Gov. Phil Scott fueled speculation last week about the future of state employees’ continued ability to work remotely when he referenced a still-to-come plan to bring employees back to state offices.
“Remote work has been helpful,” Scott said at his weekly press conference on Aug. 7, “but we have plans to bring people back at least part time, so we are hopeful in the next few months to roll out our program about how to bring people back.”
But a memo sent by Agency of Administration Secretary Sarah Clark the following day to all state workers assured employees those plans were “only in the early stages.”
Remote work has been the norm for many state employees since the onset of Covid-19 more than five years ago. Two summers of flooding soon after the end of that crisis disrupted efforts to work in state buildings, Clark wrote.
“As we once again move forward after these disruptions, we are committed to restarting our work on a more consistent approach to remote/in-person hybrid schedules, with more emphasis on in-person collaboration than currently exists,” she added.
Scott’s comments took Steve Howard, the executive director of the Vermont State Employees’ Association, the state employees union, by surprise. While some of the state’s more than 8,000 employees have started increasing their in-person presence, for many, work location is handled on a case-by-case basis, he said.
Howard described the desire for a return to office as “a solution in search of a problem,” one that overlooks how successful a hybrid schedule has been.
“The goal of management should really be, ‘is the work getting done?’ and not ‘where is the work getting done?’” he said. “This change is going to incentivize retirements, cause people to leave and make it really hard to recruit.”
A pivot back to in-person work has caused problems for state employees previously. Howard pointed to when the Vermont Department for Children and Families’ economic services division began requiring people to return to the office. That decision “backfired,” damaging staff morale due to its top-down implementation, according to the union leader.
Scott’s office declined to comment, referring questions to the Agency of Administration. Beth Fastiggi, commissioner of the Vermont Department of Human Resources, shared the memo penned last Friday by Clark.
“With this discussion becoming more visible, we know there will be a lot of questions and opinions,” Clark wrote. “The Governor and I assure you that we will communicate a thoughtful, complete approach well before it goes into effect.”
While she did not outline a timeline, she said that the process of developing the return-to-office plans will involve input from employees across agencies.
“We take the impact of this change — the positives and negatives — on our employees and the Vermonters we serve seriously. So, we are taking the time to get it right,” Clark wrote. “This strategic process is in contrast to our current operating environment, which is the result of multiple emergency responses to conditions beyond our control.”
So far, the state employees union has not heard the specifics of the administration’s proposal, and there is no set time to discuss it, according to Howard.
After the governor’s comments, Howard said the union has received close to 300 emails about what a new policy could mean for people’s lives.
“Workers should not have to read about their jobs and their lives on the news,” he said.
