TOPICS
TOPICS
New rule eases barriers to employing the disabled
The Office of Personnel Management on Wednesday released the final version of a regulation aimed at making it easier for federal agencies to hire people with disabilities.
The rule expands the types of proof that prospective employees can offer to show they have a disability qualifying them for excepted service positions. It also broadens the ways by which they can demonstrate job readiness.
But the final regulation contains stricter documentation requirements than the draft version, published in January 2005. That version would have granted agencies the authority to make eligibility decisions on a case-by-case basis, based on medical documentation provided by the applicant.
After reviewing comments on the draft, OPM revised the regulation to allow agencies to accept disability certifications from medical professionals, vocational rehabilitation specialists or federal or state agencies that provide disability benefits. The same entities can provide proof that an applicant is prepared to succeed in the position, or in lieu of that, agencies can hire a candidate temporarily and then evaluate readiness.
"We are ... concerned that agency personnel lack the expertise to make medical disability determinations," the Federal Register notice of the final rule stated. "This may result in inconsistent determinations across and within agencies and unanticipated inequities to disabled individuals; people who are not disabled could be appointed at the expense of those for whom these [hiring] authorities were intended."
Even with the change, Wednesday's regulation, which will take effect in late August, is more expansive than existing rules that allow certification of disabilities only from the Veterans Affairs Department or state vocational rehabilitation agencies.
At an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission meeting late last month, Michael Mahoney, manager of the staffing group in OPM's Strategic Human Resources Division, said the regulatory change will ease barriers to using existing hiring flexibilities. Current certification requirements have proven onerous, he said.
The new rules, which also consolidate separate authorities for excepted service appointments of applicants with mental retardation, severe physical disabilities and psychiatric disabilities into one, can help agencies boost the falling representation of the disabled in the federal workforce, Mahoney said.
From fiscal 1996 to fiscal 2005, the number of federal employees with nine targeted disabilities -- such as blindness and paralysis -- decreased by 16 percent, from 29,930 to 25,142, according to an EEOC report published last month. People with disabilities represented 0.96 percent of the total federal workforce in fiscal 2005, compared to 1.18 percent in 1996.
"Over the past 20 years, the federal government's efforts to improve the participation rate of employees with targeted disabilities have failed to result in any significant progress," the EEOC report stated.
Agencies can begin using the authority for new appointments on Aug. 25, and must convert all employees serving under the two existing authorities eliminated by the consolidation by Jan. 22, 2007.
COMMENTS
- I am trapped in a federal career. I am more than 15 years into my career and I was almost killed on the job. My reward for having worked myself almost to death was being knocked down three pay grades with no hope of advancement and assigned to work the same job, with the same duties as a group earning the pay I used to have. The federal employment through the OPM USAjobs website spouts all kinds of political smoke about the hiring of the disabled, and I have learned the experience to be like barking up a tree. You follow the instructions and send your paperwork to the designated individual and ....nothing. Recently the Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced a position that called for my exact experience and expertise. I applied and after 17 pages, I scored 100, and I know for a fact that only a few people could have come close to that score. Needless to say, word has it that they will be hiring from among their own but they still need two more people. They plan to issue another announcement. I phoned the hiring coordinator for the disabled and she just politely blew me off. I then began calling the Human Capital Officers in DC, who told me to see the "hiring authority", which is the Special Agent in Charge(SAC), here in Miami. The SAC has a secretary who informed me, "he doesn't meet with applicants". So now I've fired off some very angry emails to EEOC, OPM, and will probably write my congressmen. Quite simply, the Schedule A, non-competitive selection and hiring of the disabled does not exist at DHS. I've lost six years of my life, I'm partially blind, I sold my nice house to move into a walk-in closet size condo with access to public transportation. I've lost so much and I endure the insult of being trapped in a job going no where while doing the same tasks as a bunch who make what I used to. Renee N. Posted October 7, 2007 2:28 PM
- You are 100% right in that the government is a dead-end for those who seek to increase their career. Mine is a 20 year plus sojourn, stuck at the same level for 12 of those years. I am hearing impaired-that alone restricts my life functions and future money prospects. Also, if you complain about discrimination issues, do not try to win your case by choosing mediation or asking your agency to decide your fate by a ruling (it's akin to asking the IRS to fill in your tax form for you). Ernest C. Posted March 15, 2007 3:32 PM
- As a person who became permanently disabled because of employment by the federal government, I would be the first to tell other disabled people to stay away from federal employment. New rules do not change the unsafe working conditions in many federal facilities. They do not change that lack of accountability for managers to maintain appropriate working conditions. They do not prevent you from being kept as a token disabled worker, given meaningless, unfulfilling tasks to do and basically being made to understand that you need to stay out of everyone's way. Worst of all, God help you if you are injured doing your federal job because management and the federal OWCP will do everything possible to discredit your claim for federal workers compensation. You can be sure that they'll say your injury is a condition of your disability and is not job related. The federal government is a dead end for disabled workers looking for a real career. Robert M. Posted July 27, 2006 11:53 AM
