Pending legislation that would allow the General Accounting Office to offer early retirement and buyouts to employees will likely pass when Congress returns in September to finish out the legislative year, according to sources at GAO and on Capitol Hill.
Comptroller General David Walker has been lobbying lawmakers for the bill, which would give him the authority to revamp the agency's workforce for the future. Walker wants to offer buyouts to employees whose skills are overrepresented at GAO. In addition, the bill would allow GAO to base any future reductions in force on skills and performance, rather than on seniority.
"We critically need this legislation" to overcome skills imbalances triggered by budget cuts and hiring freezes of the 1990s, Walker said at a July hearing before the House Subcommittee on Government Management, Information and Technology.
Agency human resources officials and federal employee advocates are following the bill closely, because it could provide a model for other agencies to follow in revamping their workforces.
The Senate passed its version of the legislation as part of the fiscal 2001 legislative branch appropriations bill, but the language about GAO workforce flexibilities was left out when House-Senate negotiators combined that bill with the fiscal 2001 Treasury-Postal spending bill into a single conference report last week.
Still, congressional sources and GAO officials said it was likely the measure will pass before the end of the year.
"We didn't get it done in time to be part of the appropriations package, but there has been a bicameral agreement and our expectation is that it will get passed before Congress goes out of session this year," a GAO spokesperson said.