No USDA Furloughs
Is It Too Hard to Fire Misbehaving Feds?
Americans Still Like the Postal Service
Making Government 'Simpler'
No More Tax-Cheating Feds, Senators Say
Video: The Daily Show on Apple's Taxes
AUTHOR ARCHIVES
Kellie Lunney
Senior Correspondent
Kellie Lunney covers federal pay and benefits issues, the budget process and financial management. After starting her career in journalism at Government Executive in 2000, she returned in 2008 after four years at sister publication National Journal writing profiles of influential Washingtonians. In 2006, she received a fellowship at the Ohio State University through the Kiplinger Public Affairs in Journalism program, where she worked on a project that looked at rebuilding affordable housing in Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina. She has appeared on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal, NPR and Feature Story News, where she participated in a weekly radio roundtable on the 2008 presidential campaign. In the late 1990s, she worked at the Housing and Urban Development Department as a career employee. She is a graduate of Colgate University.
No Furloughs at Justice
April 25, 2013 This story has been updated. The Justice Department will not have to furlough any employees this fiscal year, Attorney General Eric Holder announced in a memorandum to personnel. “After careful review of our current financial situation and the additional funding we received in the final FY 2013 bill, combined with ...
Could This Be the Year for Federal Pension Reform?
April 25, 2013 Simpson and Bowles have rolled out yet another version of their deficit reduction proposals, and federal pension reform is still in there. The famous 2010 bipartisan fiscal commission led by former Republican Sen. Alan Simpson from Wyoming and former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles last week released ...
Justice Wins Flexibility to Avert Furloughs
April 24, 2013 Update: Attorney General Eric Holder has announced there will be no Justice Department sequestration furloughs in 2013. See our story here. Congressional appropriators have agreed to allow the Justice Department to shift money within its budget to avoid employee furloughs this fiscal year. The department last week asked lawmakers for ...
FLOTUS to Feds: You’re Invisible
April 23, 2013 “People don’t even know you exist.” No, that’s not some high school mean girl in Anytown, U.S.A. talking. That’s First Lady Michelle Obama speaking to Interior Department employees on Tuesday. The line elicited laughs from federal workers in the audience, and to be fair, was couched between high praise for ...
Obama Budget Would Increase Federal Workforce
April 23, 2013 The size of the federal workforce would grow by 6,180 employees under President Obama’s proposed fiscal 2014 budget. The departments of Homeland Security, Justice and Veterans Affairs would account for the estimated 0.3 percent increase in full-time civilian employees in executive agencies between this year and next, according to the ...
VA to Fast-Track Oldest Disability Claims
April 19, 2013 The Veterans Affairs Department on Friday announced that it would fast-track disability claims from vets who have been waiting a year or longer for benefits. The move will allow many vets to receive compensation more quickly, and give them an extra year to submit any additional evidence that would increase ...
Senators to Pentagon: Let Services Avoid Furloughs If They Can
April 18, 2013 Lawmakers are urging the Pentagon not to impose across-the-board furloughs if some agencies and offices within the department can come up with the savings to avoid them. Maine Sens. Susan Collins and Angus King are questioning the department’s approach to spread furloughs evenly among affected employees to maintain fairness and ...
Furloughs Begin Across Executive Branch
April 17, 2013 Employee furloughs at the Labor Department officially started this week, a union official confirmed. The number of furlough days for affected employees range across the department’s agencies, with some workers taking unpaid leave for up to two days while others are missing up to eight days of pay. The furloughs ...
Bill Aims to Give Agencies Furlough Flexibility
April 16, 2013 Senate legislation introduced Monday would allow federal agencies to decide which employees should stay on the job during sequestration. The bill would exempt “essential employees” from furlough during sequestration, using the same language to differentiate essential and nonessential employees as during a government shutdown. An essential employee is one who ...
House Rejects Bill That Would Allow Uncle Sam to Fire Federal Tax Cheats
April 15, 2013 The House voted down legislation on Monday evening -- Tax Day -- that would allow the government to fire federal employees who fail to pay their taxes. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, revived a bill earlier this year that he shepherded through the House during the 112th Congress. The legislation passed ...
