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There have been some concerns over the loss of bereavement leave for BIE. FISE would like to explain how the change came about. During the negotiation for the present CBA it was agreed by both sides that the past contract was not in compliance according to present federal regulations. Management and FISE agreed that the present CBA would follow the federal regs, which is actually required by federal law. As it were BIE employees did not have bereavement leave offered to them under federal regulations, 5 CFR 630, so the wording was removed for BIE employees.

There has been a misconception that Bereavement was its own type of leave and was not charged to the employee. As you can see it is charged to the rest of the other bureaus as sick leave.

 The other bureaus use Article 17 Leave Section 4B 1&2 pg. 61 of the current CBA which states:

Sick Leave for Family Care, Bereavement Purposes, or Serious Health Condition

(1) Sick Leave for Family Care or Bereavement Purposes: Most Federal employees may use a total of up to 104 hours (13 work days) of sick leave each leave year to:

a. provide care for a family member who is incapacitated as a result of physical or mental illness, injury, pregnancy, or childbirth;

b. provide care for a family member as a result of medical, dental, or optical examination or treatment; or

c. make arrangements necessitated by the death of a family member or attend the funeral of a family member.

BIE did not lose this per se as these same conditions can be met under FMLA and BIE can use a combination of comp time, sick leave and personal leave. Also, we have religious leave (CT) which is located in Article 17 section 11 pg. 65 of the present CBA:

Section 11. Religious Leave

It is agreed that every effort will be given to accommodating the employee in meeting their religious commitments in attending various tribal or secular ceremonies by allowing the flexibility in granting appropriate leave (which may also include a combination of various types of leave). Advance collaboration between the employee and his/her supervisor will be required in order to address workload requirements. An employee may also request the opportunity to perform compensatory overtime work for the purpose of taking compensatory time off.

This type of leave will need to be declared as religious leave and does not expire nor is there a payout if it is not used. This should be recorded on your time sheet as RL. It is very limited on its use so you do not want to declare very many hours in this specific category.  The use is strictly for the specific ceremony and does not include travel time, etc.