In 1941, President Roosevelt ordered all federal agencies to include in their wartime contracts a provision prohibiting contractors from discriminating against any worker because of race, color, creed, or national origin. President Johnson expanded this principle in 1965 when he issued Executive Order 11246, which required federal contractors and subcontractors, and federally assisted construction contractors, to refrain from discrimination and to take affirmative action to provide equal employment opportunity to all employees and job applicants, regardless of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. In the early 1970s, equal employment responsibilities were expanded by statute to persons with disabilities and certain disabled and Vietnam era veterans. (See app. I for more information on the legal authorities for OFCCP.) Established in 1966, OFCCP has seen its role evolve over time. Initially, OFCCP served as a policy-making body; using a small nationwide staff, it concentrated primarily on coordinating and monitoring enforcement, while the actual day-to-day enforcement responsibilities were scattered among other federal agencies. In 1978, enforcement responsibilities were transferred from the various federal agencies to OFCCP in order to consolidate activities and improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the investigations. Since then, OFCCP has been primarily responsible for ensuring the compliance of federal contractors, subcontractors, and federally assisted construction contractors with their affirmative action and equal opportunity responsibilities. Today, OFCCP operates with a budget of about $59 million and is authorized for 825 full-time-equivalent (FTE) staff positions. OFCCP’s national office in Washington, D.C., directs the nationwide enforcement of equal employment opportunity laws and regulations among federal contractors. Field staff in OFCCP’s 10 regional offices and 57 district and area offices conduct the actual enforcement activities. These include reviewing federal contractors’ compliance with the applicable laws and regulations, conducting investigations of individual complaints, and providing technical support to federal contractors. While OFCCP monitors the employment practices of federal contractors, OFCCP is actually one of several federal agencies responsible for enforcing equal opportunity laws and regulations. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), under title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended, investigates charges of employment discrimination because of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. EEOC also is responsible for investigating discrimination charges in employment based on age, unequal pay, and physical and mental disabilities. There is some overlap in activities of these agencies, and EEOC and OFCCP operate under a memorandum of understanding (MOU) and coordination regulations to minimize any duplication of effort. For example, under the MOU, individual complaints to OFCCP alleging discrimination under title VII are referred to EEOC. Under the coordination regulations, OFCCP acts as EEOC’s agent in investigating charges of discrimination brought by certain persons with disabilities. In carrying out its mission and responsibilities, OFCCP focuses most of its resources on compliance reviews (see fig. 1). Through this mechanism, which includes a desk audit and a site visit in most cases, OFCCP analyzes a contractor’s hiring and employment practices. OFCCP seeks to determine if these practices comply with laws that it enforces. In most of its reviews OFCCP identifies violations, many of which are considered major. Regardless of the exact nature of the violation, OFCCP’s policy is to work with the contractor to resolve the case rather than to impose sanctions, such as canceling the federal contract. In addition to compliance reviews, OFCCP conducts complaint investigations and provides compliance support, such as technical assistance to help federal contractors understand the regulatory requirements and review process. A compliance review, which often takes between 3 and 6 months to complete, usually consists of two phases: a desk audit and a site visit. The desk audit is a systematic review of documents and materials that the contractor under review provides, explaining its efforts to ensure equal employment opportunities. As part of the desk audit, compliance officers compare the representation of women and individual minority groups in the contractor’s workforce with that of the workforces of similar federal contractors in the area, and examine the contractor’s affirmative action plan. Next, OFCCP usually conducts an on-site review at the contractor’s establishment. During this phase, compliance officers investigate potential violations identified in the desk audit, verify the contractor’s activities to implement its affirmative action program, and obtain information needed to work with the contractor to resolve any violations. Activities include inspecting the contractor’s facilities and reviewing its personnel files (see fig. 2). Compliance reviews tend to uncover violations in the vast majority of cases. OFCCP identified violations in 74 percent of its completed compliance reviews in fiscal year 1994 (see table 1), and OFCCP classified these violations as either major or minor. In 73 percent of the reviews in which violations were identified, OFCCP resolved them with conciliation agreements. Conciliation