The Buzz

Clear Difference

Next month, the long-awaited transfer of the Defense Security Service to the Office of Personnel Management will become official, dramatically changing the federal security clearance process and substantially boosting the size of the workforce that deals with applications for those credentials.

The shift is scheduled for Feb. 20, OPM officials said in late November. The move will involve the transfer of approximately 20 field offices and 1,850 positions, including field investigators, supervisors and support staff. OPM currently has about 3,000 employees.

The union was originally planned for last year, but the decision was put on hold when OPM discovered that DSS' clearance process was substantially different from OPM's approach.

"This transfer will consolidate the vast majority" of federal government background checks, says Steve Beno-witz, OPM's associate director for human resources products and services. "Ninety to 95 percent will now be completed by OPM."

Federal personnel officials plan to increase the size of the contractor pool working on background investigations. OPM has about 170 workers who coordinate with six contract firms that have 3,000 employees. Benowitz says the agency wants to expand the background investigation workforce-including contractors and federal employees-to 7,500 by the end of fiscal 2006.

Bidding on Los Alamos

The National Nuclear Security Administration launched the formal process in December to find a contractor for Los Alamos National Laboratory, ending a six-decade run by the University of California as the uncontested operator of the elite facility.

The school has run the nuclear weapons laboratory for the Energy Department and its predecessor since 1943. The nuclear security agency's request for proposals marks the first open competition ever held for the contract. The move comes after a series of embarrassing lapses at the facility, including missing computers and disks and purchase card abuse by employees.

In June, the Energy Department separated the Los Alamos contract from the contract for Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which also has been run on a noncompetitive basis by the University of California.

Anthrax Attack

A federal judge dealt a blow in late November to a group of employees at the Brentwood postal facility in Washington, dismissing their lawsuit alleging that postal managers put their health in danger by failing to inform them about anthrax in the building in October 2001.

In the suit, six workers, one of whom has died since it was filed, charged that postal managers jeopardized their health and safety by failing to share information indicating that the plant was contaminated with anthrax and by deliberately misleading employees.

Two Brentwood workers, Joseph Curseen Jr. and Thomas Morris Jr., died of inhalation anthrax after a still-unknown person mailed the substance to the office of Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D. The facility has since been renamed in their memory. Several other employees became ill.

The six workers filed the suit in October 2003. The Postal Service denied the charges. District of Columbia District Judge Rosemary Collyer said the allegations "shock the conscience," but said the employees cannot file the lawsuit because the officials named in it do not bear a civil liability.

Tom Fitton, president of Judicial Watch, a watchdog group representing the workers, says they are considering an appeal. "We know that these postal workers have been severely harmed," he says. "All of this could have been prevented if Postal Service supervisors were honest with their employees."

People Process

Two key Washington institutions urged Congress and the Bush administration in late 2004 to make sure future efforts to overhaul civil service rules and regulations applied uniformly to all agencies.

In separate reports, the Government Accountability Office and the National Academy of Public Administration argued that Congress should pass legislation detailing the "core values" that underlie the civil service, the principles to support those values, and the processes and criteria that agencies must meet to implement new personnel rules.

Officials at GAO and NAPA are concerned that if Congress continues to pass legislation granting new personnel authorities one by one to agencies, there will be increasing "Balkanization of the civil service" and potential for agencies privileged with more flexibilities to raid their counterparts, says Comptroller General David Walker.

The reports are critical of the approach taken by Congress and the administration in granting new authorities in 2002 and 2003 to the Defense and Homeland Security departments. Both agencies won the right to waive existing civil service rules, allowing them to set up pay-for-performance systems, disciplinary rules and standards governing management-union relations.

Meet the New Bosses

The election results were barely in when President Bush embarked on what experts called one of the swiftest and broadest Cabinet shake-ups in history. A guide to the new appointees (as of mid-December):

CABINET DEPARTMENTS

AGRICULTURE: Mike Johanns

The two-term Nebraska governor grew up on an Iowa dairy farm. He has advocated substitutes for fossil fuels, promoted American agricultural exports and fought tax increases.
Replaces: Ann Veneman

COMMERCE: Carlos Gutierrez

The Cuban refugee went from selling Kellogg's cereals out of a van in Mexico to the company's executive office. He does not have close ties to Bush.
Replaces: Don Evans

EDUCATION: Margaret Spellings

The White House chief domestic policy adviser helped draft the 2002 No Child Left Behind Act. A longtime Bush aide, she worked on education in Texas.
Replaces: Rod Paige

ENERGY: Samuel Bodman

As deputy Commerce secretary, he managed day-to-day operations of the department. Previously, he spent 31 years as a financier and executive in the private sector.
Replaces: Spencer Abraham

HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES: Michael Leavitt

Leavitt has served as head of the Environmental Protection Agency since November 2003. Before that, he was governor of Utah, where he pioneered cooperative environmental management.
Replaces: Tommy Thompson

JUSTICE: Alberto Gonzales

As White House counsel, he advised the president that proscriptions against torture did not apply to suspected terrorists. In Texas, he served as Bush's chief counsel and on the Supreme Court.
Replaces: John Ashcroft

STATE: Condoleezza Rice

Bush's trusted national security adviser served on the first President Bush's National Security Council as a Soviet expert. She also was provost of Stanford University.
Replaces: Colin Powell

VETERANS AFFAIRS: Jim Nicholson

Decorated Vietnam veteran has served as ambassador to the Vatican since 2001. From 1997 to 2000, he chaired the Republican National Committee.
Replaces: Anthony Principi

CIA DIRECTOR: Porter Goss

Former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Goss served in the CIA during the Cold War. His effort to overhaul the agency has led to some discontent among career officers.
Replaces: George Tenet

NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Stephen Hadley

As deputy adviser, Hadley led postwar Iraq planning and signed off on now-discredited Iraq-uranium intelligence. He worked under then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney during the George H.W. Bush administration.
Replaces: Condoleezza Rice

SECRETARY OF THE ARMY: Francis Harvey

The former Westinghouse chief operating officer is affiliated with the Carlyle Group, a powerful investment firm in Washington. Harvey has no military or government experience.