Baltimore Sun

Yesterday, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) ran a full page ad in the Baltimore Sun demanding the resignation of the head of the Baltimore area's largest employer, the Social Security Administration. The head of that largest employer shot back with some nasty insinuations about the union. Coverage in the Baltimore Sun: nada. Can anyone who lives in the Baltimore area explain this to me?

Astrue To Make Appearances With Republican Congresswoman

Fresh off what amounted to a public shouting match with the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), a major power in the Democratic party, Michael Astrue is planning to make appearances on Friday with Republican Congresswoman Ginny Brown-Waite of Florida, a member of the Health and Income Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee. That Subcommittee does have jurisdiction over the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program that Social Security administers.

Update. I am told that Congresswoman Brown-Waite is on the Social Security Subcommittee. Both her website and the Ways and Means website were out of date.

Astrue Responds To Union -- And Escalates Conflict

A broadcast e-mail from the Commissioner:

From: ^Commissioner Broadcast
Sent: Thursday, February 05, 2009 12:40 PM
Subject: COMMISSIONER'S BROADCAST--02/05/09

A Message To All SSA And DDS Employees

Subject: AFGE Advertisement Regarding Employees' Activities Association

Below is a statement I have just released concerning the Employees' Activities Association (EAA). Our plan is to replace and improve important services previously supplied by the EAA, as we did when we brought the Woodlawn and Metro West child care centers into compliance with GSA policy and empowered the parents to choose the provider who can best serve them and their children.

Michael J. Astrue

Commissioner

Statement of Commissioner Michael J. Astrue Concerning the American Federation of Government Employees' (AFGE) Advertisement Regarding the Employees' Activities Association (EAA)

For nearly two decades, the Social Security Administration has entered into no-bid, no-audit contracts worth tens of millions of dollars to one well-connected organization, the Employees' Activities Association (EAA). That era is over.

The EAA has stubbornly stonewalled our efforts to conduct an audit of its activities and the activities of its secretive for-profit subsidiaries. AFGE's officers have responded to our efforts to ensure that federal laws and policies are followed by repeatedly threatening political retaliation against me and members of Social Security’s career civil service.

The American public is demanding honesty, transparency, and compliance with the law. I will continue to uphold these principles regardless of the inaccurate attacks that stance generates.

I have asked Congress to direct the Government Accountability Office to do the full audit that the EAA has thus far resisted.

I also want to thank the Social Security employees who first blew the whistle on the EAA, and I want to assure them that we will continue to stand by them.

Social Security has also sent this out as a Press Release.

"Centrist" Group Of Senators Wants To Cut $140 Million From Social Security

A group of what are labeled "centrist" Senators is circulating a list of cuts they want to see in the Senate version of the President's economic stimulus package. The list includes a $140 million cut for Social Security (page 6). This would cut out the entire amount for what the bill calls "information technology acquisitions and research, which may include research and activities to facilitate the adoption of electronic medical records in disability claims and the transfer of funds to ‘‘Supplemental Security Income’’ to carry out activities under section 1110 of the Social Security Act", but leaves $750 million for the National Computer Center.

I still cannot comprehend why the Senate bill has no money to improve the immediate situation at Social Security.

More On Union Anger At Social Security Management

From a January 14, 2009 letter from Witold Skwierczynski, head of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) union local that represents much of Social Security's workforce, to then President-elect Obama:

Current service problems [at Social Security] include the 765,000 backlog of disability hearings appeals which are awaiting hearings and decisions, the more than 500 day average processing time for disability hearings appeals, the current 20% busy rate on the SSA 800 number service, the fact that 45% of callers to an SSA field office either can’t reach an SSA employee or are told to call back due to lack of staff to handle the call, the inability of the Agency to process and complete 50% (i.e., 1.3 million per year) of scheduled SSI redeterminations, the inability of the Agency to process 67% (i.e., 465,000 per year) of scheduled medical Continuing Disability Reviews (CDRs), and significantly increased waiting times for visitors in SSA field offices. ...

