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Washington, D.C – Federal employees, the nonpolitical career professionals with the most insight and experience into how government works best, are not being adequately consulted in the ongoing reorganization, National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) President Tony Reardon told Congress today.

As a result, agency leaders are already pursuing unwise reforms that would fail to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their departments. These reforms are based on proposed budgets that do not have congressional approval and, in some cases, actually contradict the administration’s own goal of reducing layers of management, Reardon said.

“We fear that such reform efforts without employee involvement will fail, adversely impacting the morale of the federal workforce as well as the services we provide to the American people,” Reardon said in testimony submitted to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs and Federal Management examining the Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) April 12 memorandum on the federal workforce.

In one stark example, the Farm Service Agency at the U.S. Department of Agriculture last month submitted to Congress a reorganization of its budget office that resulted in a manager-to-employee ratio of 1 to 5, nowhere near the administration’s own recommendation of 1 to 11.

NTEU, which was not consulted before the plan was submitted, alerted USDA to the shortcoming and offered a solution, to no avail, Reardon said.

NTEU is also concerned that the administration’s reorganization is designed to replace civil servants with private sector contractors, despite the government’s poor track record of outsourcing that led to cost overruns and poor taxpayer service.

Reardon reminded the committee of the Internal Revenue Service’s twice-abandoned efforts to turn debt collection cases over to private agencies paid on commission after it turned out to cost the government more, not less.

“By ensuring that the outsourcing process is fair and that federal employees are able to compete for work with contractors on an even playing field, federal agencies will be better able to provide high quality services and will save taxpayer dollars and achieve the goals for the OMB Memorandum,” Reardon said.

Reardon met with OMB about how the union can help with the reorganization.

“However, to date we have not heard back from OMB regarding NTEU’s request to have OMB counsel agencies to reach out and involve front-line employees,” Reardon told Congress.

A June 30 deadline was set for “high level” reorganization plans.

NTEU represents 150,000 employees at 31 federal agencies and departments.