Two key Federal workforce bills won approval from the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC) today.
The Dismantling Outdated Obstacles and Barriers to Individual Employment (DOOBIE) Act – introduced earlier this summer by Senate HSGAC Chairman Gary Peters, D-Mich. – would prevent Federal agencies from disqualifying job applicants solely because of their reported recreational or medical use of marijuana.
The DOOBIE Act passed the panel on a 9-5 vote and will now head to the full Senate for further consideration. The five dissenting votes came from Sens. James Lankford, R-Okla., Mitt Romney, R-Utah, Rick Scott, R-Fla., Josh Hawley, R-Mo., and Roger Marshall, R-Kan.
“As we work to build a highly skilled federal workforce, it’s crucial that the federal government modernizes its hiring practices to reflect evolving laws and societal norms,” Sen. Peters said when he first introduced the bill in July. “By providing this much-needed clarity for agencies and applicants, we will ensure that the federal government can recruit and retain the best and brightest to serve our nation.”
The bipartisan Telework Transparency Act – introduced by Sens. Peters and Joni Ernst, R-Iowa – also passed out of the panel today with a 12-2 vote. Senate HSGAC Ranking Member Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Sen. Scott were the two negative votes.
The legislation would require agencies to gather quality data and monitor how telework impacts agency performance and Federal property decisions. The senators said the goal of the bill is to create more transparency and provide more oversight to “weigh the pros and cons of telework policies.”
“Federal agencies must track and consider the impact of telework on their ability to deliver services, recruit and retain talent, and ensure office operations are cost-efficient,” Sen. Peters said when he introduced the bill in April. “My bipartisan bill will require agencies to gather accurate data on telework policies to provide more transparency and help ensure federal agencies are effectively carrying out their missions for the American people.”
The Senate panel today also unanimously passed a piece of House legislation that aims to create more oversight of the General Services Administration’s (GSA) Technology Transformation Services (TTS) organization.
The GSA Technology Accountability Act was introduced by Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, in March, a year after it was discovered that TTS officials misled Federal agencies by falsely claiming that Login.gov – a single-sign-on platform – met government standards for identity-proofing.
“[O]ne thing was clear: there is insufficient transparency into TTS operations,” Rep. Sessions said when he introduced the GSA Technology Accountability Act in March. “This legislation is aimed at providing answers to basic questions: what projects is TTS working on, how much do they cost, how much revenue do they bring in, and are agencies getting what they paid for when working with TTS?”
