EEO Process Remains Slow

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently released its annual report on the state of employment discrimination complaints among federal employees, finding that agencies are continuing to fail to meet their deadlines for investigating such complaints at the initial level. There were a total of 13,248 investigations completed government-wide in fiscal 2003 in an average of 267 days, EEOC found, while regulations require those investigations to be completed in 180 days or less. Only 5,307, or 40 percent, of the investigations were completed within the regulatory time frame. Also, agencies averaged 475 days in fiscal 2003 to issue a final agency decision when there was no decision from an EEOC administrative judge, versus the 270 days allowed by regulations. At EEOC itself, the average processing time for appeals in fiscal 2003 was 285 days. EEOC continues to have backlogs at both the hearing and appellate level, although those backlogs have decreased.