Home Media Center News Releases

Washington, D.C.—While the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) continues to analyze the White House fiscal 2011 budget blueprint, its leader said today a preliminary review of the voluminous document shows a number of proposals—including several dealing with the question of who will do the work of the federal government—that would benefit the nation by improving the federal workplace.

“There are a number of positive proposals impacting the federal workforce in the administration’s budget, addressing important contracting issues and ranging from a substantial increase in the number of federal employees eligible to telework to health and wellness pilot programs,” said NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley.

She added: “These kinds of programs significantly increase the ability of federal agencies to recruit and retain talented employees, and that is always good for taxpayers.”

On contracting, the White House document emphasizes the importance of July 2009 guidance from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) directing agencies that account for most federal contracting to conduct a pilot human capital analysis of at least one program or activity where there are concerns about overreliance on contractors.

“In some instances,” the blueprint’s narrative said in a section entitled ‘Improving the Federal Workforce,’ “the result of the pilots may be that agencies replace contractors with federal employees, a step that often saves money at the same time that it improves control over mission and operations.”

That is a view that largely echoes the position long-advanced by President Kelley on the importance of agencies maintaining sufficient in-house capacity to meet mission requirements.

There are other proposals impacting contracting, as well, which President Kelley said would help bring fairness and accountability to the competitive sourcing process.

One would continue a government-wide moratorium on new public-private competitions conducted under OMB Circular A-76, and another would require agencies to create an inventory of all contractor employees performing services for the government. These ‘service contract inventories’ would also have to include the name of the vendor, the type of service provided and the cost of that service.

“For far too long a time,” President Kelley said, referring to the efforts of the previous administration, “the contracting focus was on how to turn more of the work of the federal government over to the private sector. This new focus on the best way to manage the work of the people is a welcome change.”

On other matters, the budget blueprint calls on the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to take steps to generate by 2011 a 50 percent increase in eligibility for teleworking among federal employees beyond the 2009 baseline of 102,900 members of the federal workforce who already telework.

It also calls on OPM to administer the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey annually, beginning this year, as a way “to provide leadership with more current information.” Since 2002, the survey has been administered every two years.

The White House also proposed a change in the methodology used in connection with the locality pay program. It would entail use by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) of data from a measure known as Occupational Employment Statistics (OES).

BLS developed a possible model for use of OES data in response to a request from the Federal Salary Council. A briefing on the proposal will be held later this week.

President Kelley said NTEU will look closely at the proposal and welcomes the opportunity to learn more about it.

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