Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, has said that DHS still has not adequately explained why 88 employees were put on paid administrative leave for more than a year, and has asked the department to provide more details.
The senator earlier had asked DHS to justify that use of that paid time off, also called excused absence, following a GAO report of 2014 that criticized DHS among other agencies for routinely putting employees on such leave for extended periods, even though its use is supposed to be rare and brief even then.
DHS was one of more than a dozen agencies Grassley has contacted on the issue but produced a response that was “too broad and vague to assess whether other actions might have been more appropriate,” Grassley said in a statement.
In particular, he raised concerns about four employees who had been on such leave for three years or more and another 17 who were on it for two years or more. The 88 employees were spread across the department’s components, “suggesting systemic misuse of paid administrative leave,” he said.
Earlier this year OPM issued guidance restricting use of that form of leave, particularly in situations where discipline has been proposed against an employee but the agency has not taken final action.
