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Washington, D.C. — Any efforts to reform federal hiring methods must maintain the competitive hiring process, unlike the current Federal Career Intern Program (FCIP) which circumvents merit principles and veteran’s preferences and should be ended, said the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) at a forum on federal government hiring.

“Reforms to the competitive hiring process will accomplish little if agencies are permitted to continue to avoid competitive hiring by misusing excepted service hiring authority, particularly the FCIP,” NTEU said during remarks at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) event. “The FCIP is a perfect example of hiring gone awry,” NTEU added.

NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley has repeatedly called for ending the FCIP because of abuses by agencies using it as a primary hiring tool in flagrant disregard of the original intent of the structured, two-year training and intern development program.

“Agencies can use the FCIP for almost any position, with no limit on the number of ‘interns’ they may hire, and no requirement that competitive recruitment and selection procedures be followed,” NTEU said. The resulting ‘interns’ are indistinguishable from their competitive service counterparts.

President Obama has ordered OPM to conduct a 90-day review of the FCIP. NTEU strongly supports this long-overdue evaluation. “We believe am objective review will result in a recommendation to end the program,” NTEU said.

That the FCIP is not an internship program under any commonly accepted definition is supported by its widespread use at federal agencies. The program has grown from 400 hires in its first year to 26,709 FCIP hires in 2009.

Since 2003, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has used the FCIP as its exclusive method for hiring all incoming CBP Officers, and it has since expanded its use of the FCIP to hire all incoming Border Patrol Officers and Agriculture Specialists. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation began using FCIP in 2005 to hire Financial Institution Specialists, and the Internal Revenue Service began using the program in 2006 to hire key enforcement employees, including Revenue Agents and Revenue Officers. The list of agencies abuses goes on and on.

Furthermore, agencies are specifically using FCIP to circumvent veterans’ preference requirements. NTEU cited a recent report from the Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) which found that a regional office had engaged in a prohibited personnel practice by giving several candidates for vacancies improper advantages during the hiring process under the FCIP.

In an e-mail, an EPA hiring official cited the use of FCIP because the agency did not “want to risk losing the candidates we want to hire…who may get blocked by veterans via USAJobs.”

NTEU has mounted a multi-pronged legal attack on the FCIP, in district court and before the Merit Systems Protection Board.

Outside of limited internships, NTEU supports competitive hiring in the civil service for all.

“We see no reason why the existing competitive hiring procedures should not remain the primary hiring method for recent college graduates,” NTEU said. The union added that it will strongly oppose any attempt by OPM to recreate the FCIP through a new “internship” for recent college graduates seeking entry-level positions in the federal government.

As OPM moves forward with hiring reform, NTEU offered support for: 1) elimination of the Federal Career Intern Program; 2) a return to competitive hiring in the federal government, including the hiring of most recent college graduates; 3) meaningful reforms in federal hiring; 4) a limited intern program for a small number of college students and recent graduates with special expertise needed by the government; and 5) retention and promotion opportunities for frontline employees.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union, representing 150,000 employees in 31 agencies and departments.