Unions Doubt Agencies Can Reopen Safely by Going Their Own Way

Unions are calling for governmentwide mandates to ensure federal workplaces are safe before any large-scale return to work begins during the Covid-19 pandemic and to avoid a patchwork of different agency preparations.

So far, most agencies where employees can telework haven’t begun calling their workforces back, and there’s no uniform schedule across the executive branch for doing so.

It’s unclear how many of the nation’s 2.1 million civilian federal employees are working remotely. The U.S. government hasn’t tracked the numbers. Also, some federal workers, such as Department of Veterans Affairs medical personnel and Transportation Security Administration airport screeners who can’t ...