Background
The largest settlement disclosed by the Board was for $755,000 to former Securities and Exchange Commission lawyer, Gary J. Aguirre, for his wrongful termination in 2005. The SEC settled Aguirre's claim on June 29, 2009. In January 2011, the Board ordered the US Park Police to reinstate their former Chief, Teresa Chambers, who had been fired in July 2004 for speaking to the Washington Post about the consequences of Park Police staff shortages. The Board also found her entitled to retroactive pay dating back to July 2004 and her legal costs.
Generally, appeals are heard by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. However, appeals involving claims of discrimination are heard in federal district court.
The Board carries out its statutory mission by:
- Adjudicating employee appeals of personnel actions over which the Board has jurisdiction, such as removals, suspensions, furloughs, and demotions
- Adjudicating appeals of administrative decisions affecting an individual's rights or benefits under the Civil Service Retirement System or the Federal Employees' Retirement System
- Adjudicating employee complaints filed under the Whistleblower Protection Act, the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, and the Veterans Employment Opportunities Act
- Adjudicating cases brought by the Special Counsel, principally complaints of prohibited personnel practices and Hatch Act violations;
- Adjudicating requests to review regulations of the Office of Personnel Management that are alleged to require or result in the commission of a prohibited personnel practice-or reviewing such regulations on the Board's own motion
- Ordering compliance with final Board orders where appropriate
- Conducting studies of the Federal civil service and other merit systems in the Executive Branch to determine whether they are free from prohibited personnel practices
Read more about this topic: United States Merit Systems Protection Board
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“Pilate with his question “What is truth?” is gladly trotted out these days as an advocate of Christ, so as to arouse the suspicion that everything known and knowable is an illusion and to erect the cross upon that gruesome background of the impossibility of knowledge.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“I had many problems in my conduct of the office being contrasted with President Kennedy’s conduct in the office, with my manner of dealing with things and his manner, with my accent and his accent, with my background and his background. He was a great public hero, and anything I did that someone didn’t approve of, they would always feel that President Kennedy wouldn’t have done that.”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)
“Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to our every chagrin, as welcome after satiety as after disappointment; that background which the painter may not daub, be he master or bungler, and which, however awkward a figure we may have made in the foreground, remains ever our inviolable asylum, where no indignity can assail, no personality can disturb us.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)