May 13, 2008
A summary of daily news relevant to the federal workforce produced by the Partnership for Public Service.
- Celebrate Public Service at a Washington Nationals Game!
- Federal Pay Reform Will Continue, Officials Predict
- Management Score Card Showing More Top Grades
- Federal Diary: Tax Deadbeats on the Government Payroll
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)
Federal Pay Reform Will Continue, Officials Predict
Federal Times
By Stephen Losey
The effort to bring pay for performance to the federal government will likely continue no matter who replaces President Bush in the White House, two
leading human capital officials said May 12.
David Chu, the Defense Department's undersecretary for personnel and readiness, pointed out at the Excellence in Government conference in Washington
that while congressional Democrats altered portions of Defense's National Security Personnel System late last year, they did not repeal the
system.
That was "the most important political signal given last year," Chu said. "They could have decided to reverse NSPS; they did not. That was a pointed
decision" and is a sign that pay for performance will survive.
A similar pay-for-performance system at the Homeland Security Department was dismantled by court rulings in 2006 and Congress' 2007 decision to
withdraw its funding.
But lawmakers last year kept NSPS afloat -- with modifications: They required the Pentagon to bargain with unions over how an estimated 225,000
bargaining-unit employees would be enrolled in NSPS; and they changed how much of the annual pay raise was distributed to employees and how much was
put into a pool to be distributed based on performance.
Chu and Office of Personnel Management Director Linda Springer said they believe members of both parties recognize that linking pay raises and
bonuses to employees' performance is necessary to allow the government to compete with the private sector for talented employees.
"You can have all the notions of public service and satisfaction you want -- and this may sound mercenary -- but at the end of the day, it doesn't
pay the bills," Springer said. "People deserve to be paid fairly, and I think most people recognize that."
Management Score Card Showing More Top Grades
Government Executive
By Robert Brodsky
Federal agencies are showing
consistent progress in implementing President's Management Agenda,
scoring among the highest grades yet on the administration's quarterly
score card, the Office of Management and Budget said.
For the
second quarter of fiscal 2008, which ended March 31, roughly half of
the agencies' status scores were green, the highest grade possible,
according to data released last week
by OMB. Meanwhile, more than three-quarters of agency progress scores
-- which rate advancements based on preestablished deliverables and
timelines -- received grades of green.
The percentage of green is the third-highest since the stoplight-style grading system was introduced six years ago, OMB said.
"All
this green is driven by agency interest in better management
practices," said Clay Johnson, OMB's deputy director for management.
"Federal employees want their agencies to be more effective and
efficient, and they continue to welcome the opportunity to demonstrate
their ability to perform better and better every year."
For the
second consecutive quarter, the Labor Department, the Social Security
Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency each earned
green ratings on all five PMA initiatives: human capital, competitive
sourcing, financial performance, e-government and performance
improvement. Labor has earned perfect scores since the second quarter
of 2005.
While the most recent score card showed improvements in some categories, progress was somewhat offset by declines in others.
For
example, the Office of Personnel Management brought its e-gov score up
from red to green, while OMB's score in that category went from yellow
to green. The Commerce and Health and Human Services departments,
however, headed in the opposite direction, dropping by two and one
grades, respectively.
OMB credited itself with the most progress
of any of the 26 agencies evaluated. In addition to its e-gov score,
the agency also went up a notch in financial performance, performance
improvement and competitive sourcing.
Johnson wrote in a memo
accompanying the grades that they showed a high degree of improvement
from the original score card in 2002, when "the performance of federal
programs was assessed only on an as-needed, inconsistent basis. Half of
all programs could not demonstrate they were achieving results, and
only half had clear, outcome-oriented goals."
Regardless of
whether the next administration continues the score card system,
Johnson wrote, "every government program will be held accountable for
improving its performance and making its performance public and
transparent."
Those performance challenges will likely include tightened controls on the use of government purchase cards.