AFGE believes that the stimulus package should include $1.71 billion to restore SSA staff and enable the Agency to process the workloads assigned to it by Congress and service the pension benefit requirements for the nation’s aged, disabled and poor. ...

The union has not joined its allies in the disability community and other SSA interest groups in requesting that the economic recovery legislation contain a provision for $750 million requested by SSA to construct a new National Computer Center (NCC). AFGE represents all bargaining unit employees who work at the NCC in Baltimore MD. Neither Commissioner Astrue nor any of his leadership team have to date communicated with the union regarding any desire or plans to replace the current NCC. Thus, SSA has made no attempt to justify to AFGE the enormous $750 million estimated cost for this project. In addition, SSA has made no effort to inform either the union or NCC employees regarding the proposed location of this facility. ... [A] relocation of the NCC would result in significant economic and personal disruption for employees who work in the NCC and the Woodlawn community where the current facility is located. ...

In closing, although Congress and the current administration underfunded SSA, Agency leadership is also responsible to a significant degree for the current unacceptable situation in SSA. Commissioner Astrue, Deputy Commissioner for Operations McMahon, and Deputy Commissioner for ODAR Foster are responsible for not seeking sufficient resources from Congress and for designing solutions to SSA workload problems which will eliminate SSA’s traditional role in assisting the public to obtain the most advantageous benefit possibilities. AFGE also believes that Deputy Commissioner Wells and Office of Labor and Employee Relations Assistant Deputy Commissioner Beever are directly responsible for terminating Agency communications with the union and SSA employees. AFGE urges you to ask for the Commissioner’s resignation and the reassignment of Ms. McMahon, Mr. Foster, Mr. Wells and Mr. Beever to positions outside of direct supervision of Agency operations and labor relations due to their malfeasance and gross mismanagement. If these leaders are not terminated or reassigned, you will be unable to influence the direction of one of the key Agencies in government – the Social Security Administration.

Union Wants Astrue Out

From Joe Davidson's Federal Diary at the Washington Post:

John Gage, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, was among those who successfully pushed to give the Social Security commissioner a six-year term. The thinking, when Congress approved the tenure in 1994, was that it would keep the position beyond the reach of bureaucratic politics.

But now, with a president in office he likes and a commissioner he doesn't, Gage is suffering from a case of Be Careful What You Wish For.

He and other union leaders are leading an effort to push Commissioner Michael J. Astrue out of office.

The union planned to run an advertisement in today's Baltimore Sun saying that under Astrue's watch "budget cuts and critical personnel shortages have made it impossible for your staff to service the public."

Leaders of union committees, councils and locals representing Social Security employees recently voted unanimously for a 23-point resolution expressing no confidence in Astrue, a Bush administration appointee. And Gage's office is asking executive committee members of the AFL-CIO to sign a letter urging President Obama to seek Astrue's resignation.

"If Mr. Astrue refuses to resign, we request that you use your authority . . . and remove Mr. Astrue from office for malfeasance and neglect," the letter says.

Such a finding would be the only way Obama could give Astrue the boot. His term doesn't expire until 2013. Astrue has no plans to quit before then, according to spokesman Mark Lassiter, who also said the commissioner was traveling and unavailable for comment.

The White House also had no comment on the effort to oust Astrue. But with all the problems the president has had with appointees lately, he probably isn't eager to look for more trouble.

The 23 points charge Astrue with shortchanging public service by closing SSA offices, allowing the disability claims backlog to grow and wasting resources by "substantially increasing non-productive managerial staff."

One of the main complaints the union has with Astrue concerns the decision to move Employee Activity Association functions, such as day-care and fitness centers, to other vendors. That was "the straw that broke our backs," reads the advertisement.

Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.) urged Astrue to stop all "plans to undermine" the activity association. "I am troubled by allegations that your administration has made unsupported claims of financial impropriety," her Jan. 9 letter to him said.

Clearly no fan of Astrue, Mikulski expressed concern "that an audit authorized by your office was undertaken for the sole purpose of trying to find a reason to shut down the EAA." She asked for assurances that any future actions would "not serve an ideological agenda."

