FCC Personnel Actions at Commissioner Meeting Called Routine Promotions
The FCC took a series of votes at last week’s commissioner meeting on personnel items, actions apparently having nothing to do with "burrowing" -- the practice in which non-career employees are moved to career jobs -- a senior FCC official said Monday. Instead, all of the personnel items approved at the commission’s meeting Thursday involved staff receiving promotions under Chairman Tom Wheeler. The moves were OK'd along party lines (see 1609290071).
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Among the FCC officials who were on the list was Paul de Sa, now full-time chief of the Office of Strategic Planning, who returned to the agency during the summer (see 1608160035), industry officials said. But de Sa didn’t get a career position and instead was moved from non-career to non-career senior executive service (SES) status, FCC officials said. The other personnel items were routine promotions primarily of career staff, the senior official said.
Putting the personnel matters on the agenda is unusual, but Wheeler had little choice, a senior FCC official said. Personnel items have historically been voted using a paper document that's sent from eighth-floor office to eighth-floor office and the paper on the personnel changes had been stuck in one of the offices, the official said. Under revised procedures, personnel items will now be voted on electronically like other items, with an initial circulation to all five commissioner offices, the senior FCC official said. Wheeler or another chairman can still seek a vote at the monthly commissioner meeting if necessary to force a vote, the official said.
During last week’s commissioner meeting, the FCC didn’t reveal the nature of the six personnel votes (see 1609290071) . Republicans Ajit Pai and Mike O’Rielly dissented on all six votes. Neither commented Monday.
O’Rielly flagged changes to how personnel orders are handled in testimony Sept. 15 to the Senate Commerce Committee. “The Chairman contemplated, decided and declared a new procedure for addressing personnel changes that he believes are taking too long,” O’Rielly said then, according to his written testimony. “The Commission will now vote on these items at its monthly Open Meetings, without discussion or comment. One telling thing from this new procedural decree is how fast it was issued and without any input from my colleagues or me.”
A second FCC official complained that Wheeler’s office told other commissioner offices they couldn’t discuss the votes. “It is especially troubling that a misleading account of what happened is being leaked at a time when everyone at the FCC has been instructed not to discuss personnel matters,” the official emailed.
“As to what happened at the FCC meeting last week, I don't know anything except Commissioner Pai's intimation that the chairman changed the procedure for handling certain personnel actions,” said Andrew Schwartzman, Georgetown Law Institute for Public Representation senior counselor. “More generally, and without reference to the current controversy, while I have been unhappy about several past instances where chairmen have transferred employees to SES status, I strongly support the principle of having a cadre of well-paid and experienced officials, which is the goal of the SES system.”