Other Personnel Services (OPS)
Check the new WhoseFlorida for updates OPS workers are like State Temp workers - they do the same work as regular workers but get no benefits (retirement, paid holidays, health insurance).  Some people have been OPS for over 10 years.
 
Unfair and unwarranted dismissal

What about the part-time government(OPS) workers? What of one who was fired without warning and a damaging memo written (after the fact) that wrongly accused the person of things they didn't do. This affects the persons ability to get unemployment and find work. They've been told there's nothing they can do.
... mary, 4/30/03
 
I am hoping that there are other OPS people out there that have found this website.

There are thousands of OPS workers in this state in different divisions, and probably 90%, if not more, do not understand why we are being used the way we are with no hope of this program changing. Unless you get a career position, which is highly unlikely where I work, there is no hope for our future.

I have never seen such a turnover in employees in my entire life at any place of employment. As a state employee, you think at first how fortunate you are to even get a job with the state. Your thoughts are really crushed shortly after you get to know your co-workers and find out you are going nowhere, and they unload on you the way this system works. You see the turnover. This may not be the case in other divisions, but it is in mine. I don't believe there are any "happy" employees at my place of work. Those that choose to stay need the money and have this hope that things may change.

We are disposable. We can be replaced in a heartbeat. That's the problem with this entire OPS program. If we don't like it, get another job. Make waves, goodbye.

I didn't even get any real training at what I am doing until recently, after being there for over a year. Many of us didn't. We are doing a very important job for the state. Right away you know the state is really wasting our tax dollars. When you hire people and don't give them the proper training and have them go to work, not knowing what they are doing?  The ironic part of this is the tax dollars we pay, our spouses, family, friends, etc., pay our wages!!!

Does anyone even know why OPS workers don't fall under some Federal Labor Laws? Does anyone know what the OPS State laws are? 

UPS was fined because they had temporary employees working 40 hour weeks without giving them benefits, a few years ago. There is something very, very wrong
with this picture.

There have been so many other questionable issues arise within our own division. I would like to make a change in the system.  We need to stand together as a whole and fight this. We are human being, not robots. No pay raise, no paid holidays, no benefits, and above all no hope.

I'm hoping there are other OPS workers who have found this website, so we can band together and try to do something. Or a sympathetic state representative that can guide us in the right direction.
... OPS must be anonymous, 1/11/03
Tiny Tim revisited
Although Scrooge calls it, "picking a man's pocket every twenty-fifth of December,'' he does allow Bob Cratchit to take Christmas Day off with pay. That is more than state of Florida OPS workers get.
 
MyFlorida summary of SB 466 states:
"Requires agency heads to request and receive approval from the Governor's Office to retain Other Personal Services (OPS) employees who work beyond 1,040 hours within a 12-month period. Allows exceptions for emergency and time-limited grant situations."
I am an informed OPS employee who is genuinely concerned about the 100 hour limitation provision contained in the Service First bill currently before the Senate. Beside the fact that this bill is being ramrodded through  Congress it is worrisome to me that the legislature is incognizant of the fact that OPS positions are what make many programs possible in our current form of government. Or is the legislature’s intent to dismantle vitally important agencies such as the Fish and Wildlife Commission?


Both the current statutes regarding OPS employment and the Service First amendments to the current statutes are online and available for perusal. Maybe you should check them out. Currently, to go beyond the maximum allowable hours for OPS employment one must procure the approval of the agency chief. This is acceptable the way it is since
the agency chief generally knows what his or her agency needs in the way of manpower and hours. 

The new legislation creates a new hierarchy in that the agency chief is no longer the ultimate authority regarding maximum OPS hours. One must NOW go before the Governor's Office of Policy and Budget and show just cause. Wait, is that an extra step involved in this now? Isn’t that the exact opposite of what a Republican dominated congress should do? Don’t Republicans believe that the government who governs least governs best? And isn’t the mantra of the Republicans that local government knows better than a central government? Instead, here we have a blatant, in your face, in OUR face, power grab by the  Governorship.
Are we to believe that our Republican dominated congress is now in the business of consolidating power in Tallahassee? This seems to me to be more in line with the former presidential office holder. By making this into law the majority Republican congress will, in effect, reverse their entire belief system or how they think
government should work..  more from "am"

 

So, Service First will limit OPS employees to 100 hours per month. 100 hours per month... Let's look at FMRI for a second. We've got 400 or so people employed with FMRI. A very large proportion of these 400 is OPS just like me. 

We are the ones who gather the info. We are the ones who do the legwork. We are the ones who know the regions of our state like the back of our hands and can walk in an out, gathering sensitive information without so much as a blink from the locals. We are the unseen part of FMRI that does the HARD work for low pay, no benefits, and no credit. As it is now, the creation of FTE positions is really an impossibility. 

We OPS in FMRI understand this (we don't like it, but we understand). We understand that it takes roughly twice as much money to create an FTE position as it does an OPS position. We understand that it takes a mountain of political hoohaw to create an FTE position. So basically, the way that I understand Service First is that the House and the Governor are saying "You can't have new FTE positions AND you can't have full time OPS people." 

How is this supposed to work? How is this not going to devastate FMRI? Will Service First make it easier to create FTE positions? Will Service First provide MORE money for FMRI (doubtful) to create said positions?

These positions are needed! We aren't talking about 14 man crews of line painters on the interstate... We aren't talking about redundant positions that do nothing here... We are talking about every position with FMRI needing to be there, AND MORE! We have a huge mandate, to understand and educate about the condition of Florida's recreational fisheries, commercial fisheries, seagrass, harmful algal blooms, coral reefs, manatees, right whales, water quality and more! We don't have enough people as it is!! We don't have enough resources as it is!!

 

How is this supposed to work?

 

How can you look me in the eye and say this is good for the state of Florida?

..."am" 4/6/01

 

   (Top)  (Back)