| Comment Number: | OL-10507304 |
| Received: | 3/14/2005 10:06:13 AM |
| Subject: | Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, Request for Comment |
| Title: | National Security Personnel System |
| CFR Citation: | 5 CFR Chapter XCIX and Part 9901 |
| No Attachments |
Comments:
I am writing to you because of my concern about the National Security Personnel System (NSPS). The 2004 Defense Authorization Act, passed by Congress in November 2003, authorized the NSPS. I believe that there are major differences between the intent that Congress had in mind when passing this act and the new authorities that the Secretary of Defense is now assuming. When testifying to Congress, the Secretary of Defense stated that the Pentagon’s broad mission requires greater “flexibility” in hiring, disciplining, compensating and assigning civilian personnel. It appears as if the Secretary of Defense wants the same authority over the civilian personnel as he has over the uniformed military personnel. Congress acceded to the Secretary of Defense’s wide-ranging requests, however it attached certain conditions to these requests. One specific requirement is that the Secretary of Defense must observe the legal requirements of labor relation’s statures. Additionally the Secretary of Defense must involve duly elected union officials in the development of a new personnel system. The Department of Defense has convened meetings to brief and solicit the views of persons affected by this change, however, with the exception of this web site, which is typically political in nature in that it only spins the “positive” aspects of this change, the has been no information sharing from the Department of Defense. Additionally, there has been no response to union request for specific information on what personnel problems NSPS is addressing and how NSPS will rectify those alleged problems. I believe that without the restraint of the current rules govern the conduct of federal managers, NSPS will encourage federal managers to use the system to reward employees who acquiesce to their demands and similarly and punish those employees who question federal managers policies or decisions. Additionally, it will encourage employees to become more involved in “office politics” because the employees salary would depend entirely on the personal judgment of the federal manager over the employee. Although the current system may need some minor changes, the current system works! This appears to be another example of changes for political reasons, rather than to address and fix problems. For these reasons, I oppose the implementation of the NSPS and urge you to act to instruct the Secretary of Defense to halt any further development of the NSPS.