(Source: Railroad Retirement Board press release, January 17, 2022)
CHICAGO — The U.S. Railroad Retirement Board (RRB) has named Shiri Ndang as its Director of Equal Opportunity, effective January 17, 2022.
Ms. Ndang has over 20 years of experience in Federal labor and employment law, providing guidance, advisory and representational services to executives, managers and supervisors, at both the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the Social Security Administration (SSA).
As the Director, she will oversee the activities and responsibilities of the RRB’s Office of Equal Opportunity (OEO), which include management of affirmative action, diversity, and equal employment opportunity programs. In addition to protecting the rights of RRB employees and increasing the diversity of the agency workforce, the OEO handles questions and complaints about alleged discrimination on the basis of disability in the RRB’s benefit programs. She will report directly to the agency’s three-member Board.
Ms. Ndang started her Federal career in 1993 as an intern at the EEOC headquarters in Washington, D.C. She became an investigator in 1995, working out of the agency’s New York District Office, and subsequently transferred to the New Orleans District Office, where she worked as an investigator and supervisory investigator from 1997 to 2003.
In 2003, she transferred to SSA, serving as an attorney-advisor to the Regional Chief Administrative Law Judge in Dallas, Texas, the position she held at the time of her RRB appointment. As an attorney-advisor, she assisted management with contract interpretation, union negotiations, conflict resolution, employee and labor relations, equal employment opportunity, and disciplinary actions. She is also a Federal certified mediator, serving as a member of the Dallas-Fort Worth Federal Executive Board’s mediation cadre since 2005.
Ms. Ndang received her Juris Doctor degree from Loyola University New Orleans in 2002. She also earned a Master’s of Public Administration (1993) with a public policy concentration, and a Bachelor of Arts (1991) in political science, both from Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Born in the western African country of Cameroon, Ms. Ndang was raised there and in New Orleans. At the time of her appointment, she resided in the Dallas-Fort Worth area with her husband, Emmanuel. They are the parents of two adult children.
She replaces Pamela Tate, the Director of Equal Opportunity since 2018, who retired in December 2021 with more than 36 years of RRB service.
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An independent Federal agency headquartered in Chicago, the RRB pays more than $13.3 billion a year in benefits under the Federal Railroad Retirement and Railroad Unemployment Insurance Acts covering the nation’s railroad workers and their families.