Federal Daily - November 14, 2008
USPS Debunks Rumors of Impending Massive Layoffs
Reports that the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) will soon lay off up to 40,000 employees are not true, USPS said in a bluntly worded statement released Nov. 12. Gerald J. McKiernan, USPS manager of media relations, issued the statement in response to an erroneous news story that had been circulating recently. McKiernan said the Postal Service had tracked down the story to a report out of Shreveport, La., that quoted a Postal Service spokesperson. However, that spokesperson made a mistake, McKiernan said, and USPS is not laying anyone off. Any departures are attributable to voluntary early retirement packages, which have been accepted by 3,685 employees so far. The American Postal Workers Union (APWU) in September had warned members that anticipated Postal Service operating losses of $2.3 billion for Fiscal Year 2008 could mean layoffs for thousands of postal workers for the first time in USPS history. But the Postal Service has yet to announce any intention of considering such a large layoff effort. To see more, go to: www.usps.com/communications/newsroom/2008/pr08_layoffs.htm.
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USCIS Hiring Up 24% in 2008
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) expanded its workforce by 24 percent in Fiscal Year (FY) 2008, hiring 2,058 new employees to help reduce a backlog of naturalization applications, according to a USCIS year-end report. Of those hired, 1,600 (77.8 percent) became adjudications officers, said the report released last week. The influx of new workers helped USCIS complete an unprecedented 1.17 million naturalization applications in FY 2008—an increase of more than 422,000 (56 percent) from FY 2007. As part of the effort to move new employees quickly to the front lines, USCIS revamped its training procedures. USCIS designed an extensive training program and course curricula at the USCIS Training Academy that placed a large number of newly-hired adjudications officers through a restructured basic training program. The updated program allowed the new employees to be “job ready” once they exited the academy, the agency said. All the changes have allowed USCIS to more efficiently process applications, provide better customer service and improve security against fraud and possible terrorist threats, the agency said. To see more, go to: www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.
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AFGE Urges VA to Keep Open Its N.C. VAMC Emergency Room
The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) and veterans service organizations urged the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to reconsider plans to eliminate emergency and inpatient health care services at the Salisbury VA Medical Center in North Carolina. AFGE, which represents employees at the facility, held an informational picket at the center last week along veterans groups, including the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) and Rolling Thunder. AFGE also filed a protest with the Government Accountability Office last month, saying that VA did not have the authority to make such a drastic move without consulting veterans affairs committee members in the House and Senate. “For over 50 years we have been serving veterans and now they want to pull the rug out from under thousands of veterans and force them pay out-of-pocket co-pays at private hospitals. It is not right,” said Essie Hogue, president of AFGE Local 1738, which represents employees at the facility. AFGE said that the proposed changes at Salisbury are a product of a new VA leasing program that emphasizes leasing facilities or purchasing care from outside providers, while downsizing efforts to construct new facilities. To see more, go to: www.afge.org/Index.cfm?Page=PressReleases&PressReleaseID=905.
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