Apr 29, 2009

Plans Old And New

The written statements for yesterday's Social Security Subcommittee hearing are available online. Here are a few excerpts:
Mary Glenn-Croft, Deputy Commissioner for Budget, Finance and Management, Social Security Administration:
We will use a significant portion of this funding to hire and train new employees and to provide additional overtime so that we can process critical workloads. ...
  • Our field operations will hire 1,500 employees in local field offices, teleservice centers, and processing centers;
  • Our hearings offices will hire 550 new employees and 35 additional administrative law judges, and
  • State disability determination services (DDS) throughout the country will hire 300 additional disability examiners.
Robert Hewell, Acting Deputy Commissioner, Public Building Service, General Services Administration
[Schedule for new National Computer Center]:
  • Site Acquisition: 2nd quarter FY2010
  • Design-build contract awarded: 2nd quarter FY2011
  • Construction completion: 1st quarter FY2014
Valerie Melvin, Director of Information Management and Human Capital Issues, U.S. Government Accountability Office:
Finally, a number of initiatives undertaken by SSA to improve the disability process and potentially remedy backlogs have faltered for a variety of reasons, including poor planning and execution. In fact, some initiatives had the effect of slowing processing times by reducing staff capacity, increasing the number of appeals, or complicating the decision process. Several other initiatives improved the process, but were too costly and subsequently abandoned. This was the case for several facets of a major 1997 initiative, known as the “Disability Process Redesign,” which sought to streamline and expedite disability decisions for both initial claims and appeals. In the past, we reported that various initiatives within this effort became problematic and were largely discontinued due to their ineffectiveness and high cost. Further, implementation of an electronic system enhanced some aspects of the disability claims process, but also caused delays due to systemic instability and shutdowns at the DDS and hearings offices.9 Further, the “Hearings Process Improvement” initiative, implemented in 2000, involved reorganizing hearing office staff and responsibilities with the goal of reducing the number of appeals. However, many of the senior SSA officials we spoke with expressed the opinion that this initiative left key workloads unattended and was therefore responsible for dramatic increases in delays and processing times at the hearings level.
[Is it churlish to point out that GAO was a cheerleader for all of these ill-considered plans?]

Update: The GAO report originally linked on the Social Security Subcommittee website was for the GAO testimony at the Social Security Subcommittee hearing in March. They have now updated their website to correctly link to the testimony delivered yesterday. This GAO report is extremely preliminary.

Sylvester J. Schieber, Chairman, Social Security Advisory Board

You might wonder why I would suggest that many in the American public would find taking five years or more to build a new computer center and another two to three years to get the operating equipment in place as laughable. I do not believe that most people would consider the five-to-eight-year time frame involved would reflect the urgency this project deserves given the national dependence on this agency. I do not believe that most people would accept that we could not do this on a more timely basis if we were truly committed to the task.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Pentagon was built in less than 1.5 years in the 1940s and it's going to take us 5 years to build a new NCC? That is laughable.

Anonymous said...

Anyone have any idea when these field Offices will be authorized to begin hiring? We've now heard the Commish and Ms. Glenn-Croft talk about hiring immediatley for months now... yet my field office nor any office in my 150 mile radius have received any approval! What gives? Are we waiting for the money to be appropriated?

Anonymous said...

There is another big initiative that is about to be crammed down on all ODAR offices. It is the Standardized Business Process initiative. It was first introduced over one year ago in pilot offices which were already operating in a way that mirrored the initiative. Supposedly it was successful in those offices (because they were hand picked so it would succeed). The CALJ has voiced an openness to suggestions for modification of the plan but, despite more than a year of "openness" and many, many complaints from the field, the plan remains unchanged from its initial rollout, word for word. The other administrative plan failures cited in the initial post will pale in comparison to the problems this initiative will bring to ODAR. The plan is ill conceived and will result in significant reduction in the number of cases ODAR can adjudicate and close.

Anonymous said...

SSA has over 1300 field offices. Once you spread 1500 over the program service centers, the teleservice centers and those field offices, a lot of offices will not get any authority to hire.

Anonymous said...

Taking five years to build a new computer center - how quickly does computer equipment become obsolete. The servers in FOs (field offices) are starting to fail. How much progress has been made it replacing them? SSA needs additional money in every annual budget to replace/update equipment.

Nancy Ortiz said...

Gee, I'm underwhelmed. A#4 hit the nail on the head. That number of hires won't even cover normal attrition. I expected much better from the Obama administration. I suspect I had better dip my tongue in scathe and crank up my complaint machine.

Anonymous said...

Ms. Ortiz - SSA is still operating under FY09 and Recovery Act funds. The first Obama Admin budget has yet to be enacted - and still has to survive the vipers dens that are the Senate and House Appropriations committees. So I would hold my scathing tongue for at least a few more months.

Anonymous said...

Commissioner Astrue announced that SSA would be hiring 5000 new employees in the near future. When I add the numbers in this article, it's no where close to 5000...

Anonymous said...

The SSA testimony is confusing, but the gyst is that the numbers here are only the hires attributable to the Recovery Act funding. Elsewhere, it's made known that total hires expected is 7,000 using Recovery Act money and FY09 appropriations. That's gross - not sure what net after attrition would be.

Anonymous said...

The FY 2009 budget is a Democratic budget, enacted by Democrats and signed by Obama. Between the Stimulus bill and the FY 2009 budget, SSA was given almost a Billion Extra Dollars(excluding the NCC funding). Field offices need thousands more employees above attrition, and I do not see those numbers coming. Nancy is right.

Nancy Ortiz said...

Gee. I'm not used to being right. Nevertheless, I will hold my evil tongue until we have some confirmation of our early observations here. Anyone here who contributes to other blogs may consider raising this subject. Our comments here are very useful but it would be good to do more.

Anonymous said...

Hmm, Democrats in Congress have given SSA a billion more dollars, and the Obama proposed budget keeps giving SSA more. And yet, things aren't improving? Who's in charge of SSA? Did a new Commissioner get appointed as part of the "change" promised by Obama? No - it's the same old Bush-appointed Commisioner.