May 19, 2022
Last year, GEO employees at Robert A. Deyton Detention Facility in Lovejoy, Georgia ratified a collective bargaining agreement to establish the National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE) as their union representative. Over 70 new employees joined NFFE and have been enthusiastically conducting union business to improve their workplace. This involved working with their National Business Representative, Liz Pittaluga, to bargain a supplemental agreement with facility management.
The supplemental agreement included a four percent pay raise for all employees, including a $10 hourly wage increase for some of the nurses at the facility who were underpaid in relation to other nursing positions in the area. The local also successfully bargained to add Juneteenth as a holiday, bringing the total number of paid holidays for workers at the facility to 11.
Employees from the Deyton facility, along with other GEO workers from across the country, will be traveling to southern Maryland this summer to attend union training at the William W. Winpisinger Center. New local leaders will be trained by IAM and NFFE staff on understanding their rights under their collective bargaining agreement, as well as how to run effective local lodges.
“I look forward to working with all the new officers from Deyton,” said Liz Pittaluga, NFFE National Business Representative for the Southern Region. “Together, we will continue to build the local and provide the representation they deserve, in a workspace they look forward to going to every day.”
“I am proud to welcome every worker at Robert A. Deyton,” said NFFE National President Randy Erwin. “It is great to see that they have hit the ground running in standing up their local. With the help of NFFE leadership, they achieved a pay raise across the board. This is a testament to the effectiveness of unionizing with NFFE and proof that we fight for our members at the bargaining table. I look forward to working with Deyton to help them reach whatever goals they have next.”