Tuesday Morning Federal Newscast – January 4

The nation\'s debt is reaching its ceiling, FEMA hasn\'t tried to get back the $643 million its owed, and the FDA gets news powers

The Morning Federal Newscast is a daily compilation of the stories you hear Federal Drive hosts Tom Temin and Amy Morris discuss throughout the show each day. The Newscast is designed to give FederalNewsRadio.com users more information about the stories you hear on the air.

  • The national debt has topped $14 trillion, for the first time. That puts the government within close reach of the $14.3 trillion debt ceiling. Published reports say that if the debt reaches that level, the government would quickly begin to default on its financial obligations, and a government shutdown could follow. The White House and some congressional Democrats have called for raising the ceiling. But some Republicans say they won’t go along, unless Congress agrees to significantly reduce federal spending.
  • The Thrift Savings Plan wants its money back. TSP officials say they have sent thousands of payments out to people by accident. In many cases, it was a lot of money–$10,000 or more. The Washington Post reports a processing error sent notices and payments to 9,700 TSP participants. Spokesman Tom Trabucco says they have identified those affected and are asking them to correct their accounts. Trabucco says the recipients would have gotten the money eventually because it is theirs anyway, but if they keep it now, they’ll have to pay taxes on it.
  • The Federal Emergency Management Agency hasn’t tried to recoup about $643 million in improper payments made to victims of Hurricane Katrina and other disasters. The improper payments have gone uncollected for more than three years because FEMA hasn’t given its final approval to a new process for recovering the money. Homeland Security’s Inspector General says the process for recovering improper payments can’t begin until FEMA’s administrator signs off on it.
  • Contract negotiations between the postal service and its largest union continue. Federal Times reports they haven’t reached an impasse, yet. The American Postal Workers Union says that postal executives seem to be unwilling to make a commitment to reach a deal. The Postal Service wouldn’t comment on the continuing negotiations. The four year contract with the APWU was set to expire in late November. The terms were extended, but at this point, either side can declare an impasse what would mean binding arbitration or mediation. An impasse has already been declared in the Postal Service’s contract discussions with another union, the National Rural Letter Carriers’ Association.
  • If you’ve made service credit deposits to your retirement plan, look for a letter from the Office of Personnel Management. OPM is alerting some federal workers that they might owe the government money. Federal Times reports, OPM discovered it charged some workers making service credit deposits too little interest. Those workers will have six months to pay back the difference. A few depositers were charged too much. They’ll receive refunds. Service credit deposits let employees put money into their retirement accounts to make up for periods when they did not contribute. OPM has been trying since 2008 to fix the problem of wrong interest rates charged on the deposits.
  • Companies that want to gain priority for some Veterans Affairs contracts will need to do something new. VA is asking small businesses and veteran-owned firms to provide documentation proving their status. The move is aimed at stopping ineligible firms from getting contracts set aside for service-disabled and other veteran-owned vendors. VA has given notice to more than 13,000 companies listed in its Vendor Information Pages database. The firms have 90 days to respond.
  • 2010 was a good year for your TSP. All funds showed positive returns. The S-fund did especially well, posting a 29 percent gain. The “never-has-a-bad-day” G-fund placed last, gaining nearly 3 percent.
  • President Obama will sign a bill today giving new powers to the Food and Drug Administration. But Congress must give the agency another 1.4 billion dollars to fully carry them out. New Republican leaders in the House have questioned whether the FDA should get that large an increase. Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said the FDA is already working on the regulations called for in the bill. The law will give the FDA power to regulate fruits and vegetables. And it will be able to force recalls by food manufacturers.
  • The Department of Justice is getting a shiny new home. It has fully leased one of the office buildings included in the Constitution Square project in Washington, D.C.’s NoMa district. City Biz List reports the three-building, 1.6 million square-foot, $530 million project is finished. It includes two office buildings and a residential building, spans a full city block, and is adjacent to the New York Avenue-Florida Avenue-Galludet U Metro station. Both office buildings are 12-stories tall with parking below-ground, and have achieved LEED Platinum certification.
  • Health and Human Services has opened registration for health care providers seeking federal cash for installing electronic patient record systems. The incentive program is aimed at doctors who accept Medicare and Medicaid payments. If they show meaningful use of electronic health records, they can qualify extra payments of up for $63,750 over six years. NextGov reports, those who don’t have EHR systems in place by 2015 will have their reimbursements cut. Money for the program was appropriated as part of the stimulus bill in 2009.
  • The Labor Department is enlisting a contractor to help straighten out its financial management. NextGov reports, Labor plans to expand its agreement with Global Computer Enterprises under a noncompetitive award. The company is already supporting Labor with an outsourced approach to operating financial systems. Sources tell NextGov the expansion appears aimed at fixing management flaws. In November, Labor’s inspector general said he was unable to evaluate the department’s 2010 financial statements because of a significant number of data migration, posting, reconciliation and reporting issues.
  • OPM is providing more details on what the federal pay freeze will not affect. Director John Berry says the freeze will not apply to performance awards or bonuses and recruitment, relocation, and retention incentives. Premium payments, such as overtime pay, are also excluded. Berry also says the freeze doesn’t effect raises from promotions, periodic within-grade step increases based on a fully successful level of performance, and quality step increases for outstanding performance.
  • Police in Delaware are investigating the slaying of military expert John Wheeler III. Wheeler served in several GOP presidential administrations and led the committee that oversaw construction of the Vietnam Veterans memorial. His body was found at a landfill near Wilmington. The death has been ruled a homicide. Wheeler was 66.

    THIS AFTERNOON ON FEDERAL NEWS RADIO

    Coming up today on The DorobekInsider:

    ** Does open government matter — to the public — to you? A new open government benchmarking study is just out — and we’ll talk to one of the key authors about what it means for agencies.

    ** And OPM has the first details on the federal pay freeze. We’ll talk about it with our senior correspondent Mike Causey

    Join Chris from 3 to 7 pm on 1500 AM or on your computer.

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