A Bureaucracy with a Difference?: Hopes and fears for the 'homeland' force.(new agency devoted to domestic defense)(Statistical Data Included)

With his plan for a new conglomerate federal agency dedicated to domestic defense, President Bush has reignited an old battle -- with higher stakes than the predictable turf fights over the 22 agencies slated for new management. The president's proposal anticipates a wholly new personnel system for the new agency, instead of placing it under the same rules as the rest of the federal civil-service system. If the administration succeeds in elevating the need for domestic security over federal workers' desire for ironclad job security, Bush officials will have the authority to create a unique workforce of 170,000 accountable -- which is to say, fireable -- government employees.

George W. Bush is only the latest chief executive to see how a president's fury is often no match for the rules and regulations governing the divine rights of federal workers. When the INS notified a Florida flight school, precisely six months after the September 11 attacks, that student visas had been approved for two of the hijackers, Bush was steamed -- telling reporters, "I was stunned and not happy. Let me put it another way, I was plenty hot . . . I could barely get my coffee down when I opened up my local newspaper." He explained that he had expressed his outrage to attorney general John Ashcroft, who "got the message -- and so should the INS."

Under the present rules, however, Bush will be a former chief executive long before the INS employees responsible for the embarrassing episode are former federal workers. Two days later, it was reported that the four responsible INS career employees were reassigned to other jobs in the INS and the Justice Department, but wouldn't face any disciplinary action. That same day, Ashcroft, who is responsible for enforcing all federal laws, petitioned Congress for the fundamental managerial control over the INS he currently lacks.

Ashcroft explained to the chairmen of the Justice appropriations subcommittees that there could be no effective oversight of the INS "during this crucial period" without the authority "to quickly discipline or terminate individuals for acts of negligence, mismanagement, or disregard for [DOJ] policies." For the previous four years, the subcommittees had provided limited authority to discipline derelict INS employees; this year the authority lapsed.

The president's proposal for the Department of Homeland Security, which will have the third-largest federal workforce, would grant the new secretary the authority to waive the civil-service rules that frustrate the most powerful government official in the world. Without the reform, the new agency's managers would have to live with the current cumbersome system that demoralizes high performers and protects bad employees.

As a former Reagan appointee at the Office of Personnel Management and former Republican staff director on the House civil-service subcommittee, George Nesterczuk is a veteran of two decades of battles over federal personnel reform. He agrees with the Bush administration that changes in personnel policy are fundamental to the success of the new department. Without reform, managers responsible for protecting American lives from lethal danger will be hamstrung by a personnel system that, Nesterczuk explains, has four basic problems.

First, it can be terribly difficult to hire federal workers; the process frequently takes three to four months. Several years ago, a Congressional Research Service report identified 180 federal race and gender preferences that govern much of the hiring. Second, negotiated union contracts prevent the efficient use of resources by dictating assignment policies for covered workers; this will undermine the president's effort to establish what he calls an "agile organization" capable of meeting "a new and constantly evolving threat."