Robert J Harrison

ROBERT J. HARRISON

Hello,IamRobertHarrison,runningforre-election asyour National Vice President of AFGE’s 9th District.

I come from a small local, starting as a member, being trained - progressing to becoming a steward, chief steward, executive vice president, and eventually running the local when the President left unexpectantly, then being re-elected for EVP of the local. Because of these experiences and the help and mentoring of other leaders and staff, I grew within AFGE, eventually being hired as a National Representative. It took years of work, demonstrated ability, and a track record of success working with DEFCON at the local and national levels before becoming a National Representative.

I have over seven (7) years of experience as a National Representative, have worked on issues within every agency in our district, and have knowledge that only comes with doing the work.

Since being elected National Vice President on December 11, 2021, I have focused on the mission of representing our members, building membership, mobilizing the membership, and leveraging our numbers for political mobilization to achieve our goals of protecting the rights of federal employees in the workplace and securing better pay, benefits, work conditions.

For a little over a year, I have had the honor of representing the members of the Notorious 9th and leading the best District Staff in the Federation as your National Vice President. During this period, I have either personally or through our District Staff answered your questions on challenging cases, give advice or assistance, and represented locals in presenting cases in arbitrations, Merit Service Protection Board hearings (MSPB), Office of Special Counsel (OSC) proceedings, and even in Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) hearings. Not only did we represent, but we also won, and we won big!

ROBERT J. HARRISON

Upon election, I put forth a Vison and set goals for our District, the key message being that the 9th District would not wait - we would be proactive in building resources within the District to support our locals’ missions of “representation, organizing, and collective bargaining.”

Building our infrastructure so the district would be better able to support its locals in just over a year under my leadership, we have:

• Set a clear path to improve the delivery of services to our locals by:

 Helping locals build and strengthen their internal infrastructure.

 Provided locals with direct access to support from the District Office

 Ensuring that locals have access to and are given support from national-level resources when necessary.

 Working with the AFGE National President and AFGE National Department Directors ensures that issues impacting our membership here in the 9th District are elevated and addressed

• Started Quarterly leaders calls where the District gives financial, membership, organizing, and legislative and political reports.

• Started issuing an electronic newsletter that goes to every member that highlights our activities as a District and features the successes of the locals in our District.

• Held District Presidents' meetings where your Local Presidents had the opportunity to meet in person and receive training from the AFGE National President, the AFGE National Secretary/Treasurer, the Chief Investigator for the Department of Labor covering our district, and various other AFGE Department Directors. (We will be expanding our Presidents meeting to include E-Board members from each local)

• Set a goal of growing our District by 2,200 new members, knowing this was ambitious. However, we needed a target. While we have yet to reach the goal of 2,200, we have grown by approximately 1,100 new members, bringing the District to over 18,000 members. This growth made us one of the fastest-growing Districts in the Federation!

• Redirected our organizing goals by pairing the National Organizers with our District National Representatives, ensuring targeted use of our limited district resources to grow our membership more effectively.

• Specifically targeted our DoD locals (which have the most significant potential for growth in our District) and TSA locals with National Organizers to work mainly with those locals to address the special needs of those unique bargaining units.

• We launched three (3) digital media pilot programs targeting remote and teleworking federal employees to help our district’s locals’ organizing efforts.

ROBERT J. HARRISON

• Being proactive - when faced with the possibility of the closure of two (2) VA hospitals in our District, I, along with AFGE 3rd District NVP, took the lead in opposing the AIR Commission using digital media and launching a broad-based campaign educating veterans, our members, and the general public on the dangers and potential negative impacts on our members, health care services to our veterans, but also the devastating effect it would have had on rural health care. We also partnered with Veterans Services Organizations. We did not wait: WE TOOK ACTION! Because of our efforts in combination with others, the AIR Commission was never impaneled. WE WON!

• Ensured we implemented a Legislative and Political plan that worked for us in the 9th District. I have ensured that we supported elected officials and candidates who supported us and our goals no matter what political party they belonged to.

• We took our political mobilization effort in a different direction by targeting the Congressmen and Senators from the States within our District and the specific committees that cover issues that impact our locals and members.

• Created and launched the first and only “ District Certified Instructor Program.”

• Created the “WE WORK FOR AMERICA” branding adopted by AFGE National and aired on the nationally syndicated radio broadcast.

• Under my leadership, the Notorious Ninth has led AFGE by being the first and only District to use digital media to take our message directly to Congress by specifically targeting not only our Congressional Delegations but by targeting every Congressional office in Washington D.C.

My focus has been supporting Locals and our members by providing support and resources. We have accomplished a lot in over a year but still have work to do.

Upon my re-election, we will maintain our gains by continually moving forward and focusing on the following:

 Training

 Representational Skill Sustainment

 Organizing

 Political and Legislative activities

 Use of social media and Digital

 Media OWCP support for our Locals

 Focusing on the Future of Federal sector work

ROBERT J. HARRISON

I have a lifetime record of service, from honorably serving in our country’s military to serving my community as a police officer. More importantly, I have a proven history of success working for and with the locals and members of the 9th District as a National Representative and as your National Vice President.

We have a great District with formidable locals, excellent local leaders, and the BEST District Staff in the Federation.

We are the “Notorious 9th” respected and envied for our training, activism, and superior representation.

With that vision and an eye on preparing for future fights, I ask for your vote and support for my re-election as your 9th District National Vice President.

My focus will continue to be:

YOU Train and mentor individual members, stewards, local leaders, and activists.

US B ringing all our district’s activists, local leaders, and members together as one UNION.

WE Are Focusing our efforts on working together for our common goals together. ONE

Robert J. Harrison National Vice-President