Federal employee groups fear that they are being left out of a health care reform compromise forged by unions and lawmakers to alleviate the effects of a proposed excise tax on insurance plans. The deal, posted on the Web sites of the AFL-CIO and the National Education Association, would raise the premium threshold level at which a 40 percent tax kicks ...

Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., has placed a blanket hold on all executive nominations on the Senate calendar in an effort to win concessions from the Obama administration and Pentagon on a variety of fronts affecting his home state, according to aides to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. Reid spokeswoman Regan Lachapelle said Shelby is blocking more than 70 pending nominations. ...

Civilian agencies might soon be required to set aside a percentage of funds from multiple-award, multiagency contracting vehicles for small businesses. The provision, included in the 2010 Small Business Contracting Improvements Act introduced by Sens. Mary Landrieu, D-La., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, on Thursday, would require agencies to reserve for small firms a yet undetermined portion of orders placed against federal ...

Federal agencies have room for improvement when it comes to assessing applicants for federal jobs, according to a new survey of government officials and observers. The report, released Thursday by the nonprofit Partnership for Public Service and PDRI, a human resources consulting firm, found government does a poor job of evaluating applicants for federal positions. During discussions with seven focus groups ...

Sometimes Uncle Sam sounds like he has marbles in his mouth. Read, if you can, the accompanying excerpt from an Education Department regulation, which was printed in Wednesday's Federal Register. This one sentence has more than 220 words, nearly the equivalent of a typed page, double-spaced. It's typical of impenetrable fedspeak that produces more indigestion than information. But help is on ...

WASHINGTON - From federal government clerk positions to grocery store cashiers, the competition for jobs is phenomenal. Applications for all types of positions are flooding in. "We are pretty much overwhelmed with the number of applications that we are receiving for every job posting," says Deputy Associate Director of the Center for Talent and Capacity Policy at the U.S. Office of ...

The Office of Management and Budget is developing a new federal performance management framework, the government's chief performance officer told lawmakers on Thursday. The approach will incorporate elements from other initiatives, including the Bush administration's Performance Assessment Rating Tool and the 1993 Government Performance and Results Act, OMB's Jeff Zients told a Senate subcommittee. "Our governmentwide performance measurement framework will be ...

As the United States withdraws its combat forces from Iraq, the government is hiring more private guards to protect U.S. installations at a cost that could near $1 billion, according to the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction. On Sept. 1, the Multi-National Force-Iraq (MNF-I) awarded contracts expected to be worth $485 million over the next two years to five firms ...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The White House environmental adviser under fire for inflammatory statements made before he joined the administration resigned after what he called a "vicious smear campaign against me." Van Jones "understood that he was going to get in the way" of President Barack Obama's agenda, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Sunday. The resignation was disclosed without advance ...

As another deadline looms, approximately 18,000 U.S. Postal Service employees so far have accepted a $15,000 buyout offer, officials have reported. The final tally of buyout acceptances from each job category isn't available yet, said Yvonne Yoerger, a Postal Service spokeswoman. It's also too soon to determine the agency's savings as a result of the buyout, she added. Employees were required ...

The Senate on Sunday passed a catchall spending bill that includes a 2 percent pay raise for civilian federal employees in 2010. That figure is in keeping with President Obama's request, but contrary to his Nov. 30 proposal to freeze locality pay, a portion of the raise would vary depending on costs of labor where employees are based. Lawmakers granted civilians ...

If the federal civil service had a flag, it would be flying upside down. The civil service is in distress -- not dead, but in need of rescue. Recognizing this, John Berry, the Office of Personnel Management director, ran some sweeping ideas up the flagpole on Monday to see who salutes. At the same time he heaped praise on the "unsung ...

Some federal employees will have to choose new health plans during open season this year because their insurance providers are leaving the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program, or reducing the number of areas they cover. "Some employees still might not receive instructions to change plans during open season," Kathleen M. McGettigan, deputy associate director of the Center for Retirement and Insurance ...

WASHINGTON - Computer technicians have found 22 million missing White House e-mail messages from the administration of President George W. Bush, and the Obama administration is searching for dozens more days' worth of potentially lost e-mail from the Bush years, according to two private groups that sued over the Bush White House's failure to install an electronic recordkeeping system. The groups ...

As Congress returns from a not-so-relaxing August recess, health care reform tops the legislative to-do list. But lawmakers also face several pieces of legislation affecting the federal workforce, which were left unresolved at the end of July. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Thursday will consider H.R. 1881, a bill that would eliminate the Transportation Security Administration's special pay ...

Federal government employees can expect a big jump in their health-care costs in 2010, officials said Tuesday. Employees enrolled in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program will pay an average 8.8 percent more in health-care costs, according to figures released by the Office of Personnel Management. The increase averages $5.98 per paycheck for individual health-care coverage, and a $12.87 increase for ...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Congressional aides say the Obama administration has chosen a Colorado natural resources official to be the new agriculture undersecretary in charge of the U.S. Forest Service. Harris Sherman, executive director of the Colorado Department of Natural Resources, is to be nominated soon, they said. The congressional aides familiar with the decision spoke on condition of anonymity because the ...

Current and former federal employees angered by premium increases in the Federal Long Term Care Insurance Program will get their day before Congress on Wednesday, when senators hope to get answers about why the impending price jump is warranted and what the government did to inform participants. Most federal and postal employees are eligible for the program, which is run by ...

Complaints from the federal workforce alleging discrimination by the government increased slightly in the latest figures from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, ending a recent downward trend. The EEOC's Annual Report on the Federal Workforce notes 16,752 complaints alleging employment discrimination filed against the federal government in Fiscal Year 2008 -- up 2.4 percent from the prior year. The complaints ...

In a move designed to improve employee morale and to help reduce a growing backlog, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office proposed changes Wednesday to its way of determining how long a patent examiner has to complete a patent examination and the incentives that examiners earn. The modifications, which must be approved by agency employees in the coming weeks, would be ...