[UPDATE AS OF 5:15 P.M EST TODAY: HEARING HAS BEEN POSTPONED UNTIL JULY 10] For anyone who hasn’t seen it, here is the official witness list for this Wednesday’s House hearing on the proposed revamp of the Combined Federal Campaign. Rep. Dave Reichert, R-Wash., will lead off, followed by: Mark Lambert, Associate Director for Merit System Accountability and Compliance U.S. Office of Personnel Management Kalman Stein President and CEO EarthShare Debby Hampton President and CEO United Way of Central Oklahoma Ju’Coby Pittman President and CEO Clara White Mission Ken Berger President and CEO Charity Navigator The hearing is scheduled for…
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Starting this January, federal employees and their families will have an expanded lineup of both vision and dental insurance plans to choose from, the Office of Personnel Management announced this afternoon. The number of dental plans will increase from seven to 10, according to a news release, while the number of vision carriers will rise from three to four. The last time OPM opened up the Federal Employees Dental and Vision Insurance Program (FEDVIP) to new entrants was 2006. Premium rates and coverage will be announced later this year before Open Season begins, acting Director Elaine Kaplan said in the…
The Veterans Affairs Department’s outreach strategy to try get Boston area vets enrolled in benefits is targeting the town’s famous love of sports. The VA is paying $7,500 a piece to run ads in annual yearbooks for the New England Patriots and Boston’s Red Sox, Celtics and Bruins, which, by the way, need two games to win hockey’s Stanley Cup. Michael B. McNamara, outreach program manager for the VA’s New England healthcare system, said in a phone interview that the VA as been running ads in the yearbooks for two years. So far, the strategy of reaching out to vets…
An undercover investigation by the General Services Administration’s watchdog office has traced second-hand computer equipment originally costing the U.S. government about $25 million to more than a dozen sham educational organizations and, ultimately, back to one man: Steven Alexander Bolden. Federal prosecutors in Tacoma, Wash., earlier this month filed fraud charges against Bolden, saying he tricked the government into believing he represented schools and thus was eligible for access to GSA’s Computers for Learning program. Under the program, agencies, as permitted by law, can transfer surplus computers and technology equipment to schools and nonprofit educational groups. The investigation, which was…
The mailing industry is regrouping for battle over the possibility of an emergency rate increase request from the U.S. Postal Service. After lying dormant for the last 2-1/2 years, the Affordable Mail Alliance, made up of nine trade groups and companies, issued a news release yesterday stating that the USPS Board of Governors “is set to decide on the matter imminently.” The board, which is scheduled to meet in closed session next Tuesday, ordered postal management to study the possibility of an “exigent” rate increase earlier this spring after abandoning plans to end Saturday mail delivery. At this point, no…
Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has just released a “discussion draft” of a bill intended to put the U.S. Postal Service on a more stable, long-term financial footing. The bill, which has not yet been introduced, bears some resemblance to the measure that the California Republican unsuccessfully pushed in the 2011-2012 session of Congress. It would, for example, temporarily replace the USPS board of governors with a presidentially appointed panel of five outside executives who would have the power to shake up the agency’s top management and take any steps necessary under the…
The proposed overhaul of the Combined Federal Campaign has gotten Congress’s attention. Although a final date hasn’t been nailed down yet, the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee on the federal workforce is looking into holding a hearing late this month or in early July, Meaghan Cronin, a spokeswoman for the panel’s chairman, Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Texas, said in an email. The purpose, she said, is “to better understand the impact” of what the Office of Personnel Management is proposing for the CFC. No witness list at this point. Confirmation of the impending hearing comes five days after OPM closed…
Dubbed a traitor by House Speaker John Boehner and yet hailed as a brave whistleblower by Daniel Ellsberg, Edward Snowden’s leaks about National Security Agency data collection techniques have ignited public debate about privacy, security and the scope of U.S. government surveillance activities. But legally speaking, the 29-year old, self described high school dropout isn’t really a whistleblower: “Whistleblowers are individuals who have engaged in lawful disclosure,” said R. Scott Oswald, managing principal of The Employment Law Group, a DC-based law firm that represents whistleblowers, including some in the intelligence community. Snowden, however, leaked classified information subject to a court…
Time and time again, big contractors went over the heads of General Service Administration contracting officers who were trying to negotiate good prices for the government. But when it came time to choose, GSA supervisors sided with the contractors. That’s the conclusion of recent GSA Office of Inspector report that raises troubling questions about the enormous pressure contracting officers can come under from contractors with close ties to managers and even members of Congress. While GSA says it’s got new management and won’t tolerate such interference nowadays, the bigger questions are whether this sort of thing happens elsewhere, not just…
For anyone who’s counting, this week marks six months since an advisory board released 14 recommendations for modernizing the national security classification system. The White House remains on square one—mulling the board’s first recommendation to form a steering committee to guide implementation of the other 13. “Options for the creation of a senior-level group are currently being considered,” said Laura Lucas, a National Security Council spokeswoman, who had no information today on the timetable for a decision. The Public Interest Declassification Board issued the recommendations Dec. 6 in response to a 2009 charge from President Obama for a “more fundamental transformation” of the…