Shut Down Could Idle 1,751 FCC Employees, Commission Says
With budget negotiations between Congress and the White House still stalled at our deadline, the FCC said a government shut down would idle 1,751 FCC employees. In a “Shutdown-Plan” issued Friday, the commission said that 37 employees, including Chairman Julius Genachowski and the four commissioners, would remain on duty. It said it anticipated it would take less than four hours on Monday to have employees come in, secure their desks, cancel travel plans and meetings, change their outgoing voice mail messages, and receive furlough letters.
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"There will be a skeletal crew here,” FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell said in an interview. “In my office we've been preparing for the shutdown by making sure we vote all relevant circulation items early.” McDowell noted that his staff is not considered essential by the FCC and would be furloughed. “We're trying to prepare for that, but I don’t expect any major interruptions,” he said. “The bureau staff will have delegated authority to issue, for instance, special temporary authority for broadcasters should there be some sort of incident that requires that and other urgent infrastructure or public safety-type issues.” McDowell said he remained optimistic the two sides will be able to reach an agreement to avert a long-term shutdown.
Members of the Emergency Access Advisory Committee were told at their meeting Friday that, in the event of a government shutdown, they should stop working immediately, even on their own, on any of the activities of the group. “I have to tell you to stop working at midnight tonight if there is a shutdown,” said Sharon Peltz Strauss, deputy chief of the Consumer and Government Affairs Bureau. “We have been told that advisory committees are not allowed to continue working. You're not even permitted to confer informally … because technically we are supposed to be overseeing the work that you're doing."
Advisers to the FCC commissioners got a briefing in February on what to expect in the event of a shutdown, led by Mary Beth Richards, special counsel to the chairman, but did not get a similar briefing this week.
"Up to 20 employees will be retained under the plan because their compensation is financed by a resource other than annual appropriations,” the commission said in its shutdown plan. “These are full-time employees.” That includes Genachowski and the commissioners as well as “approximately 15 [inspector general] no-year/Universal Service Funds Staff,” although the “IG staff may need to be furloughed due to lack of excepted supervisors."
Up to 13 “not otherwise exempt” employees “will be retained to protect life and property,” the FCC said. “These are full-time employees, working shifts to cover 24 hour and 18 hour operations,” the commission’s plan said. “Up to two employees working per shift at each location.” The FCC Operations Center will be staffed, the commission said. If a shutdown comes, “the number of employees to be retained to protect the life and property will not exceed 5 percent of the number of employees on-board at the beginning of a hiatus less those exempt,” the commission said.
Two other full-time employees will stay on “to conduct treaty negotiations -- functions instrumental in the discharge of the President’s constitutional powers,” the commission said. Two other employees, one full- and one part-timer, “will be retained for critical” information technology “issues,” the commission said.
The commission will also keep 10 full-time contractors to monitor the commission’s IT system, eight contractors to guard commission headquarters during the workday and three other contract guards for all other times, two more contract guards to guard field offices in Gettysburg, Pa., and Columbia, Md., and a contracted “Security Patrol Service for Puerto Rico and Honolulu (drive by twice daily),” the commission said.
Additionally, the commission will have at least one staffer each on-call to deal with needs in “senior management,” the managing director’s office, the general counsel’s office, the Enforcement Bureau, the Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, and the inspector general’s office, the commission said. Up to 10 other IG staffers “may be called upon” by the FBI or Justice Department, the commission said. Enforcement Bureau field supervisors will be on call throughout the country, another two staffers will be on-call for COMSEC and “others as needed for immediate protection of life or property, such as to handle an unanticipated natural disaster or other emergency,” the commission said. Two staffers at the managing director’s office will “process payroll for work performed prior to shutdown -- up to one day depending on when in the pay period a furlough occurs and whether time keeps already have transmitted payroll records,” the commission said.
FCC officials we spoke to said the mood was upbeat at the agency as the shutdown loomed. “I was just down in the cafeteria and a lot of people are chit-chatting and jovial and saying, ‘I sure hope I get a couple of days off out of this,'” one official said. The mood isn’t “down at all. People are happy. It’s spring time. People have lived through this before.” A second official said he was ready to take a few days off if necessary. “I could use some time off,” the official said. “It’s been a tough year so far” at the FCC.