Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca13-15-03202/USCOURTS-ca13-15-03202-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Department of Transportation
Intervenor
Merit Systems Protection Board
Respondent
Vanetta Simmons
Petitioner

Document Text:

NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

VANETTA SIMMONS,

Petitioner

v.

MERIT SYSTEMS PROTECTION BOARD,

Respondent

DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION,

Intervenor

 

______________________ 

2015-3202

______________________ 

Petition for review of the Merit Systems Protection 

Board in No. NY-0752-15-0109-I-1.

______________________ 

Decided: September 22, 2016

______________________ 

VANETTA SIMMONS, Jamaica, NY, pro se.

JEFFREY GAUGER, Office of the General Counsel, Merit 

Systems Protection Board, Washington, DC, for respondent. Also represented by BRYAN G. POLISUK. 

Case: 15-3202 Document: 37-2 Page: 1 Filed: 09/22/2016
2 SIMMONS v. MSPB

JIMMY MCBIRNEY, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for intervenor. Also represented by BENJAMIN 

C. MIZER, ROBERT E. KIRSCHMAN, JR., ELIZABETH M.

HOSFORD. 

______________________ 

Before NEWMAN, LOURIE, and CHEN, Circuit Judges.

NEWMAN, Circuit Judge.

Vanetta Simmons appeals the final judgment of the 

Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) dismissing her 

involuntary retirement appeal.1 The Board held that Ms. 

Simmons failed to establish that her retirement from the 

Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was involuntary, 

and dismissed the appeal. We affirm the decision of the 

Board.

BACKGROUND

Ms. Simmons was employed as a Human Resources 

Specialist in the Queens, New York office of the FAA. On 

April 22, 2014, Ms. Simmons was informed that she 

would be reassigned to a Benefits Operation Center 

(BOC) in Kansas City, Missouri, as part of a consolidation 

of regional benefits specialists into the centralized BOC. 

Ms. Simmons was informed that if she accepted administrative reassignment, she would hold the same position at 

the BOC, be eligible for relocation expenses, and maintain 

the same base pay and grade.2 The reassignment notification letter included a conditional election form; Ms. 

 

1 Simmons v. Dep’t of Transp., No. NY-0752-15-

0109-I-1, 2015 WL 5677177 (MSPB, Sept. 28, 2015) (Final 

Decision).

2 Ms. Simmons’ gross pay would be reduced to accommodate the lower Kansas City locality adjustment 

rate.

Case: 15-3202 Document: 37-2 Page: 2 Filed: 09/22/2016
SIMMONS v. MSPB 3

Simmons was informed that electing reassignment was 

for planning purposes only.

On April 28, 2014, Ms. Simmons was also informed 

that she was eligible for special consideration for vacancies at her current duty location in Queens. The FAA 

explained that hiring officials would consider her application before other candidates if she qualified for a particular vacancy, but did not guarantee selection. The letter 

also stated that if Ms. Simmons applied for and accepted 

a lower grade position, the demotion would be considered 

an “involuntary-management action” for pay retention 

purposes. On August 15, 2014, Ms. Simmons’ manager

corrected this information, and informed Ms. Simmons 

that under the terms of the reassignment, pay retention 

was unavailable.

On May 2, 2014, Ms. Simmons applied for a Human 

Resources Specialist position. The hiring manager interviewed Ms. Simmons first, but ultimately selected another candidate. In August 2014, Ms. Simmons applied for a 

Labor Relations Assistant opening. Ms. Simmons was 

interviewed by the hiring manager for that position, but 

was not hired.

On June 20, 2014, Ms. Simmons returned the conditional election form, indicating that she accepted the 

administrative reassignment. Ms. Simmons wrote on her 

signed forms that she was accepting the administrative 

assignment “under duress because [she] was not given the 

proper information to make a reasonable or rational 

decision.” Ms. Simmons did not report for duty, as scheduled, in Kansas City on January 12, 2015, but instead 

applied for discontinued service retirement and retired at 

a reduced annuity, effective January 10, 2015.

Ms. Simmons filed an appeal with the MSPB, asserting that she retired from the FAA involuntarily. Ms. 

Simmons stated that the reassignment was the result of 

coercion because the administrative reassignment was not 

Case: 15-3202 Document: 37-2 Page: 3 Filed: 09/22/2016
4 SIMMONS v. MSPB

a valid exercise of agency authority. She also stated that 

she was provided insufficient and misleading information 

regarding the reassignment and special consideration 

hiring authority, and that she was placed on sick leave 

restriction as an intimidation tactic. She explained that 

she could not accept reassignment due to financial and 

familial obligations.

The AJ determined that that although Ms. Simmons 

made non-frivolous allegations, she did not establish by a 

preponderance of the evidence that her retirement was 

involuntary. The AJ found that the FAA established a 

legitimate and bona fide management reason for reassigning Ms. Simmons and similarly situated employees to the 

Kansas City office. Further, the AJ determined that Ms. 

Simmons failed to demonstrate that the agency provided 

her with inadequate or misleading information. The AJ 

recognized that personal health and financial issues 

impacted Ms. Simmons’ desire and ability to relocate, but 

that those factors did make her retirement involuntary. 

The AJ dismissed Ms. Simmons’ appeal. 