Astrue responded by saying the activity association had become "a large and complex commercial enterprise that abuses its exclusive access to our employees for the benefit of for-profit subsidiaries." He acknowledged, however, that an investigation "could not prove or disprove most of the serious allegations." Nonetheless, he added, "it was clear that significant deficiencies existed and that employees were being denied the affordable, professional care that their children deserve."

Here is more from the union about the EAA controversy.

Social Security Hastens To Approve Disability Claim For Man Needing Heart Transplant

I posted about the article in the Spartanburg (SC) Herald Journal about a man who needs a heart transplant who had been denied Social Security disability benefits. The newspaper is now reporting that the man has now been approved by Social Security.

There have always been media stories about Social Security claimants who have been denied. I never saw any systemic effort by Social Security to speed up adjudication in those cases until the last year or so. Now, it happens virtually every time that a newspaper or television station runs a story about a person who has been denied Social Security disability benefits. This is not happening by accident. This has to be coming down from the Commissioner's office.

Doing this gives readers or viewers the mistaken impression that the report that they saw or heard was an isolated example, but this is wrong. There are terrible systemic problems.

Hastening to solve the problems of individual claimants who are featured in the media is terrible public policy. Instead of trying to mislead the public about its problems, the agency should be telling the newspapers and television stations the truth, that it is doing the best it can, but that it is badly understaffed and underfunded.

Barack Obama has talked about using another controversy as a "teachable moment." Commissioner Astrue needs to consider the concept and consider what his obligations are as a public servant.

Progress On VOIP

From a press release issued by Nortel Networks Corporation:

Nortel Government Solutions ... completed the core network for the massive new U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) VoIP [Voice Over Internet Protocol] system within 180 days of initial purchase orders, an aggressive requirement of the 10-year, US $300 million Telephone Systems Replacement Project (TSRP) award. ...

The new system, expected to become one of the largest enterprise VoIP deployments in the world, is already supporting more than 125 offices and more than 33,500 calls daily. To date, the new system has handled over 1.6 million calls. With 12-16 offices added each week, approximately 500 offices will be added per year until all 1,526 offices are online. Nortel Government Solutions has engineered the system to support over 100,000 phones. Installation and maintenance teams are positioned across the country for rapid deployment, training, and support.

NASI Proposals

The National Academy of Social Insurance (NASI) has produced a set of Social Security proposals that are worth considering. The NASI booklet is difficult to read online. I have pulled out their summary and posted it on the Social Security Perspectives blog for easier reading.

Certainly, the proposal to update Supplemental Security Income will get attention and will probably be adopted. The others, who knows. I just wish that someone would have addressed the two parts of the Social Security Act that I would most like to see changed -- the actuarial penalty for disabled widows benefits and the marriage penalty for disabled adult children. They both sound very technical, but they are both indefensible and hurt innocent people.

Press Release On State DDS Furloughs And Hiring Restrictions

A press release from Social Security:

Michael J. Astrue, Commissioner of Social Security, in a letter today to Governor Edward G. Rendell, Chair of the National Governors Association, urged states to exempt their Disability Determination Services (DDSs) from hiring restrictions and furloughs. The DDSs are state agencies that make medical determinations for Social Security and Supplemental Security Income disability claims.

“I am compelled to write to you to express my grave concern over the hiring restrictions and furloughs that some states are employing,” Commissioner Astrue said. “Each month, SSA provides over $11 billion in Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income benefits to more than 12.1 million citizens across the nation. We could not provide these vital benefits to some of the most vulnerable people in our society without the DDSs’ work.”

Social Security funds 100 percent of DDS employees’ salaries as well as overhead -- about $2 billion nationwide this year. These funds cannot be used by the states for any other purpose, so states do not save money by cutting employees in DDSs – they only slow getting benefits to the disabled. Nevertheless, many governors are imposing across-the-board hiring freezes or furloughs that also affect DDS employees.

States receive significant benefits from the operation of the DDSs. The faster SSA approves claims for benefits, the sooner many disability applicants move from state to federal support. In addition, the salaries for DDS employees funded by SSA reduce unemployment levels in the states.