April 21, 2008
A summary of daily news relevant to the federal workforce produced by the
Partnership for Public Service.
- Federal Diary: Election E-Mails Can End Your Term in the
Office
-
Nation Faces Billions in Long-Term Care Costs for Wounded
Troops
-
Workers with Disabilities Must Be Part of Diversity
Discussions, Says EEOC Commissioner
- DOD, DHS Find Voice in Blogs
Election E-Mails Can End Your Term in the Office
The Washington Post
By Stephen Barr
It's so easy. A friend sends an e-mail about the
presidential campaign and you forward it to an office buddy.
With that click of the mouse, you are at risk of being
fired. For a Hatch Act violation.
E-mails, blogs and campaign Web sites can be cyber-traps
for federal employees, especially those accustomed to using their government
computer for personal matters, such as trading messages with children or
sharing jokes with friends.
The Office of Special Counsel, an independent agency that
investigates and prosecutes allegations of improper political activities by
government employees, is getting calls these days from federal workers who are
confused about the rules or worried they may have committed an
"e-Hatch" violation, said Ana Galindo-Marrone, chief of the Hatch Act
Unit at the OSC.
Much of the employee interest has been stirred by the
presidential campaigns, which have spawned Web sites to raise money,
distributed e-mails by the thousands and urged supporters to use blogs and
social networking sites to get out political messages.
For the OSC, the movement of politics into cyberspace has
led to a rethinking of how to interpret the Hatch Act, which was written in
1939 to limit partisan activities by government workers and substantially
amended in 1993.
The law prohibits federal employees from engaging in
political activity while on duty, wearing campaign buttons in the office and
putting campaign bumper stickers on a government car. It also bans soliciting,
accepting or receiving political contributions, and prohibits employees from
using their official positions to influence or interfere with an election. Violators
are usually punished and can even lose their jobs.
The last Hatch Act debate in Congress, in 1992 and 1993,
occurred just as the Internet revolution was starting. There was nary a word
about the potential power of Web sites and e-mail to shape political opinion.
Today, of course, political messages, campaign
solicitations, cartoons and satire whiz across the country via e-mail. Federal
employees cannot control what pops into their e-mail inbox. However, forwarding
an e-mail that urges a vote for a specific candidate or seeks to raise campaign
money is a Hatch Act violation if done inside a federal building, the OSC has
determined.
The OSC takes into account what the e-mail says and how
many people receive it, since those factors help determine whether a federal
employee may have engaged in electioneering in the office, using a government
computer network and e-mail account.
Blogging about politics at work falls into the don't-do
category, but blogging from home may also get a federal employee in trouble.
Presidential campaign Web sites, for example, encourage
supporters to create blogs on the site to advocate the candidate's positions.
They also usually carry a link for campaign donations, and that can be trouble
for a federal employee, even when using a home computer. The OSC may view the
donate button as soliciting for political contributions, another no-no under
the Hatch Act, and set off an investigation.
The OSC handles Hatch Act cases at the federal, state and
local level, and Galindo-Marrone said they have been on the rise since 2000.
That year, the OSC investigated 97 cases. Last year, it looked into 281 cases.
Through March of this year, it has received 96 complaints. Most of the cases
begin when a federal employee alerts the OSC to questionable activities in the
workplace.
In recent months, Galindo-Marrone has been touring
federal agencies, explaining that technology is increasing the ways that
employees can get into trouble at their office desks.
That is what happened to a NASA employee in Houston.
An OSC investigation found that in 2006 and 2007, the
employee used his government e-mail account to coordinate and plan activities
for a political group and to assist a candidate running for state
representative while at his NASA office. He also made blog postings from work
to promote campaigns of several candidates, and, at least twice in 2006, urged
blog readers to make political contributions.
As a result, the OSC found him in violation of the Hatch
Act. The employee was suspended for 180 days without pay.
Nation Faces Billions in Long-Term Care Costs for Wounded
Troops
Government
Executive
By Bob Brewin
The United States must prepare to provide lifetime care
for troops severely wounded in combat operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, the
Navy's top doctor warned this week. And an independent study released on
Thursday concluded that the country also faces a steep mental health care bill
for dealing with combat stress.
In the study, the RAND Corp. estimated the costs of
dealing with stress issues and psychological illnesses of combat troops at $6.2
billon for just the first two years after those troops return home. That
includes direct medical care costs, the price of lost productivity and
suicides. The study is the first nongovernmental assessment of the
psychological needs of veterans who have served in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. Eric Schoomaker, the Army's surgeon
general, told reporters at the Pentagon on Thursday that treatment of troops
with amputations or severe burns could dramatically improve during the next few
years through research efforts led by the new Armed Forces Institute of
Regenerative Medicine. The institute, backed by more than $250 million in funding,
will grow new cells from a wounded individual to repair burned flesh or replace
digits lost in combat, akin to "a salamander growing a new tail,"
Schoomaker said.
Schoomaker said at the briefing that all the services are
seeing troops survive with more severe wounds than any time in history as a
result of improved body armor, better trained combat medical personnel and a
speedier aeromedical evacuation system. The Military Health System can
transport a wounded soldier from the battlefield to a stateside hospital in 24
hours.
Until recently, Defense had estimated the survival rate
from combat wounds in Afghanistan and Iraq at 92 percent, compared to 81
percent in Vietnam and 75 percent in World War II. But Terry Jones, a spokesman
for the Military Health System, told Government Executive that new data shows
the survival rate for those wounded in the current conflicts has edged up to 97
percent.