On appeal, the full Board affirmed the dismissal, 

holding that the difficult nature of Ms. Simmons’ decision 

did not render it involuntary. Final Decision ¶ 12. The 

Board also held that Ms. Simmons had not established 

that she based her retirement decision on misinformation 

from the FAA. Id. ¶ 9.

DISCUSSION

A.

An involuntary retirement is deemed equivalent to

forced removal. Staats v. U.S. Postal Serv., 99 F.3d 1120, 

1123-24 (Fed. Cir. 1996). The decision to retire is presumed to be voluntary. Id. at 1124. Ms. Simmons contends that the FAA’s reassignment plan led her to retire 

involuntarily, and thus was an improper removal action. 

Ms. Simmons bears the burden of establishing nonCase: 15-3202 Document: 37-2 Page: 4 Filed: 09/22/2016
SIMMONS v. MSPB 5

voluntariness by a preponderance of the evidence. 5 

C.F.R. § 1201.56(b)(2)(A). There are two principal 

grounds on which a retired employee may overcome the 

presumption of voluntariness: (1) the retirement was the 

product of misinformation or deception by the agency; or 

(2) the retirement was the product of coercion by the 

agency. Staats, 99 F.3d at 1124. 

To establish that the agency coerced her into retiring, 

Ms. Simmons must show “that the agency effectively 

imposed the terms of [her] resignation or retirement, that 

[she] had no realistic alternative but to resign or retire, 

and that [her] resignation or retirement was the result of 

improper acts by the agency.” Id. Involuntariness “does 

not apply to a case in which an employee decides to resign 

or retire because he does not want to accept a new assignment, a transfer, or other measures that the agency is 

authorized to adopt, even if those measures make continuation in the job so unpleasant for the employee that he 

feels that he has no realistic option but to leave.” Id.

Ms. Simmons first asserts that her retirement was coerced by an improper reassignment. For a directed reassignment to be coercive, it must be it must be based on 

neither a legitimate nor a bona fide management reason, 

that is, the directed reassignment must have no solid or 

substantial basis in personnel practice or principle. 

Rayfield v. Dep’t of Agricul., 26 M.S.P.R. 244, 246 (1985). 

However, if the agency establishes that a reassignment is 

legitimate, the Board will not review the underlying 

management considerations that underlie the exercise of 

agency discretion. Frey v. Dep’t of Labor, 359 F.3d 1355, 

1358 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Ms. Simmons states that the 

reassignment was not bona fide and based on legitimate 

management considerations because the benefits specialists located in the FAA’s Washington, D.C. headquarters 

were not required to relocate. Ms. Simmons also stated 

that prior to April 22, 2014, the agency told her that she 

would not be reassigned. She stated that the relocation 

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6 SIMMONS v. MSPB

was unnecessary because her work performance was 

effective at her regional duty station, and that the centralized BOC in Kansas City was unsuccessful.

The Board found that the FAA presented sufficient 

evidence to rebut Ms. Simmons’ assertions of improper 

acts. The FAA submitted declarations to show that the 

headquarters employees performed different functions 

and that the agency decided to fully consolidate operations in Kansas City after partial centralization failed to 

realize the desired efficiency gains. Substantial evidence 

supported the Board’s finding that the reassignment was 

based on legitimate management concerns.

Ms. Simmons states that she was faced with choosing 

between retiring and relocating to Kansas City, and that 

she did not want to relocate because the prospect presented her with a difficult personal and financial situation. 

However, “the fact that an employee is faced with an 

unpleasant situation or that [her] choice is limited to two 

unattractive options does not make the employee’s decision any less voluntary.” Staats, 99 F.3d at 1124; see also 

Covington v. Dep’t of Health & Human Servs., 750 F.2d 

937, 942 (Fed. Cir. 1984). The Board’s ruling that her 

retirement was not coerced was in accord with precedent. 

B.

Ms. Simmons also states that the FAA provided her 

with misleading information on which she relied in deciding to retire. For example, Ms. Simmons alleges that 

agency officials were unprepared for or cancelled meetings, and that they delayed providing information on 

voluntary early retirement options and incentives 

(VERA/VSIP). Ms. Simmons also states that the offer of 

special consideration for other positions was misleading 

because she did not receive special consideration and the 

agency did not assist her in finding a new regional placement. She also states that she received inaccurate inforCase: 15-3202 Document: 37-2 Page: 6 Filed: 09/22/2016
SIMMONS v. MSPB 7

mation about the availability of pay retention for demotions to a lower grade position.

The Board found that Ms. Simmons had not shown

that she relied on any of the alleged misleading information in deciding to retire. Ms. Simmons retired eight 

months after the information about voluntary early 

retirement and incentive programs was provided and five 

months after the inaccurate pay retention information 

was corrected. The FAA submitted declarations from the 

hiring officials explaining that Ms. Simmons received 

initial consideration and interviews as promised, although 

she was not selected.

The Board’s findings that Ms. Simmons had not relied 

on misleading information and that her retirement was 

not coerced were supported by substantial evidence, and 

in accordance with law. The dismissal of the appeal is 

affirmed.

No Costs.

AFFIRMED

Case: 15-3202 Document: 37-2 Page: 7 Filed: 09/22/2016