Agencies not tracking special government employees

The Federal Headlines is a daily compilation of the stories you hear discussed on  Federal Drive with Tom Temin. 

In today’s Top Federal Headlines, the Government Accountability Office says agency managers don’t know how many SGE’s they have working for them.

• Agencies don’t do an adequate job of tracking how many special government employees they use. SGEs are temps with special expertise. Most work on federal boards. They’re not supposed to work in agencies for more than 130 days in a year. The Government Accountability Office found agencies have about 1,100 specials at a given time. But because managers don’t know for sure, they can’t track SGEs who might be violating conflict of interest or other ethics rules. (Government Accountability Office)

• Senior Executives will soon be able to get more money. New guidance from the Office of Personnel Management and the Office of Management and Budget has directed agencies to raise their limits on Senior Executive Service bonus spending to 7.5 percent  of employees’ aggregate salaries from 4.8 percent. It also included methods for how to use awards to increase retainment and recruitment. (Federal News Radio)

• The Office of Personnel Management wants federal employees to stay connected no matter where their office might be. As part of OPM’s ongoing employee engagement webinar series, the agency is taking a look at how to communicate with employees who work remotely. The goal is to use more than just the phone or email for communication, and to regularly meet with employees to talk about work and then some. (Office of Personnel Management)

• The next large IT services contract is under fire. The General Services Administration is facing its first protest on the $50 billion Alliant 2 governmentwide acquisition contract. Enterprise Information Services submitted a complaint to the Government Accountability Office on Aug. 10. EIS is protesting GSA’s terms of the solicitation. Sources tell Federal News Radio EIS is arguing the RFP violates federal contracting law as it does not state that the agency will perform a cost realism analysis before picking winners. GAO has until November 18 to decide on the protest. (Federal News Radio)

• Some good cybersecurity news for the Commerce, Energy, and Justice Departments. The congressional reviews from each agency’s inspector general required by the Cybersecurity Act of 2015 show the three agencies have all made positive gains in strengthening their cybersecurity. For instance, DoJ is making progress in implementing personal identity verification access for users. (Department of Commerce Office of Inspector General, Department of Energy Office of Inspector General, Department of Justice Office of Inspector General)

• Appointed representatives of people filing claims with the Social Security Administration may have some new standards and rules of conduct to abide by. SSA has proposed new revisions to the standards representatives must follow when helping SSA claimants. It’s also looking to clarify its procedures when charging reps who break the rules. The agency says the changes are needed to address some representative conduct it has deemed inappropriate. (Federal Register)

• The Veterans Affairs Department has 40 applications from medical centers across the country to be part of the VA’s innovation network. The department heard from over 30 different projects from eight pilot sites across the country. The VA made investments in 38 of these innovation pilots so far. The goal is get average federal employees thinking about simple new tools and ideas they can implement to improve their experience at the VA.

• Top Air Force officials have been working on ways to offer the Air Force’s airworthiness expertise “as a service” to U.S. Aerospace companies — partially as a way to boost foreign military sales for aircraft the Air Force might never buy on its own. The brand-new Non-Defense Military Aircraft Office will use cooperative research and development agreements — it’s just inked the first one, with Textron. Air Force experts will evaluate that company’s aircraft against government standards. In exchange, the military hopes to get smarter about ongoing innovations in commercial aviation long before it has to put together its next solicitation to buy a new airplane. (Air Force)

• Workers will break ground on the site for the Virginia National Guard’s new state headquarters today. The new facility will be located on the northern section of the Defense Supply Center Richmond in Chesterfield County. The adjutant general of Virginia, Virginia National Guard joint staff, and Air National Guard staff will all stage there. (WRIC)

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