Homeland Security cancels immigration officer job contest

The Homeland Security Department has halted a controversial public-private competition for roughly 1,300 immigration services jobs.

Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge told congressional appropriations committee leaders in an Oct. 8 letter that he had decided to cancel the competition. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., pressured Ridge to halt the contest for immigration information officer and contact representative jobs, said Charles Showalter, president of the American Federation of Government Employees' National Homeland Security Council 117.

But Valerie Smith, a Homeland Security Department spokeswoman, said Ridge cancelled the public-private competition to allow Citizenship and Immigration Services more room to focus on reducing a backlog of immigration-related paperwork. The contest yielded many "good ideas" on improving immigration services work and wasn't a waste of time, Smith said.

CIS initiated the competition in August 2003. In a Sept. 27 letter urging lawmakers to strip the Homeland Security Department's fiscal 2005 appropriations bill of language blocking funds for the competition, Ridge noted that CIS has invested a lot of time in the A-76 study. "A competitive solicitation is being finalized, and a significant amount of work has been completed in the preparation of an in-house bid for the work," he wrote.

Despite Ridge's requests and a veto threat, House and Senate negotiators stood by the appropriations bill language. The House approved the conference report, including the block on the CIS competition, on Saturday. The Senate cleared the final version of the $32 billion spending package on Monday.

"Secretary Ridge made the right decision on behalf of the American public," Showalter said. Department officials must now address other "vital" management problems, including a lack of training and support for customs and border patrol officers, he added.

Mary Lynch, an AFGE official at CIS' Vermont service center, said the decision grants federal immigration services workers a long overdue reprieve and a chance to concentrate on mission-critical work. "All along, we've been trying to say that continuing this study was a detriment to reducing the backlog," she said.

The immigration services jobs should never have been classified as commercial on Federal Activities Inventory Reform Act lists in the first place, Lynch said. She noted that as long as the jobs remain "commercial," CIS officials retain the option of initiating another job contest.

But for the time being, employees at the Vermont service center are happy. "We are in an atmosphere of utter jubilation here," Lynch said.

The head of the Office of Management and Budget's competitive sourcing program declined to comment on Ridge's decision to cancel the immigration services contest. He referred all questions back to the Homeland Security Department.