Proposal to Overhaul Pentagon Workforce Is Retread of Failed Policies

Largest federal employee union says DoD plan would undermine workforce rights, protections

News provided by

American Federation of Government Employees

Sep 15, 2015, 03:00 ET

WASHINGTON, Sept. 15, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A Pentagon proposal to overhaul how civilian employees are hired, paid, promoted, and managed is a retread of failed policies from the Bush administration, the nation's largest federal employee union said today.

"The Department of Defense is spinning these proposals as the 'Force of the Future,' but they are nothing more than a bad flashback," American Federation of Government Employees National President J. David Cox Sr. said.

As pictured in this 2009 rally photo, the American Federation of Government Employees led the fight against the Department of Defense's National Security Personnel System, a failed attempt by the Bush administration to overhaul workforce policies for civilian employees. AFGE says a new reform proposal from the Pentagon repeats many of the same failed policies.

Many of the pay and performance management provisions contained in the Pentagon's plan are regurgitated from the Bush administration's failed National Security Personnel System, which was pushed through Congress in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.

"NSPS was so discriminatory and harmful to the workforce that it was repealed by Congress less than two years after taking effect," Cox said. "This was one of the most spectacular failures in personnel management, and we object to these proposals being repackaged and sold to us again."

A particularly troublesome proposal would transfer civilian employees from Title 5 of the U.S. Code, which covers the bulk of federal civil service employees, to Title 10, which primarily covers the military. DoD's report outlining the proposed changes is filled with vague, non-specific and often conflicting statements about how this change would apply to the workforce and which employees would be affected.

"While we are still working to understand the implications of such a drastic move, it is clear that this move would give the current Defense secretary and any future secretary a blank check to craft a personnel system that could easily undermine and violate the fundamental principles of our long-established commitment to a merit-based civil service system," Cox said. "We believe all employees should remain under Title 5, and be afforded the rights protected therein."

The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) is the largest federal employee union, representing 670,000 workers in the federal government and the government of the District of Columbia. AFGE represents 250,000 civilian employees in the Department of Defense.

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SOURCE American Federation of Government Employees