Archives for August 2022

With the end of fiscal year 2022 approaching and a Sept. 30 deadline, Congress still has a lot on its plate to avoid a continuing resolution (CR), or potentially a government shutdown.

Although some lawmakers have said a CR is already nearly inevitable, there are several key components on Congress’ to-do list when the House and Senate return from the August recess.

Appropriations bills

So far, the House passed six of its 12 spending bills for fiscal 2023 on July 20. Senate Democrats also released draft legislation for the 12 companion appropriations bills on July 28.

If any of the 12 bills don’t pass Congress by the end of September, lawmakers will likely put forward a CR for those components. CRs are common; the federal government has operated on them for all but three of the last 46 years, the Government Accountability Office reported on Aug. 1.

For federal agencies, a CR would mean temporarily continuing the same funding levels from last fiscal year. Federal unions, like the National Treasury Employees Union, said CRs have severe impacts on agencies’ functions.

“Too many federal agencies are still suffering from several years of budget cuts or flat budgets that have stalled hiring and affected the ability to deliver on their missions,” NTEU National President Tony Reardon wrote in an email to Federal News Network.

The House already passed the 2023 financial services and general government appropriations bill, but Senate Democrats’ version is still in its draft form. Neither the House nor the Senate mentioned the White House’s 4.6% federal pay raise proposal in the spending bill, meaning they aligned with that across-the-board percentage.

NTEU, though, said it will continue to push for a higher pay raise for federal employees next year.

“NTEU is supporting the 5.1% average pay raise for federal employees in 2023 as contained in the FAIR Act,” Reardon wrote. “Given the ongoing disparity between public and private-sector salaries, and rising costs, we believe a 5.1% pay increase is absolutely warranted.”

In their draft appropriations bill, Senate Democrats also included a lift on the pay freeze for senior political appointees, a provision that has remained in place since at least 2014.

National Defense Authorization Act and Schedule F

The National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2023 passed the House on July 14, which would appropriate roughly $840 billion in national defense spending. It also included several provisions directly impacting the federal workforce.

The bill aligned with the White House’s 4.6% pay raise request for military personnel, a step toward the same pay raise for civilian feds. Another provision in the legislation would establish a $15 minimum wage for federal contractors.

Part of the House’s version of NDAA, which Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) introduced, would block the return of Schedule F, a now-rescinded Trump-era executive order that would make roughly 50,000 feds at-will workers. Similar language to try to prevent Schedule F was also included in Senate Democrats’ financial services and general government appropriations bill.

Republican lawmakers, though, proposed legislation that would put in place regulations similar to what Schedule F previously allowed. Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) introduced legislation to abolish the Merit Systems Protection Board, an agency created to let federal employees appeal firings or workplace retaliation. The bill, however, is unlikely to make it through Congress with Republicans currently in the minority in both houses.

Social Security Fairness Act

A key piece of bipartisan legislation that’s gained traction would repeal two provisions that either reduce or eliminate Social Security benefits for retired federal employees and their spouses.

The Social Security Fairness Act, which Rep. Rodney Davis (R-Ill.) introduced and Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) sponsored, recently surpassed 290 co-sponsors. John Hatton, staff vice president for policy and programs at the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association, told Federal News Network that the high number of co-sponsors could propel the bill to a House floor vote.

“With recent House rules changes, securing more than 290 cosponsors has real significance,” Hatton said. “Congressman Davis has filed a motion to add the bill to the House consensus calendar, which may force either a House vote or committee action.”

The bill would remove both the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP) and the Government Pension Offset (GPO). The WEP reduces Social Security benefits for federal retirees in the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS), who have earned both a CSRS pension and Social Security benefits through private sector work. The GPO reduces Social Security benefits for spouses, widows and widowers of federal retirees affected by the WEP.

“Both the WEP and the GPO have unfairly penalized federal retirees for decades,” Hatton said. “In some cases, GPO completely eliminates Social Security survivor benefits for widows. House members have shown high levels of support for repeal of these provisions in the past.”

