Director's Annual Report

Workforce Management And Development

Judiciary Benefits
Expanding HR Capabilities
Training Court Employees
Court Compensation Study
AO Workforce Restructuring
Employee Suitability Program
Fair Employment Practices

Judiciary Benefits

The Judiciary recognizes that competitive employee benefits help attract and retain a talented workforce to serve the courts. A strong commitment to offering benefits competitive with the private sector continues to enhance the Judiciary's appeal as a progressive employer. The Judiciary took the lead in establishing long-term care insurance in fall 1999, followed by the flexible benefits program in January 2000. Enrollment in both programs has exceeded industry norms.

In an area as dynamic as employee benefits, continuous reassessment is in order. The Administrative Office updated a 1998 benefits study that helped identify the need for the programs in place.

Two benefit gaps identified by the study—improved dental and vision benefits—were recently addressed by enactment of The Federal Employee Dental and Vision Benefits Enhancement Act of 2004 (P.L. No. 108-496). This law required the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to issue a bid solicitation for health carriers to offer packages of vision and dental benefits. The OPM plans to make these new benefits available beginning January 2007.

Other benefits improvements for the Judiciary would require legislation, substantial funding, and commitment of new resources. The Judiciary is seeking legislative authority necessary to effect many of the recommendations in the study. That legislation has not yet been enacted. It was again transmitted by the Judicial Conference to Congress in June in a proposed "Federal Courts Improvement Act of 2005."

Flexible Benefit Program Grace Period. In July, the Director of the Administrative Office implemented a two-and-a-half-month grace period for the Health Care Reimbursement Account (HCRA) component of the federal Judiciary's Flexible Benefit Program. This means that, beginning with the 2005 plan year, HCRA participants can be reimbursed for any eligible health care expenses incurred as late as March 15, 2006, from funds set aside pretax from their salary during 2005. This change will benefit participants by helping them to avoid forfeiting contributions to their Health Care Reimbursement Accounts.

The Flexible Benefits Program allows employees to set aside salary on a pre-tax basis in special accounts that can be used to fund health care—including medical, dental, and vision—and dependent care, including childcare, expenses. Since the flexible benefits program was introduced more than five years ago, judges and court employees have saved over $158 million. In 2005, there were 10,300 enrollments, or about 31 percent of the workforce, in the reimbursement accounts. Including tax savings from participation in the health benefits premium plan, judges and Judiciary employees increased their take home pay by nearly $31 million through tax savings in 2005. On average, judges increased their take-home pay by $2,715 and Judiciary employees increased theirs by $2,285.

Long-Term Care Insurance Buy-Ups. Participants in the Federal Judiciary Long-Term Care Insurance Program had an opportunity in 2005 to purchase an additional amount of coverage on a guaranteed issue basis. CNA , the program's insurer, makes this buy-up opportunity available every three years for those participants who wish to upgrade their coverage to keep pace with inflation. Response to the offer was strong, with 37 percent of eligible participants electing to accept the offer.

Judiciary Voluntary Separation Incentive and Early Retirement Programs. The Judiciary's ever-increasing technological advances coupled with cuts in Congressional funding are creating the need to reshape the Judiciary workforce. In fiscal year 2005, two voluntary buyout and early retirement program periods resulted in 343 buyouts and 126 early retirements.

The Judicial Conference approved the extension of the buyout and early retirement programs through fiscal year 2009, to be implemented each year at the discretion of the AO Director. Unlike prior programs, non-chambers Judiciary Salary Plan employees may be eligible for the early retirement program; however, they will continue to be ineligible for the buyout program. Under the provisions of P.L. No. 107-296, the AO Director has the authority to approve buyout plans for court units. In August 2004, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) approved the Judiciary's request to offer early retirement to employees of courts and federal public defender organizations throughout fiscal year 2006. Having this expanded authority from OPM permits more efficient and timely approval of courts' requests. Continued use of these management tools will help court offices restructure and realign positions and personnel needed to fulfill their mission.

Expanding HR Capabilities

The Judiciary is continuing to identify and implement additional functionality in its PeopleSoft-based Human Resources Management Information System (HRMIS). View access capability, fully implemented during fiscal year 2005, allows appropriate court staff to access and review employee data maintained in HRMIS. This capability permits court human resources personnel to answer many of the questions that would normally require person-to-person contact with AO staff. The courts have embraced this new capability and are eager for additional functionality. On target for fiscal year 2006 is addition of the remote data entry feature. It will allow court personnel to submit personnel actions directly through the system and potentially will eliminate many of the paper documents currently being sent to the AO. Plans are also underway for a major upgrade of the PeopleSoft system, which will provide a solid foundation for future enhancements.

Training Court Employees

During last fiscal year, the management of the nationwide training function was restructured to incorporate training activity into existing program planning and budgeting processes. All training efforts can now be linked to the organization's mission or program objectives, and all resources and costs associated with training can be identified, reviewed, and reported. The National Training Spending Plan (NTSP), now supported by the Office of Finance and Budget, provides the budget baseline for each directorate's training plans. Centrally established contract vehicles are available for each directorate to plan, develop, and deliver training for court clients. Critical agency-wide training activities, such as distance learning, web-based training, training advisory services, and the virtual university continue to be managed centrally. Training staff and the Federal Judicial Television Network—a critical component of distance learning—were reorganized at the AO to better meet the courts' mission-critical training at lower cost.

