When it was passed in October, the Defense Authorization Bill for fiscal year 2001 funded the Defense Department for another year. The measure aims to take some of the pressure off the EEOC, which has been berated by Congress because of its handling of discrimination complaints by federal employees.
Legislators claim the process takes too long and costs the federal government too much.
Officials from the Postal Service and the Air Force have praised ADR efforts and have said the mediation process has worked well in their agencies. Federal employees will now be faced with the possibility of losing all of their employment rights based on the way this pilot program was passed. In an effort to protect federal workers, Clinton has directed the Secretary of Defense to approve no more than three pilot programs one in a military department and two in Defense agencies and to personally approve each program. Finally, I am directing that the Secretary submit an assessment of the pilots, together with the underlying data, to the EEOC within 180 days of the completion of the 3-year pilot period. Darby and Rawle King, who serves as chairman of BIG's legislative committee, say the provision is dangerous and question the ability of Congress to make changes to existing law by adding a provision to an appropriations bill.