The Senate also introduced companion legislation for the Social Security Fairness Act.

Equal COLA Act

The Equal COLA Act received some attention this year in Congress, with high inflation levels over the last several months.

Currently, CSRS retirees and Social Security beneficiaries receive cost of living adjustments, or COLAs, that match inflation levels. After Congress switched federal employees to a new retirement system during the 1980s, retirees under the Federal Employee Retirement System now receive a smaller COLA, with the exact deduction dependent on how high inflation is in a given year.

The Equal COLA Act would remove the disparity between COLAs for FERS and CSRS retirees.

“With inflation as high as it’s been for decades, FERS retirees are seeing the value of their hard-earned retirement benefits erode as prices rise,” Hatton said. “Without an adequate COLA for two years and counting, a key component of their retirement income will continue to weaken.”

Senate confirmations

Out of roughly 4,000 politically appointed positions at agencies, around 1,200 of those roles require Senate confirmation after the president picks a nominee. So far, for the Biden administration, the Senate has confirmed 442 positions.

The chart below, which Federal News Network obtained from the Partnership for Public Service, shows the Biden administration’s progress in Senate nominations and confirmations compared with other recent administrations.

The Partnership for Public Service, in collaboration with the Washington Post, also have a tracker of how many key roles Biden has filled to date. You can see that tracker here.

In addition to Senate confirmations, the Partnership’s President and CEO Max Stier wrote in an email to Federal News Network that passing Congressional spending bills on time is key to ensuring agencies’ effectiveness.

“Keeping the government’s lights on is one of Congress’ most important and basic functions,” Stier wrote. “Patchwork funding by continuing resolution takes our civil service’s focus away from solving the many problems they confront every day, threatens the effective delivery of services the public depends on and wastes government resources. On-time passage of funding bills is not only the right thing to do, it also makes good fiscal sense.”

 

The Army is delaying the further release of its massive human resources and benefits IT program for the second time in a year, citing issues with stress tests and soldier feedback.

The Integrated Personnel and Pay System – Army (IPPS-A) is the service’s attempt to consolidate dozens of duplicative pay and benefits systems, give soldiers mobile access to human resources information and unveil new features to soldiers like a talent marketplace to help them find their next station.

The program, however, has hit a snag on its third release — preceding releases broke ground on IPPS-A and gave some initial program aspects to members of the National Guard.

“Release 3” is a landmark for the program because it gives essential personnel services and talent management abilities to active duty, reserve and Guard soldiers.

That release hit a snag last October, which was supposed to take about a year to iron out, but now the Army says it needs to delay it further.

“We made significant progress due to the great work by our soldiers who participated as system testers, but we have more work to do before IPPS-A is ready,” Lt. Gen. Doug Stitt, deputy chief of staff, G-1, said in an Aug. 12 release. “We must get this right for our soldiers and our Army families.”

A stress test that is used to check the readiness of the system, paired with solider feedback found more issues that need to be handled before release 3 can make its debut, the Army said in the release.

This particular delay is holding off what the Army calls the Legacy Systems HR Brownout, which shuts off old systems that will be taken over by IPPS-A. The brownout precedes the cutover phase, which allows some of IPPS-A’s features to go live.

“While we delayed the brownout, Army senior Leaders will make the final decision in the coming weeks on how that ultimately affects the currently scheduled September go-live date,” Army spokesman Hank Minitrez told Federal News Network. “The team is quickly assessing the results of the [stress tests], what fixes need to be applied and the time required to retest and validate final functionality of the system. Those actions best inform us on recommendations moving forward.”

Minitrez said in the meantime soldiers should not expect to see much impact in their daily lives.

“Soldiers who were scheduled to permanent changes of station (PCS) will PCS,” he said. “Plans were developed to ensure that those who were supposed to be promoted during brownout and cutover were promoted once IPPS-A comes online. Legacy systems will be operating normally, so there will be no disruption to soldier promotions.”

