May 19, 2008

 

A summary of daily news relevant to the federal workforce produced by the Partnership for Public Service. 

1. Federal Diary: Rewarding Intelligence
2. Serious Deficiencies in Nursing Homes Are Often Missed, Report Says
3. Education Seeks Financial Management Support
   
4. Celebrate Public Service at a Washington Nationals Game! 

Rewarding Intelligence

The Washington Post

By Stephen Barr

 

The government's intelligence community is changing its pay system to better reward agents and analysts, part of an effort to fix problems identified after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"The world has changed pretty dramatically. So we wanted to do something that would put emphasis on rewarding superior performance," said Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence.

The Defense Intelligence Agency, the first of the 16 agencies in the government's intelligence community that will convert to the new pay system, will make the transition in September. Officials expect the system to help in the recruitment and retention of civilian employees and make it easier for employees to take assignments outside their home agencies -- a requirement for those who aspire to a top intelligence leadership position.

McConnell appeared at a news briefing last week to underscore his personal commitment to the new pay system, which will replace the decades-old General Schedule that is used by most federal agencies. That system has been faulted by critics for primarily rewarding employees for their time in government rather than how well they do their job.

McConnell retired as a Navy vice admiral after 29 years of service and worked for about 10 years at a consulting firm before returning to government last year as the second director of national intelligence.

His experience in the private sector, he said, reinforced the value of sharing information and coordinating across organizational boundaries -- top concerns of the commissions that reviewed intelligence practices after 9/11.

Many federal employees are wary that pay-for-performance systems can be fairly administered. In 2001, a performance-based pay program proposed for the CIA went to the back burner after employees complained to members of Congress.

"Now there will be some concerns; there always are concerns," McConnell said. "But basically think of it as a merit-based system that rewards high performers. It has the flavor of the private sector, in that you get superior performance. One of the ways it is often described is that you get the behavior that you reward. So that is the way we are thinking of this."

In designing the new system, officials have benefited from a pay-for-performance system that has operated for about a decade at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), where "the results have been spectacular," McConnell said.

Officials also used feedback from intelligence employees to shape the new system, which is called the National Intelligence Civilian Compensation Program.

A number of officials who oversee personnel policies in the intelligence community joined McConnell for the announcement of the new pay system. They included Ronald Sanders, chief human capital officer for national intelligence and a key architect of the new system; John S.Allison of the Defense Intelligence Agency; Mary Kay Byers of the National Reconnaissance Office; Ed Carpenter of the National Security Agency; Tom Coghlan of the office of the director of national intelligence; Ellen E. McCarthy of the Defense Department; Pamela A. McCullough of the FBI; Terri Powers of the CIA; and Laura B. Snow of NGA.

Officials would not say how many people work in the intelligence community, but it has been estimated at about 100,000. Nearly half of the workforce has less than five years of service, Sanders said, a reflection of hiring and staffing changes since 9/11.

The new system collapses the General Schedule grades and steps into broad salary bands and splits intelligence employees into three occupational groups -- supervisor/manager, professional and technician/administrative support.

The new pay system also expands on the General Schedule, adding the monetary equivalent of two steps to provide more earning potential for high performers. For example, instead of hitting the top rung of GS grade 15, step 10, an intelligence employee can go as high as a step 12.

The bands also give technical employees an opportunity to earn as much as a supervisor, in contrast to the GS system, which encouraged technical experts to take a management position to get higher pay.

The new pay system also attempts to mitigate a common concern among federal employees -- that they are at risk of falling behind GS annual raises, which are set by Congress.

Employees who receive a job rating of successful or higher will receive a raise equal to the government-pay increase, a locality pay adjustment, plus raises and bonuses tied to their job performance rating. An employee rated unacceptable will not receive a pay increase or bonus, Sanders said.

"We said, in part to overcome some of the anxiety that is associated with this, we said at the outset that successful employees will get the GS and locality -- that means everyone successful and above will get it," Sanders said. "That reduces the amount available for performance payouts, but it also reduces the anxiety and uncertainty. So our conclusion was it was worth it.

"We want employees to accept this. We don't want them to fear it." 

Serious Deficiencies in Nursing Homes Are Often Missed, Report Says

The New York Times

By Robert Pear

 

Nursing home inspectors routinely overlook or minimize problems that pose a serious, immediate threat to patients, Congressional investigators say in a new report.

In the report, to be issued on Thursday, the investigators, from the Government Accountability Office, say they have found widespread "understatement of deficiencies," including malnutrition, severe bedsores, overuse of prescription medications and abuse of nursing home residents.

