ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, December 30, 1995 TAG: 9601020047
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE STAFF WRITER
SOME WORKERS got checks for less than $10. Many rallied to protest government gridlock.
Representatives Bob Goodlatte, Rick Boucher and other members of Congress can expect to get their full $11,133 monthly paycheck on time, and even got to take a few days off to enjoy the holidays at home.
Beverly Warren got a check for $56.76 Friday, even though she worked full time the past two weeks.
While Republicans hold up a bill that would pay the federal work force while they negotiate a budget deal with President Clinton, local government employees want to know what happened to their contract with America - the one where they get paid every two weeks.
"We didn't have presents this year," said Warren, a nursing assistant at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Salem. "We didn't even have a tree. We're going to save that money."
The single mother of three is one of more than 3,000 federal employees who work in the Roanoke Valley. Those people - whether or not they were required to stay on the job after the government shut down Dec. 16 - did not get paid beyond that date.
About 100 VA employees rallied in front of the medical center Friday, their payday. The American Federation of Government Employees, which represents about 1,200 people at the medical center, wanted to show its anger that Congress recessed for the holidays without passing a bill to pay federal workers. Protesters also wanted to let creditors know their bills may not get paid on time next month.
The protest lasted only 30 minutes - the length of the lunch breaks they were giving up. Most of those who stood at the front entrance on Roanoke Boulevard held signs berating Congress and its decision not to appropriate money to pay government workers while the budget battle drags on.
The Senate has unanimously approved legislation three times to stop paychecks for members of Congress and the president during a full or partial government shutdown. But House Republican leaders have refused to allow a vote on the matter.
"Millions of people compromise in relationships, in marriages, every day in order to have successful relationships," said Tracy Turner, who works on a cancer ward at the medical center. "We'd like to see the Democrats and Republicans work better together."
Turner figures he can last one pay period without getting a check before having problems with his budget. "I don't think Congress is aware of the little people and how much this affects them," Turner said. "These people don't have stock portfolios, summer homes in resort towns or PACs handing them money."
The lowest-paid employee at the medical center, a nursing assistant, got a check for 15 cents Friday. Even though employees got paid only for five days in the Dec. 10-23 pay period, their normal deductions still were withheld. Twenty employees there got checks for less than $10.
While the deductions mean their health insurance benefits are paid up, government employees cannot take paid sick leave during the shutdown. They can't take paid vacation time, either, even if they'd made plans long before the budget crisis.
At the VA, the administration is stretching the rules a bit: those who get sick or were scheduled for vacation are being counted as furloughed. Workers deemed nonessential and sent home on furlough still have hope that Congress will pay them when the government reopens. Those who are working through the shutdown won't have to count on the generosity of Congress; they'll be paid - eventually.
VA workers say patient care has not suffered - just morale.
M.K. Johnson, a clinical psychologist, said she was frustrated because of the attitude some people hold about federal workers. If all the doctors or mail carriers had been sent home, "this would have been resolved a week and a half ago."
As a single person, getting less than half her normal paycheck is "real scary," said Elizabeth Nichols, a vocational rehabilitation specialist.
"I don't think private industry or the public realizes the kinds of impact the loss of federal salaries, even for a few weeks, will have on their businesses," said Alma Lee, president of the federal employee union's local chapter.
As of 1992, the federal government provided about 14 percent of state residents' total personal income, or about $25 billion per year. In areas such as Roanoke where there are few military jobs, the share of income from federal employment was closer to 8 percent. No more current information was available.
VA workers are hoping creditors will give them a break when the mortgage and car loan payments are late next month. The VA's credit union is offering workers 30-day loans against their paychecks at 6 percent interest, but the workers' union said they were working on getting no-interest loans.
Mortgage broker Dickson Watts warned that financial institutions are required to collect residential mortgage payments on time and often are powerless to extend the payment deadline.
"There is not a lot of room for them to forgo when the payments are due," said Watts, president of Phoenix Financial Corp. of Virginia Inc. in Roanoke.
Federal workers who rent their homes through Hall Associates Inc. will be given additional time to pay their rent if they need it, said a spokeswoman for the property manager. Hall Associates plans to extend rent due dates for strapped federal workers for as many weeks as the government delays giving workers their pay, she said.
Roanoke Gas officials vowed not to turn off the heat of any customers deprived of their usual income by the federal government shutdown and the city of Roanoke's water and sewer bill-collection department plans to take an understanding approach, too, said collections chief Debbie Moses. "Just tell us what is going on," Moses said. "We are going to listen to them."
Staff writer Jeff Sturgeon and the Associated Press contributed to this story.
LENGTH: Long : 111 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: STEPHANIE KLEIN-DAVIS/Staff. Alma Lee, president ofby CNBLocal 1739 of the American Federation of Government Employees,
speaks at a Salem rally. 2. Lindsey Meador, 9, stands$ with her
father, Eugene Meador, at a rally at the Veterans Affairs Medical
Center in Salem. color.