Packin’ it in

When Congress passed the law creating the Homeland Security Department last fall, it also gave agencies across government several new personnel flexibilities, such as direct hiring authority and categorical ranking. It also broadened their authority to offer some employees the opportunity to retire early.

Voluntary early retirement authority, which leads to "early outs," has been used in the past to reduce the size of the government during agency reorganizations or budget reductions while avoiding involuntary layoffs. In 1999, Congress granted OPM permanent authority to allow agencies to offer early retirement. Now, agencies can also use early outs when they need to restructure the workforce, under interim rules published Friday by the Office of Personnel Management in the Federal Register.

"Sometimes we have changes in the workforce . . . because we have too many employees and we need to run a [reduction-in-force]; sometimes we have people who don't have the right skills, so we need to do some workforce restructuring," explained Ellen Tunstall, deputy associate director for talent and capacity policy for OPM. "Look at the IRS or the Postal Service where they have gone from sort of a manual operation to an automated operation; you might need different kinds of skills to do that kind of work or fewer people to do that kind of work."

Agencies still need to seek OPM's approval before using the measure. Their requests should clearly explain why they need the authority, how it fits with the agency's overall human capital management plan, when and how long they intend to use it, and the number of employees eligible for early retirement, among other things.

Though the regulation became effective on June 13, OPM is asking for written comments on the interim rule. Send those comments by Aug. 12, 2003 to:

Legislative Roundup

The Senate Governmental Affairs Committee approved several bills Tuesday that benefit federal workers:

• The NASA Workforce Flexibility Act of 2003 (S. 610) would allow NASA to pay bonuses for recruitment and relocation of employees. It also would allow exchanges of NASA personnel with private companies and other organizations and set up a scholarship program for graduate students who want to work with the space agency.
• The Federal Employee Student Loan Assistance Act (S. 926) would raise the amount government agencies are able to spend on paying student loans for employees. That amount would increase from $6,000 to $10,000 annually and raise the total amount of student loan payments to any one employee to $60,000.
• The Homeland Security Federal Workforce Act (S. 589) would create a pilot program that would allow several departments to repay student loans for employees in national security positions. Under the legislation, the Defense, Homeland Security, State, Energy, Treasury and Justice departments, the National Security Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency would be able to participate in the pilot test. The bill also would create "national security fellowships" for eligible graduate students who agree to work in national security positions and would authorize a National Security Service Corps, under the direction of a National Security Service Board, to allow mid-level employees to rotate to different national security positions.
• S. 481 would boost the pensions of employees in the Federal Employees Retirement System who have received disability payments at some point in their careers to make up for lost contributions. Lawmakers offered the bill after learning that Louise Kurtz, a civilian Army employee who was injured in the Sept. 11 attack on the Pentagon, was unable to contribute to Social Security or the Thrift Savings Plan while out of work on disability payments.

FSAs

Federal employees still weighing the pros and cons of Flexible Spending Accounts have another nine days to make a decision. The Office of Personnel Management has extended the open season for enrolling on the accounts to Friday, June 27.

Employees can use the accounts to set aside pre-tax dollars for health, child and elder care. Up to $3,000 can be socked away in health care accounts to cover certain expenses not covered by traditional health insurance, such as co-payments, deductibles, laser eye surgery and dental work. Employees can set aside as much as $5,000 in dependent care accounts for child care and elder care costs.

OPM Director Kay Coles James has encouraged agencies to pay the fees associated with the accounts.