Distance Learning. AO staff completed the conversion of the Contracting Officers Certification Program's classroom training to a distance learning format. A court focus group was used to test and modify the distance learning training. The training will be made available for general use during the first quarter of FY 2006.

Registration was offered to all court staff in the recently revised court budget management web-based training program, "Managing the Local Court Budget." Registered court staff will begin the training program in January 2006 and have one year to complete it. The training program is a comprehensive knowledge-based, self-teaching, self-assessment tool on budget management and budget decentralization that takes approximately 10 cumulative hours to complete. Court feedback shows that this web-based training program meets a primary financial management training need in the courts.

National Court Budget Management Training Program. Increased skills-based budget management training to the courts was recommended in the 2004 KPMG assessment of the Judiciary's budget decentralization program. To address this finding, the AO and the Court Training Workgroup, a subcommittee of the Budget and Finance Advisory Council, developed a budget management training curriculum for court unit executives, budget analysts, and other court managers with key budget responsibilities. Beginning in fiscal year 2006, the AO will manage delivery of a court-developed budget management training program with court staff as faculty. A pilot session will be offered in the Fourth Circuit in the spring of 2006 and a completed program will be presented to the Tenth Circuit later in fiscal year 2006.

Court Compensation Study

The AO is overseeing a comprehensive court compensation study in an effort to limit future growth in compensation costs and to prepare for possible changes to the Executive Branch's pay schedule—the basis for the Judiciary's pay system. The study being conducted by The Segal Company covers 28,000 biweekly court employees—both chambers and non-chambers—currently paid according to three separate systems. The Judicial Resources Committee and a working group of judges, court managers, and employees are guiding the effort. Phase 1 of the study identified and quantified the primary salary increase cost drivers for the past six years for analysis. This will be followed by the development of job benchmarks and a market survey of comparable private and public employers. Judiciary salary levels will then be compared with those of comparable occupations. Suggestions about revisions to the classification system, pay schedule, pay delivery system, and pay policies will be reviewed by the Judicial Conference Committee on Judicial Resources and recommended to the Judicial Conference for approval in 2007.

AO Workforce Restructuring

The Administrative Office continues to address the need for workforce restructuring that includes reorganization, technology enhancements, and recruitment of employees with essential skill sets to meet critical mission needs. An emphasis on decentralization and customer service has redefined much of the work away from operations and shifted to policy and program management. As the Judiciary moves forward with deployment of major national IT systems, staff resources are required to shift IT focus to configuration management, risk management, quality assurance, training, and product support. Additionally, the AO expanded and formalized its telework program. Telework programs typically provide benefits to the employer, the community, and the employee through increased productivity, reduced traffic congestion and air pollution, and improved work-life balance.

The AO has worked to reduce personnel costs. Through vigorous support of a cooperative education program, a workforce investment program, the use of student volunteers, and increased entry-level hiring, the AO has cut its temporary help services costs in half over the past five years and reduced the average salary cost of new hires by five percent over the same period. The AO implemented other programs in 2005 to support workforce management requirements. A background check program was started on all new hires, volunteers, and contractors to help determine suitability for federal employment.

Employee Suitability Program

In May, the Employee Suitability Program for Judiciary employees was implemented. It requires mandatory background checks or investigations for all newly hired employees, contractors, and volunteers in federal courts and federal public defender organizations, and all current employees in courts and federal public defender organizations who are appointed, promoted, or have a personnel action change to a high-sensitive position. The purpose of this program is to ensure that federal court and federal public defender organization employees and volunteers meet standards of trust and confidence for their positions as Judiciary employees. This policy also covers contractors whose duties would otherwise be performed by Judiciary employees, whether or not a particular court has employees performing such duties. The policy allows for optional local background check programs, for sensitive positions only, that meet national requirements.

In September 2005, the Administrative Office awarded a national Blanket Purchase Agreement allowing all Judiciary organizations to purchase digital fingerprint systems. These systems will replace the traditional inked fingerprint card method and will improve the timelines and accuracy of the fingerprint check process.

Fair Employment Practices

The Administrative Office (AO) served as staff to the newly established Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Subcommittee on Diversity of the Committee on Judicial Resources. This subcommittee was created by Judge Royal Furgeson, chair of the Committee on Judicial Resources. Issues of importance to the subcommittee included developing principles and goals on diversity, and structuring a sample project that will capture district demographics to enhance the breadth of The Judiciary Fair Employment Practices Annual Report.

The Policy on Reasonable Accommodation for Persons with Disabilities and the Reasonable Accommodation Guidelines for Persons with Disabilities were posted on the J-Net.

All Employment Dispute Resolution (EDR) Coordinators were trained in the EDR Claims: Lessons Learned course. This training program examined the responsibilities of EDR Coordinators and aided participants in updating their EDR plans. In addition, AO staff conducted sexual harassment and disability law training at the Conference for Federal Defender Administrators in Atlanta , Georgia , and developed diversity tool kits for the courts.

The AO Heritage Celebration Series continued in 2005, celebrating the histories of African Americans, Women, Asian and Pacific Islanders, Hispanics, and Native Americans.