GSA: Transgender employees must have access to bathroom they identify with

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

• Transgender government employees must be allowed to use the bathrooms that correspond with their gender identity in federal buildings. The General Services Administration issued a notice clarifying that discrimination based on gender does qualify as sex discrimination. (Federal Register)

• The Office of Personnel Management wants to make sure current political hires don’t “burrow” into the next administration. Acting Director Beth Cobert released a memo telling agencies not to hire political appointees for career jobs without OPM approval. Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) wrote letters in July warning agencies about burrowing. (Federal News Radio)

• Federal union leaders say they’re still rebuilding the relationships they lost after former President George W Bush repealed an order that set formal partnerships between federal managers and unions. They want more accountability baked into an executive order during the next administration. President Barack Obama signed an executive order back in 2009 that re-established those formal relationships, but union leaders say there are few measures in the order that actually enforce these relationships.

• The Census Bureau is expecting to train as many as 1 million enumerators and listers as part of the 2020 population count. So the Census is looking for a learning management system that can handle that scale. The bureau issued a request for information earlier this month seeking a software-as-a-service learning management system. The LMS would be the system of record for online and classroom training. Census said it is considering another contract to develop the courses and LMS customization. Responses to this RFI are due Aug. 25. (FedBizzOpps)

• The Internal Revenue Service issued final regulations to clarify who falls under the 2 percent foreign procurement excise tax. A few major exemptions include the tax does not apply to foreign subcontractors doing business with a U.S. based prime contractor. Also foreign contractors who do business with the Agency for International Development will be exempt as well. (Federal Register)

• A new audit suggests the Defense Department has been low-balling the costs of its operations and maintenance functions in every one of its budget proposals since 2009. The O&M accounts make up about 43 percent of DoD’s budget — and the Government Accountability Office said DoD spent, on average, 5.9 percent more in than it proposed to on O&M between 2009 and 2015. There’s nothing illegal about that. Most of it happened via transfers between the Pentagon’s base budget and its wartime accounts. But GAO said the practice makes it difficult for Congress to monitor actual Pentagon spending and compare it against what lawmakers approved, since DoD doesn’t report all of its its O&M obligations on an account-by-account basis. (Government Accountability Office)

• Some former employees of the Environmental Protection Agency were still reaping the benefits of working with the agency. EPA’s Inspector General said 149 employees who had separated from the agency continued to receive transit subsidies, some of which were using their EPA paid transit cards. The IG said the improper payments totaled nearly $1,500. (Environmental Protection Agency Office of Inspector General)

• No cell phone is required to access online Social Security accounts now. SSA issued a policy weeks ago requiring text message authentication for seniors to access their “My Social Security” account online. But members of the Senate Aging Committee, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) urged the agency to rethink the idea since some seniors may not have cellphones and the agency agreed. (Senate Committee on Aging)

• The Justice and Health and Human Services departments are locked in a three-way battle with a major health insurer. Justice blocked a merger between giants Aetna and Humana. Aetna, citing large losses, said it would pull out of state health insurance exchanges it participates in. Health and Human Services faced a partial collapse of the Affordable Care Act. Aetna’s withdrawal would leave some states with no ACA insurance options. Expect Congress to argue over how to reform the law. (U.S. News)

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