agreements are used for major violations. Many conciliation agreements address violations such as a contractor’s failure to complete a workforce utilization analysis or to correct for problems with its past performances. Some agreements do address outright discrimination, such as one case in which a compliance review uncovered a pattern of discrimination against African American applicants who had been denied jobs at a facility. In addition to the actual conciliation agreement, OFCCP may require the contractor to provide financial compensation to the individual victims of discrimination. For example, in fiscal year 1994, OFCCP reached 553 financial agreements valued at $39.6 million, and, in the case of the discrimination previously cited, the company agreed to pay over $630,000 in back wages to the 32 qualified applicants who had been denied jobs. OFCCP resolved the remaining compliance reviews with letters of commitment, which are used for minor violations such as the need to make technical corrections to a contractor’s affirmative action plan. While OFCCP emphasizes bringing contractors into compliance with the employment laws rather than penalizing them for not complying, OFCCP may recommend enforcement proceedings—that is, legal actions—if a contractor fails to resolve discrimination or affirmative action violations. Seventy-five cases were referred for enforcement in fiscal year 1994, and in one such case OFCCP found that a contractor discriminated in compensating a class of minorities and women. The contractor refused to conciliate, and OFCCP then recommended the case for enforcement. After an administrative hearing, the Secretary of Labor may order that a contract be suspended or cancelled, and the contractor may be debarred from doing business with the federal government. Debarments, however, are rare, with five contractors debarred in fiscal year 1994. In two of these cases, the contractors did not honor their conciliation agreements by failing to recruit and hire women, and by filing false reports. Enforcement resources not devoted to compliance reviews are used for complaint investigations and other support activities. OFCCP dedicates about 11 percent of its enforcement hours to investigating specific complaints of employment discrimination. OFCCP investigates cases involving groups of people or patterns of discrimination, as well as individual or group complaints filed under the disability and veterans’ laws. In fiscal year 1994, OFCCP completed 802 complaint investigations and found violations in 19 percent of the cases. OFCCP devoted the remainder of its enforcement resources—about 10 percent—to various support activities. Staff give technical assistance, such as advising contractors on how to meet their equal employment opportunity obligations. OFCCP provides this assistance by answering individual questions and sponsoring seminars on OFCCP policies and regulations. OFCCP staff also spend time supporting litigation efforts and completing other activities, such as (1) linking contractors to specific community recruitment and training resources that can help fill workforce deficiencies and (2) reviewing periodic progress reports required by agreements reached during compliance reviews. In fiscal year 1989, OFCCP’s staff size was larger than it had been since the early 1980s, and the agency completed a record number of compliance reviews. By fiscal year 1994, OFCCP’s budget had decreased by 9 percent in real dollars (see table 2). As OFCCP’s budget decreased in real terms, so did the size of its staff. From fiscal year 1989 to fiscal year 1994, OFCCP’s total FTE staff decreased by 15 percent, from 970 to 820 (see fig. 3). Moreover, the actual number of compliance officers working at OFCCP decreased by 33 percent and has been below the authorized level since fiscal year 1990, primarily because of attrition and hiring freezes. During this time the number of completed compliance reviews decreased by 33 percent, from 6,232 to 4,179. OFCCP officials explained that part of this decline was due to the decrease in OFCCP’s funding and staff levels, as well as a changing emphasis from reviewing a single establishment to undertaking more labor intensive lengthy reviews such as corporate management reviews and construction mega-project reviews. The number of complaint investigations, in which OFCCP reacts to specific complaints filed by a person or persons, also decreased by 39 percent during this period. This drop, from 1,321 to 802 (see fig. 4), was due in large part to a reduction in the number of complaints actually received by OFCCP, according to OFCCP officials. One of the procedures OFCCP uses to initially identify contractors for compliance reviews may not lead to appropriate targeting of contractors. Because OFCCP aggregates data pertaining to all minority groups in a company during its initial selection stages, rather than focusing on data pertaining to each minority group separately, it could overlook companies that discriminate against one or more particular minority groups. Contractors are required to report on the race, ethnicity, and sex of their workforce in each of nine occupational categories. OFCCP then uses these data as part of its process to determine which contractors should be targeted for compliance reviews. This includes comparing the percentage of all minorities and the percentage of women in a contractor’s workforce to that of all other federal contractors in similar industries and geographic areas.