With such survival rates, "we have become victims of
our own success," Vice Adm. Adam Robinson, the Navy's surgeon general,
told a Senate Appropriations subcommittee on Wednesday. Severely wounded
soldiers will need a lifetime of care, Robinson said.
Robinson said in the past, Defense has been responsible
for acute care and the Veterans Affairs Department has handled long-term
sustained care. The question the nation now faces, he said, is how to meld the
two. According to the RAND report, as of January 2008, a total of 30,721 troops
had been wounded in action in Iraq and Afghanistan, with approximately 3,000 of
them suffering from severe wounds and illnesses, including amputations, serious
burns, spinal cord injuries, blindness and traumatic brain injuries.
The RAND report said another 300,000 U.S. troops suffer
from major depression or post-traumatic stress from serving in the wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan, and 320,000 have brain injuries.
RAND said there was a "large and largely unmet need
for psychological services" by troops.
Almost half the troops who brought their mental problems
to the attention of a mental health professional in the past year did not
receive even minimally adequate treatment, RAND reported. And 60 percent of
troops who experienced traumatic brain injuries had not been evaluated for the
condition.
Schoomaker said at the subcommittee hearing on Wednesday
that soldiers who are potentially suicidal sometimes have to wait as long a
week to 10 days to receive help. He emphasized that suicide prevention is not
just medical matter, but a command issue. Troop commanders and noncommissioned
officers need to deal with potential suicides as part of a comprehensive Army
approach to the problem, he said.
"Our policy is that patients in crisis will be seen
immediately," Cynthia Vaughn, Schoomaker's spokeswoman, told Government
Executive. "Routine behavioral health cases will be assessed within seven
days. If follow-on specialty care is warranted, patients will be seen within 28
days."
Army Col. Loree Sutton, a psychiatrist and chief of the
newly created Defense Center of Excellence for Psychological Health and
Traumatic Brain Injury in Arlington, Va., told a Pentagon press briefing on the
RAND report that Defense has "come a long way, ... but we've got a long
way to go" when dealing with combat stress issues.
Sutton said the department has dramatically increased the
number of mental health professionals to deal with the problem.
She said Defense is halfway to its goal of hiring an additional
1,000 mental health professionals. Insurers supporting the Military Health
System's TRICARE health care plan have added another 3,000 such specialists to
their networks. Also, the Veterans Affairs Department has boosted its mental
health staff by 4,000 and the Public Health Service has assigned 200 mental
health professionals to work with Defense.
Workers with Disabilities Must Be Part of Diversity
Discussions, Says EEOC Commissioner
HR.BLR.com
The workplace is where perceptions of people with
disabilities will be changed, said Christine M. Griffin, commissioner of the
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), during her keynote address at
NY HR Week on April 17. "Employers must look at individuals' talents, not
impairments," she said.
Griffin asked the human resources professionals:"Are
disabilities part of your diversity discussions or your diversity mission
statement? They should be because individuals with disabilities have
experiences that add value." However, she went on to explain how the situation
for these workers is still challenging.
She emphasized that dealing with diversity in terms of
disabled workers post-Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) goes beyond ramps,
websites, and vendor initiatives. "It's people, not policies not lip service,"
that must be addressed, she said.
Griffin said that people think that because there is
better physical access to workplaces, the problem is fixed; or they may think
that people with disabilities don't really need jobs because of Social Security
and other government programs. Of course, this isn't true, she explained,
describing how because she uses a wheelchair, she is often brought into
workplaces through a loading dock.
She added that ADA responsibilities should include
budgeting for accommodations for disabled workers. Companies and public
agencies need centrally funded accommodation programs, so the cost isn't coming
directly out of departmental budgets, she explained, saying that the perceived
high cost of even computer-based accommodations make managers shy about hiring
these workers, especially in smaller companies.
The cost of the average accommodation is only $500, she
said, so "don't focus on the obstacles. They can be overcome, especially
with innovations in technology." She also suggested that employers look
into state and nonprofit funding for accommodations.
To read the rest of this article, click here.
DOD, DHS find voice in blogs
Federal Computer Week
By Wade-Hahn Chan
Agencies are increasingly using
blogs to communicate with the public, bypassing the mainstream media and
engaging readers directly.
As a result, those agencies are distributing their
message to a wide audience and creating a forum for government officials to
interact directly with people.
Government agencies host 30 ongoing blogs on various
subjects, from AIDS awareness to personal blogs of agency officials, such as
Robert Carey, the Navy's chief information officer.
"These tools are really a way to bring people closer to
the government," said Gwynne Kostin, the Homeland Security Department's Web
communications director. By posting on a blog and getting other bloggers to
link to and respond to those posts, agency news can reach a wider audience than
they can through a TV report or brief newspaper story, said Kostin, who spoke
at the American Learning Institute's Social Media in Government conference last
week.
The Defense Department has been one of the most
successful agencies at using blogs -- both its own and others'. Jack Holt, chief
of new media operations at DOD's Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense,
said the traditional method of shopping press releases to newspapers and TV
stations is less effective now.
The media, he said, quickly dropped coverage of a heated
battle that took place early February in Baghdad, dubbed the Battle on Haifa
Street, in favor of reporting the death of former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole
Smith.
That experience convinced Holt that he needed to target
people who were passionate about military news: military bloggers, a group that
includes veterans, warfighters' spouses, historians and other people interested
in the military and current events. Holt organizes frequent roundtables with
those bloggers, giving them access to DOD officials to talk about various
subjects and events.
To read the rest of this article, click here.