A March Government Accountability report (GAO-08-333)
found that nearly 41 percent of $14 billion in purchase card
transactions were not properly authorized. Federal employees, the
report found, used the cards for subscriptions to Internet dating
services and to purchase iPods and lingerie.
OMB officials found
a silver lining in the GAO report, arguing that once the breakdown in
internal controls was discovered, agency leaders moved quickly to
recover inappropriately spent funds and to discipline those involved.
Agencies are now in the process of implementing more stringent card
usage policies.
"We are encouraged that agencies and auditors
have more tools today to bring to light the unacceptable ... credit
card misuse," said Danny Werfel, OMB's deputy controller. "With these
tools, agencies are taking immediate action to address charge card
misuse through disciplinary actions and other measures and are now
tightening controls and policies to eliminate abuses of the charge card
program."
No agency saw its financial performance score drop as a result of the purchase card controversy.
Tax Deadbeats on the Government Payroll
The Washington
Post
By Stephen Barr
Federal employees are held to a high standard when it comes to ethics and the public trust. That's also the case when it comes to taxes.
Recently released data from the Internal Revenue Service show that federal employees owed $1.23 billion in overdue taxes in October 2007. According
to the IRS snapshot, 3.79 percent of federal employees could be labeled tax deadbeats.
A billion-dollar tax debt sounds pretty bad. But the percentage of federal employees who have not paid their taxes on time actually has dropped
slightly. For example, in 2005, the delinquency rate was 3.93 percent, and in 2006, 3.81 percent.
The compliance rate for the government is generally better than the rate for all Americans, the IRS said. The agency, though, does not release data
that can be compared against information on federal employees, in part because the IRS knows a lot more about the income of people who work or have
worked for Uncle Sam and can more easily match payroll, pension and other documents.
The IRS has been checking on federal employees since 1993 as part of a project called the Federal Employee/Retiree Delinquency Initiative, or FERDI.
Government employees and retirees are considered delinquent if they have an unresolved federal income liability or have not filed a tax return.
The 2007 data show that 171,549 federal employees owed the $1.23 billion in overdue taxes. Of those, 69,383 had entered into installment agreements
to pay off $388.6 million of the back taxes.
Almost every corner of the government has its share of tax laggards, including Congress and the White House, the data show.
In the House of Representatives, with more than 10,700 employees, the delinquency rate was 4.03 percent. The Senate, with nearly 6,700 employees, had
a delinquency rate of 3.16 percent. At the Executive Office of the President, with 1,700 employees, it was 2.21 percent.
Some of the more notable delinquency rates were in relatively small agencies, where percentages are higher even though only several dozens of
employees owe taxes. The delinquency rate was 7.23 percent at the Government Printing Office, 6.67 percent at the Federal Labor Relations Authority,
5.46 percent at the Smithsonian Institution, and 5 percent at the Merit Systems Protection Board.
Some large departments also had a higher proportion of tax laggards than the government-wide delinquency rate. The rate was 4.68 percent for civilian
employees of the Army, 4.44 percent at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and 4.16 percent at the Department of Health and Human
Services.
The government's retirees also fall behind on their tax obligations, according to the IRS. More than 132,000 military retirees owed $1.47 billion in
overdue taxes, for a delinquency rate of 4.05 percent. More than 66,000 federal civilian retirees owed $558.5 million, for a delinquency rate of 2.42
percent.
The grand total owed by federal employees, military personnel and retirees came to $3.58 billion. Those overdue taxes were owed by 449,531 people out
of 9 million government employees and retirees, the IRS calculated.
While those amounts are large, it's important to note that the IRS brought in $2.69 trillion in taxes in fiscal 2007. The most recent estimate of the
"tax gap," the difference between what taxpayers should have paid and what they actually paid on a timely basis, is $345 billion.
Not surprisingly, IRS employees have one of the best compliance rates. For 2007, the IRS delinquency rate was 0.89 percent, down from 1 percent in
2006 and 2007. IRS employees can be fired for failing to comply with the tax code under the 1998 law that restructured the agency.
