The FLRA has had only two members, split by party, since early last year. Image: dorengo5/Shutterstock.com
By: FEDweek StaffThe Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee has scheduled confirmation hearings for director of the Office of Government Ethics and for a third member for the FLRA governing board—the next steps toward filling out the leadership of central agencies overseeing the federal workforce.
The latter nomination is of special interest to federal employee unions, since they have been counting on the FLRA with a Democratic majority under the Biden administration to reverse a number of pro-management decisions it issued with a Republican majority under the Trump administration.
However, after only a short period with a Democratic majority in 2022, the FLRA has had only two members, split by party, since early last year after the term of a former Democratic member expired and he did not seek renomination. A nomination to fill that seat was made months later but the nominee later withdrew, delaying the process. The current nominee is Anne Marie Wagner, associate special counsel with the OSC.
Also to be considered is the nomination of current FLRA member Colleen Duffy Kiko for another term there, and the nomination to head the Office of Government Ethics of David Huitema, currently the senior ethics official at the State Department.
Meanwhile, the MSPB has said that in the two years since its quorum was restored, it has reduced by two-thirds the backlog of nearly 3,800 cases that had built up during the prior five years when it could not issue decisions at the board level (although hearing officers continued issuing decisions in that time). The board said it has prioritized taking up the oldest cases and those that set precedent for deciding others.
One seat on the three-member MSPB board has been vacant since early last year. The committee earlier approved the nomination for that seat of Henry Kerner, formerly head of the OSC; a vote in the full Senate still is pending.
That also is the case with the nomination of Suzanne Elizabeth Summerlin, formerly with the general counsel’s office of the NFFE union, to be FLRA general counsel.
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