Nursing homes are typically inspected once a year by state employees working under contract with the federal government, which sets stringent standards. Federal officials try to validate the work of state inspectors by accompanying them or doing follow-up surveys within a few weeks.

The accountability office found that state employees had missed at least one serious deficiency in 15 percent of the inspections checked by federal officials. In nine states, inspectors missed serious problems in more than 25 percent of the surveys analyzed from 2002 to 2007.

The nine states most likely to miss serious deficiencies were Alabama, Arizona, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee and Wyoming, the report said.

More than 1.5 million people live in nursing homes. Nationwide, about one-fifth of the homes were cited for serious deficiencies last year.

"Poor quality of care -- worsening pressure sores or untreated weight loss -- in a small but unacceptably high number of nursing homes continues to harm residents or place them in immediate jeopardy, that is, at risk of death or serious injury," the report said.

Nursing homes must meet federal standards as a condition of participating in Medicaid and Medicare, which cover more than two-thirds of their residents, at a cost of more than $75 billion a year.

The study was done at the request of Senators Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, and Herb Kohl, Democrat of Wisconsin, who is chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging.

Mr. Grassley and Mr. Kohl have introduced a bill to upgrade nursing home care and increase the penalties for violations of federal standards. The maximum fine, now generally $10,000, would be increased to $25,000 for a serious deficiency and $100,000 for one that resulted in a patient's death.

The senators are pushing to have their bill included in a package of Medicare changes that Congress is expected to pass next month.

But the American Health Care Association, a trade group for nursing homes, opposes the Grassley-Kohl bill in its current form.

Bruce A. Yarwood, president of the association, said: "We should not be increasing fines, adding auditors and encouraging a 'gotcha' mentality. We should be testing new, less punitive ways to measure and improve the quality of care."

Influential consumer groups support the bill. David P. Sloane, senior vice president of AARP, the lobby for older Americans, said it was "one of the most significant nursing home reform initiatives" in two decades.

Under the bill, nursing homes would have to provide consumers and the government with more information about their owners and "affiliated or related parties," including any individual or company that had a role in managing their operations.

Lewis Morris, chief counsel to the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services, said he had often been frustrated in trying to identify the owners of nursing homes that provided substandard care.

"We have found nursing home residents who were grossly dehydrated or malnourished," Mr. Morris said. "We've found patients with maggot infestations in wounds and dead flesh. We've found residents with broken bones that went unmended."

After discovering such problems, the federal government has required some companies to sign compliance agreements, monitored by outside experts. "Our experience shows that such compliance programs do improve the quality of care," Mr. Morris said.

The Bush administration said it agreed with the findings of the accountability office and would supervise state inspectors more closely.

"We fully endorse and will implement all the G.A.O. recommendations," Vincent J. Ventimiglia Jr., an assistant secretary of health and human services, said in written comments on the report.

Education Seeks Financial Management Support

Federal Computer Week

By Mary Mosquera

 

The Education Department's Federal Student Aid (FSA) program is seeking support for its Financial Management System (FMS). The department released a draft proposal May 13 on the Federal Business Opportunities Web site.

FSA needs a vendor to monitor daily FMS activity and perform development, security and daily operations maintenance, the department said in the posting. Comments are due by June 9.
FSA expects to move FMS operations to a new vendor between September and November, the department said.

In addition to integrating FSA's systems and acquiring new applications, Education said it hopes to improve program integrity and access to colleges and universities, enhance customer service, and reduce program administration costs.  The department also wants the system to help make federal student financial assistance programs less susceptible to fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement.

FMS is the single point of institutional financial information for FSA and integrates data from several sources.

Education anticipates the award of a single indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract with a one-year base period and nine one-year options. The contract will be a mix of fixed price, time and materials, and performance-based task orders.

 

Celebrate Public Service at a Washington Nationals Game!

The Partnership for Public Service

 

Join the Washington Nationals and the Partnership for Public Service as we celebrate public service this summer -- come cheer the Nationals on to victory! Get discounted tickets for three summer games -- click here to purchase through the Partnership for Public Service. You do not need to be a federal employee to receive this discount.

 

Discounted tickets are available for games on:

• Saturday, May 24 vs. Milwaukee Brewers
• Saturday, July 12 vs. Houston Astros
• Saturday, September 20 vs. San Diego Padres

Discounted ticket prices are:

• RF Mezzanine: $33 (Normally $38)
• Scoreboard Pavilion: $24 (Normally $29)
• Upper Infield Gallery: $15 (Normally $20)