Except as provided herein, the provisions of this Partnership Agreement shall not be unilaterally amended or suspended except as permitted or required by law, regulation or the applicable term agreement between SSA/OHA and NTEU Chapter 224.

The Senior Attorney Program will be extended until the HPI roll out is completed and NTEU has at least 195 new permanent Senior Attorney Adviser positions.

The parties, in partnership, will have ongoing open communication and sharing of information, regarding the HPI consistent with the purpose and objectives of the OHA/NTEU Partnership Agreement. A special forum will be established to address and resolve issues and problems.

Prior to the next phase of the rollout of HPI, management and NTEU will meet to discuss the status of HPI and to discuss possible improvements in the process.

The GS-905 9/11/12 attorney position in the NTEU bargaining units will be called Attorney Adviser rather than Attorney Analyst.

Management intends to fill all bargaining unit positions and the GS-905 supervisors’ ability to perform Senior Attorney Adviser duties will not adversely impact on this.

Management intends to use the Processing Group Supervisor (PGS) as the successor position for the Supervisory Attorney Advisers. The Parties encourage all qualified applicants to compete for the GS 905 GS- 13/14 Hearing Office Director positions.

The parties agree that the hiring and retention of attorneys who are licensed to practice and are in good standing with the Bar of the jurisdiction(s) in which they are licensed provides a benefit to the SSA/OHA and the public. Additionally this is an important element of the conditions of employment of the GS-905 9/11/12 and GS-905-13 positions.

The SSA will not require any professional employee to take (or not take) any action as determined by any state bar that places his/her license in jeopardy, and no professional employee will be required to resign his/her position in order to retain his/her good standing.

Consistent with the efficient and effective use of resources, direct supervision, including the appraisal, of the legal aspects of the attorney’s work and work product shall be by an attorney.

The non-attorney supervisor is precluded from passing judgment on the adequacy of the employee’s legal skills.

Section 3.01

The Office of Human Resources will provide advisory services in the review of the allocation ceiling for increases, when justified, prior to the implementation of Phase II, and prior to the implementation of Phase III.

Section 4.01 Hearing Office Director (1 per hearing office)

There are both GS-905 and GS-950 series Hearing Office Director.

Section 4.02 GS-13 Senior Attorney Advisers (at least 195 Positions)

The GS-905 Series position descriptions will be amended as agreed by the Parties. Management agrees to strictly adhere to the provisions of Article 6 of the OHA/NTEU Term Agreement.

GS-13 Senior Attorney Advisers positions will be filled through NTEU/OHA Term Agreement Article 35, Merit Promotion.

To be eligible for selection as a Senior Attorney Adviser, an Attorney Adviser must meet the following requirements:

Those Attorney Advisers who do not currently meet the requirements will become eligible to compete for the Senior Attorney Adviser position when they complete the requirements above.

If an individual who has been performing duties other than those enumerated in his/her position description for more than 50% of his/her duty time (excluding overtime) during the past 12 months and who can reasonably be expected to continue such duties in the foreseeable future is selected as a Senior Attorney Adviser, that individual’s duty station shall receive an additional Senior Attorney Adviser allotment. No office shall receive more than 2 such additional allotments.

The Partnership will establish a four member workgroup to develop assessment criteria for approval by the Co-Chairs.

It is the intent of Management and the Union that no bargaining unit member be improperly affected by the non-merit selection or non-selection for the position of Senior Attorney for any part of that program after June 30, 1998 or any permanent position. For example, the quality of an applicant’s work will not be discounted because it was performed at a GS-12 rather than a GS-13 level.

Senior Attorney Advisers and Attorney Advisers who wish to commence or continue to engage in the outside practice of law may do so in conformity with the provisions of Article 53 of the Term Agreement.

Section 4.03 Processing Group Supervisor (PGS) GS-13 position (at least 195 Positions)

There are both GS-905 and GS-950 series Processing Group Supervisors.

Management will post vacancy announcements for each office.

Processing Group Supervisors who are attorneys will be able to perform Senior Attorney Adviser duties as appropriate.

Section 4.04 – Attorney Adviser GS 9/11/12

The GS-905 Series position descriptions will be amended as agreed by the Parties. Management agrees to strictly adhere to the provisions of Article 6 of the OHA/NTEU Term Agreement.

All incumbent Attorney Advisers will be reassigned to this position.

Management will follow Merit Promotion Article of the NTEU Agreement.

Senior Attorney Advisers and Attorney Advisers who wish to commence or continue to engage in the outside practice of law may do so in conformity with the provisions of Article 53 of the Term Agreement.

Section 4.05 – Paralegal Analyst GS 9/11/12

All permanent incumbent Paralegal Specialists will be reassigned to this position.

Management will follow Merit Promotion Article of the appropriate NTEU Agreement.

NTEU agrees that NTEU 224 Merit Promotion Article applies to all NTEU-represented employees in OHA. The Co-chairs will develop the Assessment criteria.

During the roll out of the HPI, all positions will be announced and filled at the GS-9 level in accordance with the appropriate NTEU contract.

Section 4.06 – Lead Case Technician GS-9 position

At least one (1) Lead Case Technician per Processing Group.

NTEU agrees that the NTEU Merit Promotion Article applies to all NTEU-represented employees in OHA. The Co-chairs will develop Assessment Criteria

Positions will be announced and filled in accordance with the appropriate NTEU contract.

Management agrees not to reassign any GS-10 supervisor to the Lead Case Technician position. The supervisor position will be a Red Line Job for incumbents.

Section 4.07 – Senior Case Technician GS-6/7/8

All incumbent Legal Assistants will be reassigned to this position.

This position does not require any typing.

