Greetings, Union sisters and brothers. On January 8, 2025, your UPE 005 and 008 bargaining teams met with DHA management regarding changes to the DHA telework policy, which UPE has been advocating for. The part of the policy that would change currently requires employees to be able to return to the office within 120 minutes if they are called in. The change would be that for events scheduled ahead of time, reasonable county time would be allowed for travel.
Management also agrees to add additional functions that would be eligible for telework: Eligibility Trainers, Service Center Clerical, and Service Center HSS (new requests).
In addition, management agrees to expand telework for Workforce Coordinators, Vocational Assessment Counselors, Child Care HSSs, WTW HSSs, Social Workers in HSP and Family Stabilization, HSQRS in QA/QC, and HSSs in Foster Care Eligibility.
The Union has proposed to add a new requirement that program managers would have a firm deadline for responding to employees’ telework requests so our members would not be kept waiting, as is too common now. Stay tuned for further updates.