Feds in Anchorage, Fairbanks and Juneau, Alaska, will have to tighten their belts a little after Dec. 3. That is the day those employees’ cost-of-living allowances will drop from 24 percent to 23 percent, the Office of Personnel Management said in a Nov. 3 Federal Register notice. The reductions are based on cost-of-living surveys OPM conducted in 2006. And the COLA in those cities could drop even further. OPM in August proposed reducing the allowance to 22 percent. That reduction would not occur until December 2009 at the earliest. The COLA for federal employees in other parts of Alaska will remain unchanged at…
A curious memo may halt spending on many earmarks intended for federal agencies. OMB Director Jim Nussle issued a memo Oct. 23 detailing conditions that must be met for agencies to spend earmarks embedded in the fiscal year 2009 continuing resolution, which also contains the Defense, Homeland Security and Veterans’ Affairs appropriations. In order for an agency to allocate funding for an earmark, the earmark must meet three conditions. They are: 1. It must have been in the FY 2008 appropriations bill; 2. It must continue in 2009 and beyond (no one-time, non-recurring projects or grants); and 3. The affected…
Earlier today we mentioned Barack Obama’s slight fundraising edge among federal employees in the presidential race; he’s received about 13 percent more from feds than his rival, John McCain. In case you’re wondering how this compares to recent elections: In 2004, George W. Bush received three times as much from federal employees as John Kerry did. Bush hauled in about $249,000 from government employees, compared with Kerry’s $80,000. If feds vote with their wallets, they’re significantly more excited about Obama’s candidacy than they were about Kerry’s.
T’is the season — open season, that is. Beginning next Monday, Nov. 10, you have four weeks to choose your insurers for health, dental and vision coverage in 2009. You can also set up flexible spending accounts for pretax savings on health and dependent care expenses. You can start your planning today, as the Office of Personnel Management has posted premiums and other details on the 2009 plans. Happy shopping.
This has been an astoundingly expensive presidential campaign — more than $1 billion spent since the primaries. How much did federal employees contribute? We decided to take a look at the donor database for both candidates. Barack Obama seems to have the fundraising edge among feds: his donations outpaced John McCain’s by about 13 percent. Defense Department employees contributed nearly half of the total amount donated by feds — not surprising, since Defense is by far the largest federal agency. The Agriculture Department seems to have contributed the least: just $250 for Obama, and nothing for McCain. The agency-by-agency numbers…
Hard to believe, but after nearly two years of campaigning, we’re just 24 hours away from voting for a new president. Voter turnout tomorrow is expected to reach record highs — so be prepared to spend some time waiting in line at your polling place. Not sure where that is? Maryland: Polls are open from 7:00 am to 8:00 pm. Check your polling place here. Virginia: Polls are open from 6:00 am to 7:00 pm. Check your polling place here. District of Columbia: Polls are open from 7:00 am to 8:00 pm. Check your polling place here. (If you live…
Citizens like you, they really like you…or at least your agencies’ websites. That’s according to the latest quarterly report released by ForeSee Results today. ForeSee is that company that helps the government conduct its user feedback analysis. You may have seen their little while survey boxes pop up when you’re cruising your favorite dot-gov site. ForeSee sees that the customer satisfaction with federal websites is on the rise. In the latest report satisfaction improved 1.4 percent to 73.9 on the American Customer Satisfaction Index 100-point scale. That figure is just the governmentwide average. Approximately 25 percent of government sites scored…
Can’t find a worthy charity in the Combined Federal Campaign? Send a check to the Scott Bloch Legal Defense Trust! (Donations are not tax-deductible, sorry.) The recently-retired special counsel is looking for help to defray his mounting legal costs. Bloch was forced out of office last week, an event that capped years of controversy surrounding his tenure, but still faces an ongoing grand jury investigation. The Web site includes praise for Bloch from a number of conservative luminaries, including Weekly Standard executive editor Fred Barnes, Heritage Foundation co-founder Paul Weyrich, and Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) Noticeably absent is any praise…
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., plans to introduce a bill next month to cap executives’ pay — and the bill has a catchy name. The “Stop the Greed on Wall Street Act” would ban companies that received cash from the Treasury Department’s financial rescue plan from paying any employees more than $400,000. That’s the salary currently earned by the U.S. president. The cap would make $400,000 the max for total compensation, including cars, benefits and retirement, all of which have added up to millions of extra dollars for CEOs. Outlining legislation he plans to introduce when Congress reconvenes next month, Sanders…
We’ve written before, on this blog and in the newspaper, about the problems at Interior’s Minerals Management Service, which collects royalties from oil and gas exploration projects on federal lands. The most recent problems affect the “royalty-in-kind” program, which collects royalties in the form of oil and gas instead of cash; MMS sells the products for a profit. MMS says it’s more lucrative than a cash royalty program; good-government groups and many experts disagree. Apparently, so does the Government Accountability Office (pdf): MMS’s annual reports to the Congress do not fully describe the performance of the royalty-in-kind program and, in…