
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, May 11, 1993                   TAG: 9305110176
SECTION: NATL/INTL                    PAGE: A-6   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: New York Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

FIRED AIR-TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS GET CRACK AT THEIR OLD JOBS

The Clinton administration has decided to invite air-traffic controllers dismissed in their 1981 strike to reapply for their former jobs, administration and congressional officials said Monday.

The controllers, barred from re-employment by President Ronald Reagan, would be allowed to seek reinstatement after the administration decides how many are needed, what criteria to use in their rehiring and what retraining they would require.

The plan to send the ousted controllers back to their jobs is being developed jointly by the departments of Labor and Transportation and the Office of Personnel Management. They hope to send their recommendations to President Clinton this week, the officials said. It is not known when he will act on them.

How many of the controllers would return and how quickly also was unclear. The National Air Traffic Controllers Association, which is affiliated with the AFL-CIO, estimates that 3,000 of the 11,400 controllers who were dismissed are interested in returning to work. But the Federal Aviation Administration contends there is no shortage of air-traffic controllers and plans to hire only 200 more this year.

The administration's action comes amid mounting pressure from Democrats in Congress who consider the ban on re-employment unjustly punitive. They believe that just as the ban became a defining moment for Reagan, showing that he could not be taken lightly when federal workers defied the government, rehiring the controllers would have symbolic weight for Clinton as well, signaling a more compassionate, pro-labor stance.

The rehiring of the former controllers also would be a victory for organized labor, for which the dismissals were the first sign of the hard times in the Reagan years.

Besides deciding how much retraining the former controllers would require, the agencies working on the plan to reinstate them are considering whether they would get their seniority back or have preference over other applicants. Back pay is not being considered.

The former controllers could be sent to relieve shortages at congested airports in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.

by CNB