Union Labor Day Greeting to NASA Ames Employees

September 7, 2009

Dear Ames Federal Employee:
 
As America takes time today to honor hard working Americans across the nation, let me wish you and your family a very happy Labor Day.
 
But as we celebrate the holiday and enjoy the well-deserved time off with our friends and families, let us commemorate those workers who sacrificed so much for the many rights that working Americans enjoy today. In particular, we cannot forget the critical role that Labor Unions played in creating the American middle class and in preserving our treasured way of life. Weekends, the 8-hr workday and 40-hr workweek standards, sick leave, vacation time, child-labor laws, employer provided health care and pensions, social security, medicare, the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, the family and medical leave act, and many other things that we now take for granted, were all hard fought battles with Labor Unions leading the charge. One need not be left wing, nor pro-labor to acknowledge these truths and to remember today to recognize those who came before us and made our way of life possible by forging the laws that reflect our American pro-family
values.
 
For NASA employees, we continue to struggle against those who malign all federal workers, disparage the federal government, and in particular call for the dismantling of NASA’s core federal capabilities. Your Union however is cautiously optimistic that the tide is slowly turning and that NASA and its workforce will prevail against these external political and pecuniary interests. We are working diligently in Washington D.C. with Congress and the new Administration so that NASA may be provided with the resources needed to reach our full potential and to deliver on all our critical promises to the nation.
 
Although there are many tens of thousands of people who are paid by NASA, there are only 18,000 human beings on this planet who have been accorded the honor and privilege to say they work for NASA. As we have recently witnessed, administrators and other political appointees come and go, but we, NASA’s federal workforce, remain the keepers of the flame and the guardians of the dream. IFPTE is extremely proud to represent more of these talented and dedicated employees than any other Union. IFPTE will continue in the year ahead to do its very best to help NASA become an even better Agency and place to work, and to provide a more secure future for you and your family.
 
Sincerely,
 
–Lee Stone
President
Ames Federal Employees Union
IFPTE local 30, AFL-CIO