Federal managers have fired fewer bad employees each year since President Obama took office.
Fewer than 4,900 career civil servants were fired in fiscal year 2013 out of 1.4 million — about one out of every every 300 employees — according to Office of Personnel Management data.
The figures were 5,700 in 2010, 5,500 in 2011, and 5,200 in 2012. Only partial data was available for fiscal 2014, but it was on track for 4,800, the lowest in recent memory.
There are also about 7,700 senior executives in the federal government, who are held to a higher standard than those in the General Schedule rank and file.
But only five in the Senior Executive Service were fired in 2012, seven in 2013 and none in the first half of 2014.
Both of Congress’ new top bureaucracy watchers — Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, and Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis. — have identified the inability to get rid of bad federal employees as a top reform target.
Employees haven’t gotten automatic across-the-board pay raises in several years, but Chaffetz said rooting out the worst performers is a better money-saving strategy.
“I can guarantee you we’re going to have a hearing about the fact that there are more than 4,000 people on paid administrative leave” while lengthy misconduct investigations take place, Chaffetz told The Hill.
At OPM, officials said the number of bad employees pushed out was actually higher because they often resign — sometimes taking an early retirement with full or partial pension — or they transfer to another government post while firing proceedings are underway.
“Many federal employees may elect to resign before or during a formal disciplinary or removal process can be initiated and completed. In addition, supervisors and managers who proactively address poor performance through the Performance Improvement Plan process often succeed in elevating the level of performance to a satisfactory or higher level, which addresses the problem directly rather than through an often arduous removal process,” an OPM spokesman said.
The spokesman declined to comment when asked whether having an “arduous” firing process is a problem requiring attention. The spokesman also declined to say how many federal employees were fired for egregious conduct violations versus insufficient job performance.
“It’s going to take six months to a year,” said a former official in the George W. Bush administration who spoke on a condition of anonymity because he is still active on labor issues.
“They need to give me a bad rating, then put me on a performance improvement plan. If I show no improvement they’ll begin the process, which I can appeal.”
“If I see something coming like that, do I want to claim one of the other categories, gender, race, age, whatever, so I turn this into something instead of a performance issue, I decide to make this into a discrimination issue?”
Agencies sometimes pay to settle those complaints so they don’t reflect badly on the agency, even if they aren’t supported by facts.
Rules also make it easy for a past or current federal employee to get a different government job, so they often transfer while the firing process is under way. Agencies often seem to do little to investigate the employee’s reputation at the old department.
A disgraced VA official, Susan M. Taylor, was on track to begin a new job at the Department of Energy despite a public inspector general’s report that found she exhibited “complete disregard for the laws, regulations, and VA policies.”
A simple online search turned up that information, but DOE wasn’t told by anyone at the VA of the investigation. The job offer was rescinded after the Washington Examiner reported the situation.
The former Bush administration official said current bosses are content to give a good reference, preferring to make the transfer happen so they’ll be personally rid of the problem rather than doing a year of paperwork to make sure the American public is unburdened of a poor performer for good.
When a new federal employee is first hired, he is on a probation period in which it is easier for managers to get rid of him — and indeed, as many federal employees are fired during this probationary period as in the remaining two or three decades of an employee’s career combined.
“The most important thing that could be done is doubling the probationary period,” because it’s easy to “hide” and escape notice of managers for a time, especially if there is a change of managers or other distractions, the former Bush official said.
Congress and Obama acknowledged that bad things happen because the government is stuck with bad employees after veterans died waiting for treatment as bureaucrats subjected them to repeated delays and covered it up with misleading paperwork.
In August, Obama signed a law reducing the appeal rights of SESers at VA. But the hurriedly approved measure did nothing to address the much more numerous rank-and-file employees, or senior employees at other agencies.
“If Congress presents [Obama] with an expansion that would apply to the rest of the SESers, he doesn’t have an argument to veto that after he’s acknowledged it was needed at VA,” the former Bush official said.
Whether managers choose to avail themselves of available tools is another matter.
Only one person had been fired by VA under the new rules as of Oct. 24, after being on paid leave for months, and she still had a remaining opportunity to appeal.
Two others resigned, and one continues to draw a $179,000 salary while she contests disciplinary action.
“The culture of accountability in a place with a large workforce with no profit incentive is a different issue,” the former Bush official said.
