue a decision thereon under its Procedures for Decisions on Apropriated Fund Expenditures Which Are of Mutual Concern to Agencies and Labor Organizations. Additionally, GAO agreed to confine its opinion to the question submitted as to the legality of the contract provision in question since it no longer has the authority to review arbitration awards. With regard to the question, the Water and Power Resources Service believes that the payment of construction rates is illegal. The Service's position is based on its view that these temporary employees are engaged in the maintenance, repair, and upkeep of the powerplant and related facilities and that the payment of construction rates to such employees is not a prevailing practice among the northwest utilities that make up the wage survey. The union's position is that the labor-management agreement requires payment of construction rates and that management had no authority to unilaterally terminate the payment of construction rates in violation of the agreement. GAO held that the negotiated labor-management agreement provision is protected by the savings provision in Public Law 392 which provides for the payment of construction rates of pay to specified temporary employees of the Grand Coulee Project Office. However, GAO held that, since the arbitrator has found that the payment of the construction rate of pay to temporary employees was not a prevailing practice in the area, and since the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 requires that agreement provisions protected by Public Law 392 be negotiated in accordance with prevailing rates and practices, the temporary employees may not continue to be paid at construction rates of pay.