Senator: Instead of furloughs, trim deadwood -- FederalDaily.com
http://www.coburn.senate.gov/public...&File_id=dbafe1c5-91b3-4d5b-84bc-a042be409c87
Senator: Instead of furloughs, trim deadwood
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) this week said that before furloughing employees in critical positions, agencies should remove from the federal payroll any employees who are "paid to do nothing."
"It makes little sense to furlough air traffic controllers and border patrol agents," Coburn wrote in a March 27 letter to Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry, "while retaining employees who are AWOL [absent without leave], on standby, not performing official duties, or sitting idle awaiting security clearances."
As an example, Coburn cited an oversight report on AWOL federal employees his office released in 2008 that found that employees at 18 departments and agencies were AWOL for "at least 19.6 million hours between 2001 and 2007."
Coburn also took aim at so-called "official time" that certain employees spend during work hours to attend to union-related activities. He pointed to an OPM report that found that such time spent by employees cost the federal government $155 million in 2011.
He also noted the expense of paying for "standby" employees.
"While it makes sense to have some on standby, such as employees of the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs, others are less obvious, such as standby employees at the Agricultural Marketing Service," he wrote.
While most of his letter targeted federal workers, Coburn did not spare federal contractors, specifically those who are drawing pay while awaiting security clearances, which can take months.
"Under current arrangements, these employees are paid large salaries during waiting periods, but are not given meaningful work," he wrote, citing a Federal Times estimate that put the cost of wasted contractor man-hours at "between $900 million and $1.8 billion a month."
Coburn, ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, asked Berry to provide the committee with numbers and costs associated with standby hours, official time, AWOL employees, and security clearance delays.
http://www.coburn.senate.gov/public...&File_id=dbafe1c5-91b3-4d5b-84bc-a042be409c87
Senator: Instead of furloughs, trim deadwood
- By FederalDaily Staff
- March 28, 2013
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) this week said that before furloughing employees in critical positions, agencies should remove from the federal payroll any employees who are "paid to do nothing."
"It makes little sense to furlough air traffic controllers and border patrol agents," Coburn wrote in a March 27 letter to Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry, "while retaining employees who are AWOL [absent without leave], on standby, not performing official duties, or sitting idle awaiting security clearances."
As an example, Coburn cited an oversight report on AWOL federal employees his office released in 2008 that found that employees at 18 departments and agencies were AWOL for "at least 19.6 million hours between 2001 and 2007."
Coburn also took aim at so-called "official time" that certain employees spend during work hours to attend to union-related activities. He pointed to an OPM report that found that such time spent by employees cost the federal government $155 million in 2011.
He also noted the expense of paying for "standby" employees.
"While it makes sense to have some on standby, such as employees of the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs, others are less obvious, such as standby employees at the Agricultural Marketing Service," he wrote.
While most of his letter targeted federal workers, Coburn did not spare federal contractors, specifically those who are drawing pay while awaiting security clearances, which can take months.
"Under current arrangements, these employees are paid large salaries during waiting periods, but are not given meaningful work," he wrote, citing a Federal Times estimate that put the cost of wasted contractor man-hours at "between $900 million and $1.8 billion a month."
Coburn, ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, asked Berry to provide the committee with numbers and costs associated with standby hours, official time, AWOL employees, and security clearance delays.