NTEU agrees that the NTEU Merit Promotion Article applies to all NTEU-represented employees in OHA. The Co-chairs will develop the assessment criteria.

The parties agree that this new position will provide qualifying experience for the Paralegal Analyst position.

Section 4.08 – Case Technician GS-4/5/6

All incumbent HOCs and MDCs will be reassigned to this position.

Employees will be eligible for typing pay.

NTEU agrees that the NTEU Merit Promotion Article applies to all NTEU-represented employees in OHA. Co-Chairs will develop Assessment Criteria.

Section 4.09 – Regional PD’s GS-1 through GS-7

Management will keep PDs open, employees will continue to perform their PDs and the positions will be red-line jobs.

It is not Management’s intent to have any new regional position descriptions and all existing Regional position descriptions will be Red Line Jobs.

Section 4.10

The parties agree that the grade controlling duties and responsibilities between the Senior Case Technician and Case Technician will be identified.

The Parties agree that the Employer will not introduce a "team" environment or any performance evaluation plan in which performance by any person other than that individual being evaluated is a feature without re-opening the Term Agreement and negotiating an appropriate contract article.

Assignment to groups will be in a fair and equitable manner and will be revisited through partnership prior to implementation of Phase II.

The new hearing process is not a teamwork environment by definition because there are no team leaders and each process unit will have a supervisor.

There are no group evaluations or input on evaluations of other employees. Individuals will be evaluated on their individual work product without regard to the success level of other people in that same group.

Lead Case Technicians and ALJs will not provide any input for performance evaluations. Bargaining unit members will not have input into the evaluation of other bargaining unit members.

For the purposes of determining the Step 1, 2, and 3 management officials for all employee grievances filed under the negotiated grievance procedure, the provisions of Article 45, Section 5 of the NTEU/OHA Term Agreement continue to apply with the successor position of the Group Processing Supervisor or Hearing Office Director, as appropriate, being substituted for the Supervisory Staff Attorney.

Section 7.01 – Management will follow Article 14 of the Contract regarding details and temporary assignments

Section 7.02 – The Union will be notified appropriately, and in advance, and afforded an opportunity to be present and participate in any formal discussion scheduled by management with any bargaining unit participants in this plan. Participation may be through teleconference, videoconference, IVT or in person.

Section 7.03 – A copy of each vacancy announcement for HPI offices and information regarding the selectees (i.e. Name, former grade, position and work location as well as new position and grade) will be sent timely to the President, NTEU Chapter 224.

Section 8.01 – Training issues will be referred to the Union/Management Workgroup established pursuant to Section 8.05 of this Agreement.

Section 8.02 – Work will be distributed in a fair and equitable manner. Management has determined that performance will not be predicated on global (non-specific to the actual individual work product) numeric standard. Through the appropriate partnership mechanism, the parties will strive to create a process to provide an adequate opportunity for career advancement involving both the SSA and Medicare workloads.

Section 8.03 – The right of employees, who currently are entitled to work at a Flexiplace work site pursuant to Article 57 of the NTEU/OHA Term Agreement, shall not be altered by HPI. Those employees not currently eligible to participate in Flexiplace must complete two (2) years of service as an Attorney Adviser in the bargaining unit beginning on or after October 1, 1997 in order to become eligible unless an exception is granted under Section 2 (B) (3) of Article 57 or its successor.

Section 8.04 – If any Agency statement, rule or policy (including HALLEX instructions) is inconsistent with this Agreement, this Agreement will take precedence and control except as provided in Article 59 of the OHA/NTEU contract.

Section 8.05 – Union/Management Workgroup will be chartered under the sponsorship of the OHA/NTEU Partnership to address the use of numbers, benchmarks, processing times and related data in measuring workloads, work process and individual/group performance under Phase I.

It is understood that the Agency will not use numbers, processing time, Benchmarks and/or measurement indicators to evaluate an individual’s performance except as provided for in Article 37 Section 8 of the Contract.

Section 8.06 – Management has determined that: The Union may develop and distribute information to its members to help them participate more effectively in this program. After OHA’s migration to Microsoft Word from WordPerfect 5.0, local hearing office employees, including Senior Attorneys, will no longer be able to write local macros. The tools available within the flexible system developed by the Office Systems will enable Senior Attorneys to modify their decisions as they may deem appropriate. Management has determined the need for a national system for writing decisions, rather than the numerous macros that currently exist in WordPerfect 5.0. In addition, any type of document that imports data from the Hearing Office Tracking System (HOTS) must be developed by the Office of Systems. Locally developed systems that extract data from HOTS constitute a security violation.

Management will provide the Union with the e-mail addresses of the GS-13 Senior Attorneys from the bargaining unit and information may be distributed in this manner for this purpose only, in order to aid in the effective dissemination of information. This provision does not limit the use of e-mail by the Union as set forth in the appropriate NTEU/OHA term agreement.

Section 8.07 – Both parties retain their statutory and contractual rights. The Union’s right for bargaining has not been waived for such matters as security, space allocations/considerations, seating, furniture, etc. related to each HPI office. The issue of space, furniture and equipment for new paralegal analysts will be negotiated at the office level. Issues dealing with office moves, expansions, changing the physical layout of the office will be handled in accordance with the OHA/NTEU Term Agreement.

Section 8.08 – The Agency will provide appropriate notice to the Union to the extent required by law.

Section 8.09 – The Union has not waived any of its bargaining rights or bargained on any issues which are not specifically addressed in this Agreement, such as space allocation/considerations, seating or furniture for each hearing office. It is further understood that these issues were not addressed in this agreement and the Union has not waived any of its rights to do so.

Section 8.10 – The provisions of the Agreement of July 13, 1993 between the parties involving the use of personal computers by bargaining unit employees remains in effect.