A bulletin earlier this month from the Office of Special Council (OSC) revealed the office had alerted President Joe Biden and Congress about allegation s of “substantial waste, mismanagement and unlawful employment practices at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).”
The letter from Special Counsel Henry J. Kerner may be read here.
According to the bulletin, two whistleblowers from the agency’s human resources office told OSC the ATF “unlawfully provided law enforcement pay and benefits to agents and investigators who filled non-law-enforcement positions, such as in human resources. These positions had been intentionally misclassified to be within the law enforcement job series.”
A report in FedManager said the Office of Personnel Management found ATF acted “outside of merit system principles and demonstrated disregard for the rule of law and regulations that implement Federal human capital management policies and practices.”
The OSC bulletin noted OPM “suspended ATF’s authority to classify federal law enforcement positions.”
“ATF has also begun the process of updating position descriptions to accurately reflect job duties,” OSC reported. “As of March 2023, 36 of the employees who held misclassified positions had been reassigned and another 14 had retired. ATF’s Internal Affairs Division is currently investigating the circumstances surrounding the implementation of the illegal policies and practices.”
In a statement, Kerner said, “I thank the whistleblowers for coming forward with these very serious allegations and am pleased that under OPM’s oversight, ATF has initiated corrective measures. While I find the report to be reasonable, progress toward full resolution has been slow, which may be attributable to the long-standing nature of the problems and the entrenched culture reinforcing ATF’s practices. I am pleased that OPM continues to monitor progress in implementing required corrective actions, and I urge ATF’s internal affairs to hold the responsible parties accountable.”
According to Kerner’s letter to the president, “OPM identified 91 misclassified positions in four
directorates and ATF self‐identified another 17 for a total of 108 affected positions. ATF conceded that 70 of these positions were misclassified but contested the designation of 38 others, arguing that some merely required updated PDs to accurately reflect job duties. ATF requested that OPM reconsider its conclusions regarding those positions and, on January 12, 2022, submitted reconsideration requests for 32 of the 91 positions OPM identified as misclassified.”
