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United States Department of Army, United States Army Garrison, Fort Mcclellan, Alabama (Activity) and American Federation of Government Employees (Petitioner/Labor Organization)

[ v57 p108 ]

57 FLRA No. 31

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF ARMY
UNITED STATES ARMY GARRISON
FORT MCCLELLAN, ALABAMA
(Activity)

and

AMERICAN FEDERATION OF
GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES
(Petitioner/Labor Organization)

AT-RP-00067

_____

ORDER DENYING APPLICATION FOR REVIEW

May 3, 2001

_____

Before the Authority: Dale Cabaniss, Chairman; Donald S. Wasserman and Carol Waller Pope, Members

      The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) filed an application for review of the Acting Regional Director's (RD's) Decision and Order dismissing certain of AFGE's election objections as untimely. The Agency filed an opposition to AFGE's application.

      The application is denied because AFGE has failed to demonstrate that review is warranted under 5 C.F.R. 2422.31(c), which provides that the Authority may grant an application for review when the application demonstrates that:

(3) There is a genuine issue over whether the Regional Director has:
(i)     Failed to apply established law;
(ii)     Committed a prejudicial procedural error;
(iii)     Committed a clear and prejudicial error concerning a substantial factual matter.

      AFGE claims that review is warranted on the ground that the RD erred in determining that AFGE's election objection dated October 13, 2000 was not timely filed under 5 C.F.R. § 2422.26(a). Contrary to AFGE's claim, the RD did not determine that this objection was untimely; the RD addressed and dismissed the objection on the merits. The Union further claims that its later submission of supporting evidence was timely filed. Contrary to AFGE's assertion, the RD did not find the submission of supporting evidence untimely; the RD [ v57 p109 ] considered that evidence in resolving the merits of the October 13 objection.

      The RD dismissed as untimely three additional objections to the election, which were raised by AFGE in conjunction with the supporting evidence that was received by the RD on October 20, 2000. [n1] To the extent that AFGE requests review of the RD's timeliness determination regarding the three additional objections, we find that the RD properly concluded that those objections were not timely filed. Specifically, under 5 C.F.R. § 2422.26(b), as the tally of ballots was personally served on October 12, 2000, any objections to the election must have been filed and received by the RD no later than October 19, 2000. As the three additional objections were received by the RD on October 20, 2000, the RD properly dismissed them as untimely[n2] 

      Accordingly, we conclude that AFGE has not demonstrated that there is a genuine issue warranting review. In view of this conclusion, we deny the application for review.



Footnote # 1 for 57 FLRA No. 31

   AFGE's three additional objections to the election are as follows: (1) that employees had been given monetary awards or time off awards prior to the election; (2) that an Agency representative sent an inaccurate e-mail regarding ballot procedures to employees; and (3) that three supervisory employees were permitted to vote.


Footnote # 2 for 57 FLRA No. 31

   We note, however, that the RD inadvertently miscalculated the due date for the filing and receipt of objections to the election as October 17, 2000. 5 C.F.R. § 2422.26(a) provides that "[o]bjections [to an election] must be filed and received by the Regional Director within five (5) days after the tally of ballots has been served." In computing the time period for filing objections, 5 C.F.R. § 2429.21(a) provides that "the day of the act, event, or default from or after which the designated period of time begins to run shall not be included." 5 C.F.R. § 2429.21(a) further provides that "[w]hen the period of time prescribed or allowed is 7 days or less, intermediate Saturdays, Sundays, and Federal legal holidays shall be excluded from the computations." Thus, the properly calculated due date is October 19, 2000.