The Army’s original delay to release 3 last October was also due to stress testing.

IPPS-A has had some cost growth and time slippage even before then. Original estimates on the program had the Army hitting the payroll phase by 2016, according to 2012 Congressional hearing. That is now slated for the mid-2020s.

The Army awarded a five-year, $159 million contract to CACI in 2015 to develop the program. It won a second two-year, $112.5 million contract modification in 2019 for continued support work on IPPS-A.

Adding in other contracts related to development, support and equipment for the program, the Army has already spent about $900 million on building IPPS-A, and another $200 million on testing, support and implementation. It has another $77 million budgeted for development in 2022 and $16 million for training.

Minitrez said the Army has made progress on the program since last October.

“The Army has not wavered in its commitment to getting IPPS-A, release 3 to the Army and this time has been devoted to fixing and replanning testing of the system while also ensuring readiness of the Force to begin using the system,” he said. “In an effort to best prepare the force, we conducted additional Rehearsal of Concept drills of Brownout/Cutover actions. These drills helped refine our internal processes and allowed Commands to practice execution of their tasks.”

He added that they “never stopped training and preparing the force [for] this monumental transformation. Last summer, the completion rates for mandatory training were less than ideal. That training is essential to ensure that HR professionals can conduct daily business and provide support for our customers. To stress the importance and requirements, we added several more engagements across the Army, added additional training opportunities and focused messaging to Leaders and the Force. While we still have a little ways to go, the Force has responded and our training rates have increased significantly.”

As the travel industry — and prices — recover from COVID-19, the General Services Administration is giving federal employees a little more leeway on hotel costs for official travel.

The base daily traveling allowances will rise slightly from $155 per day in 2021 to $157 per day in 2022. Per diem lodging rates will account for that rise, increasing from $96 per night to $98. Meals and incidental expenses will not change from their current range of $59-$79 per day.

For feds who already have an idea of their travel plans for fiscal 2023, GSA included a new calculator tool that will allow them to search by city, state, zip code or a map to determine the exact amount of their per diem.

Per diem rates are based on average daily rate (ADR) data from the lodging industry. By law, the General Services Administration sets these rates annually. While the ADR declined sharply due to COVID restrictions, GSA decided to freeze lodging rates at 2021 levels. But according to STR, the contractor that provides GSA with this data, the ADR has increased significantly since the beginning of 2021 and at points even exceeded 2019 pre-pandemic levels.

Much of the United States — about 2,600 counties — are covered by the standard Continental United States (CONUS) per diem rates. There are, however, 316 non-standard areas (NSAs), which have higher per diem rates than the standard CONUS allowance. That’s after GSA removed three regions from the NSA list, and sorted them back into the CONUS category:

• Cromwell/Old Saybrook, Connecticut (Middlesex County)
• El Paso, Texas (El Paso County)
• Rock Springs, Wyoming (Sweetwater County)

No new NSA regions were added for 2023.

GSA also takes seasonal rate changes into account.

“To better represent seasonal rate fluctuations, GSA has created seasonal rate periods in many markets where there is a sustained period (two or more months in length) where rates (ADR) are different from the preceding or following period by at least 15%,” the website says.

For example, according to GSA’s calculator, a fed traveling to New York City in October through December of 2022 would receive $286 per night for lodging. But in January and February, they would only receive $159 per night for lodging.

GSA also noted that there are allowances for increased travel reimbursements where the standards rates are insufficient. The Code of Federal Regulations outlines instances where this would apply, as well as guidance on the maximum amounts that can be reimbursed.

It’s up to GSA to establish per diem rates for CONUS, which includes the 48 contiguous states and the District of Columbia. The Defense Department sets per diem rates for Alaska, Hawaii and the U.S. territories, while the State Department handles foreign rates.