[asl]

From what I read the point of these letters here - the FAA have imposed working condition rules that will lose controllers who want to be controllers because they have partners stationed elsewhere, when there is a nationwide shortage of controllers that isn't bad or inept it is assanine. Effectively you go where we tell you, not where you request. Now compare to the ATCO program in the UK - which offers same location requests for couples, opposing co-ordinated shifts for couples with young families (i.e. there's no childcare costs cos when one is working the other's at home and so on, and then joint rest days, so they can spend time as a couple) and joint holiday entitlement for couples (i.e. even if they are at the same ATC centre they can holiday at the same time as each other.
Now when you are short-staffed which one of these is going to keep more staff working??
Come on - it's not rocket science!!!
It looks like the FAA will have to learn their lesson the hard way - well so be it. The sooner they realise that the ATC's are their most valuable resource and like any other resource it needs sufficient maintenance to keep it running smoothly.
Personally I don't understand why with this sort of idiotic management the ATC's don't go out on strike, it is obviously the only thing the FAA will understand.