Panel targets GAO pay system
Performance-based approach was a hallmark of David Walker's tenure as head of the agency.
One day after David Walker's formal departure from GAO, a House subcommittee is set to blast the pay system that represents the former comptroller general's signature managerial change within the agency.
"We're definitely repudiating what he did," a subcommittee staffer said of Walker's efforts to overhaul pay and personnel systems at the congressional auditing agency.
The House Oversight and Government Reform Federal Workforce Subcommittee plans a hearing Thursday on several bills affecting GAO. Among them is a measure that Federal Workforce Subcommittee Chairman Danny Davis, D-Ill., plans to introduce that would grant retroactive cost-of-living increases to hundreds of GAO employees who did not receive one in the last two years.
Walker's move in 2006 and 2007 to reassign thousands of analysts to a lower pay category as part of a new pay-for-performance system drew widespread criticism within GAO and led agency employees to form a union in September.
The issue has received added attention because many believe GAO should serve as a model for federal agencies it evaluates and because Walker specialized in human capital management before becoming comptroller general in 1998.
The subcommittee today will release what are likely to be unflattering results of studies on the effect of the new pay system on GAO's workforce. Those include a survey by GAO's Employee Advisory Council on workers' opinions of the new system and a study of how the change affected African-Americans at GAO.
The subcommittee has pressed GAO repeatedly on whether the system will hurt black employees. The panel has had longstanding concerns about diversity among the agency's personnel.
The subcommittee staffer said Walker, who had told Davis he would testify today, appeared to have timed his resignation to avoid the hearing.
"He was trying to make a point," the aide said. "If you are the human capital guru and you are the model agency, what would you do?"
A GAO spokesman declined to comment in detail before the hearing but said in a statement: "We are working with the committee in various ways … to find the proper balance between providing employees greater certainty regarding annual pay adjustments while preserving the incentives and rewards of the GAO pay for performance system."
The hearing will cover legislation that would make various administrative changes requested by the agency. The bill would require the deputy comptroller general be appointed by the comptroller general, rather than the president; mandate that GAO's annual report to Congress assess federal agencies' cooperation with GAO audits; and authorize added funds for GAO to hire staff.
Other provisions would create an office of inspector general at GAO and allow the agency to keep money or property received as gifts. A companion measure has been introduced in the Senate.