The Government Transformation Initiative

6/18/2013

House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

Chairman Issa, Ranking Member Cummings, members of the Committee, thank you very much for holding this hearing today and allowing me to provide comments on the Government Transformation Initiative. Its purpose, according to its proponents, is to make the federal government more economical, efficient, effective and respected.

NTEU has a long history of working with this Committee and with the Congress in a bipartisan fashion to accomplish important goals. The passage of phased retirement legislation is an excellent example. It is a welcome option for the federal workforce and will provide federal agencies with an important new management tool. The legislation provides critical savings to the federal government and will ensure through its mentoring requirement that federal agencies retain the valuable knowledge and expertise of retiring workers – many of whom have 30 or more years with their agencies.

Just last month, NTEU worked with this Committee to extend an expiring pay demonstration program for some of the employees at the Department of the Treasury’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax & Trade Bureau (TTB). For the past 14 years, these employees have worked under a pilot program that places them in an innovative and well-designed pay for performance demonstration system instead of the General Schedule. This particular alternative pay system has been good for both TTB employees and management. It has been a significant aid to management’s goals of improved employee recruitment, retention and morale. It has also been well regarded by the participating employees. This is another example of NTEU supported innovation that this Committee has been able to advance.

Innovation, efficiency and effectiveness are goals NTEU has long promoted through its work with the Congress and with agencies where we represent employees. With our management partners at the Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), we helped develop and implement an advanced telework program with cost saving results to management, morale boosting flexibility to employees and production increases that have pleased applicants. This Committee’s action in favor of NTEU supported Telework Enhancement legislation made much of this innovation possible.

According to the White Paper prepared by the leadership of the Government Transformation Initiative, legislation establishing a statutory Commission to oversee and direct the transformation of the federal government is key to “fixing” the federal government. It would be modeled after the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process. The White Paper goes on to say that enactment of legislation establishing this Commission is necessary to help Congress and the President improve government performance, reduce duplication and wasteful redundancies, achieve fiscal sustainability, and enhance the government’s credibility.

The Commission would review what the government does, how it does it, how it performs, how it is financed and how it measures success. Isn’t that what the oversight, authorizing and appropriations committees of the Congress do now? Short-circuiting Congressional oversight and debate on something as critical as the role of, and funding for, federal agencies risks making Congress irrelevant. Congress’ role is to legislate – with input from interested parties, expert advice and healthy debate, not to potentially rubber stamp a Commission’s proposals.

Congress already has the authority to consolidate or eliminate duplicative government programs. It already has the authority to enact legislation to improve government operations and management. And it already has the authority to review the economics and efficiency of federal agency operations. Yet, the proposal under consideration today would create a Commission whose duties largely replicate those of Congress – the Commission would even have the authority to hold hearings and gather testimony on the effectiveness of government programs.

Moreover, for the first two years, the Commission would be funded through appropriations and after the two year period, would be at least partially funded through “an agreed-to portion of the savings obtained through its efforts.” The Commission would even have the authority to detail federal employees from federal agencies to the Commission. At a time when many federal agencies are being starved for both resources and staff, NTEU cannot support enactment of legislation like this.

Federal employees have not had a pay increase in three years. Agency training budgets have been slashed. The total federal workforce dropped by 14,000 employees in May 2013 alone and according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the government’s current staffing level is at its lowest point in more than five years. Most federal agencies are scrambling to enact the cuts required by sequestration, some have resorted to furloughing employees and many have frozen hiring and are seeking to further reduce their workforces through buyouts and early retirements. This is hardly the time to establish a Commission to perform Congress’ own duties and grant scarce appropriations to such a Commission.

If such a scheme is deemed appropriate – and necessary – to improve the government’s performance, why not adopt a similar mechanism for enacting an annual budget resolution and setting annual appropriations levels? These annual Congressional actions are every bit as difficult and time consuming to enact as reviewing federal agencies’ mission and performance, yet I doubt Congress would approve a private Commission to take over its budget and appropriations functions.

The Government Transformation Initiative bills itself as a coalition of corporations, nonprofits, academics and others interested in contributing to the transformation of the federal government. What is not said is that several coalition members themselves do a lucrative federal contracting business.

One coalition member in particular, the Professional Services Council (PSC) refers to itself on its Website as “the voice of the government services industry”. PSC’s mission, again, according to its website, is “solely focused on preserving, improving and expanding the federal government market for its members”. Is this what government transformation means to them? Is it just another way to increase market share for their members?

The proliferation of private companies working under contact with the federal government has exploded in size in recent years – at great cost to taxpayers. Between 2001 and 2008, federal spending on contracting out increased by almost 140% from $222 billion to a whopping $532 billion. This explosion in federal contracting has led to a dramatic increase in the size of the federal government’s contract workforce which already exceeds the size of the federal workforce. According to the Office of Management and Budget, this excessive reliance on contractors has eroded the in-house capacity of agencies to perform many critical functions and has undermined their ability to accomplish their missions.

A recent report by Bloomberg Government that analyzed data from 24 agencies and departments in 20 categories of federal purchases provides even more shocking data. Their report found that a majority of the top 200 government contractors made more money on federal awards in 2012 than they did in 2011, despite major budgetary cutbacks. Overall, the federal government spent $516.3 billion on contracts in fiscal 2012 alone.

NTEU is skeptical of the need to establish a Commission to transform government. Perhaps what we really need is a Commission to examine and propose a transformation of the federal contracting boondoggle. A great deal of the criticism of federal employees and the programs they oversee stems from Congress’ failure to provide adequate funds to agencies to administer their programs. All the Commissions in the world won’t improve agency operations if those agencies don’t have adequate funds and personnel to perform their work.

To take extremely scarce dollars from agencies struggling to deliver their missions during these times of austerity in order to fund a Commission that is being promoted by some who could financially benefit from its recommendations would be irresponsible at best. We urge the Committee to oppose this proposal.