The past few years have been a period of upheaval for civil rights at USDA. During this period, an increasing number of USDA employees have filed discrimination complaints. Also, in December 1996, a group of minority farmers demonstrated in front of the White House to protest what they viewed as systemic, long-standing discrimination in the Department’s agricultural lending programs. In October 1997, minority farmers filed a class action lawsuit that charged USDA with discrimination in lending and other departmental farm programs between 1983 and 1997 and failure to investigate discrimination complaints. In addition, recent legislation would enable past complainants either to bring suit or to obtain a departmental hearing on the record. This legislation waives the statute of limitations for suits alleging discrimination between 1981 and 1996 that were filed with the Department before July 1, 1997. Concerned about allegations of discrimination, the Secretary of Agriculture, in December 1996, appointed the Civil Rights Action Team to review civil rights issues and develop recommendations to address institutional problems. The team held a dozen “listening sessions” with USDA customers and employees throughout the country before issuing its report in February 1997. The report made 92 recommendations to address four major problem areas: (1) the organizational structure of civil rights, (2) the lack of management commitment to civil rights, (3) program delivery and outreach, and (4) workforce diversity and employment practices. Shortly after the report was issued, the Secretary established a Civil Rights Implementation Team to implement the report’s recommendations. Several months later, in testimony before the House Committee on Agriculture, the Secretary stated that his goal was to get USDA out from under the past and have it emerge as the federal civil rights leader. Regarding organizational issues, the action team’s report noted that USDA’s civil rights program had been in a persistent state of chaos because of numerous changes since the 1980s. The last reorganization prior to the team’s report had occurred in October 1995, when departmental civil rights responsibilities were divided between two offices with two separate leaders—one office was responsible for employment and program discrimination complaints and one for all remaining civil rights issues, including the development of civil rights policy. In addition, most USDA agencies had their own civil rights offices that performed some complaint-processing functions. According to the report, this fragmentation of responsibilities left employees and customers (such as farmers) confused about where to go for help. In March 1997, USDA consolidated its departmental civil rights functions under a new Office of Civil Rights (OCR). While OCR has overall responsibility for the Department’s civil rights program, USDA’s agencies continue to have their own civil rights offices that are responsible for ensuring agency-level compliance with civil rights laws and regulations.OCR’s fiscal year 1999 budget is about $13 million, about the same as in the previous year. As of October 1, 1998, OCR had about 120 staff. OCR is undergoing another reorganization that was expected to be effective January 15, 1999. Under this reorganization, the office will consist of nine divisions, as shown in figure 1. The reorganization will add three new divisions to the current structure—the Program Adjudication, Program Compliance, and Resource Management Staff divisions. It also creates a new position of Deputy Director for Systems and Administration, which was filled in September 1998. The Program Investigations and Adjudication Divisions will be responsible for processing program complaints; the Employment Complaints Division will continue to be responsible for processing employment complaints. While there are similarities in some of the steps followed in processing the two types of complaints (such as conducting an investigation and determining whether discrimination has occurred), the specific procedures used to process them and the laws and regulations that govern them are different. USDA is responsible for enforcing many statutes, regulations, and executive orders that prohibit discrimination on such grounds as race, color, national origin, and age in programs or activities that it conducts (conducted programs) and in programs for which it provides federal financial assistance (assisted programs). USDA’s conducted programs (such as farm loan programs) are administered directly to participants through agency offices; USDA’s assisted programs are those in which nonfederal organizations (such as the states) are responsible for providing federal assistance to participants, such as those in the Food Stamp Program. OCR is responsible for processing complaints for both conducted and assisted programs, but the great majority of its cases arise from conducted programs. However, other than requiring that complaints generally be filed within 180 days from the date the person knew or should have known of the alleged discrimination (conducted programs) or the date of the alleged discrimination (assisted programs), USDA’s codified regulations provide few specifics on the program complaint process. On November 1, 1997, OCR began implementing a new system for processing discrimination complaints in conducted programs. For complaints accepted on or after that date, OCR requires that they be resolved (through dismissal, withdrawal, settlement, or decision) within 180 days from the date the complaint is accepted. The system also establishes interim time frames, including a requirement that the USDA agency against which the complaint was filed provide OCR, within 24 days, its perspective on the complainant’s allegations. As of October 1, 1998, OCR had 611 cases remaining in the program complaint backlog and 193 new program cases. In fiscal year 1998, OCR had about 30 staff assigned to processing new and backlog program complaints. The vast majority of program complaints come out of the programs conducted by USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA) and Rural Housing Service. As of October 1, 1998, 65 percent and 23 percent of new open cases were related to FSA and Rural Housing Service programs, respectively, as were 61 percent and 21 percent of open backlog cases. Several statutes protect federal employees against discrimination in employment—particularly title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended, which makes it illegal to discriminate in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Employment discrimination complaints within USDA are to be processed under the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) regulations that apply to executive branch employees. These regulations also establish processing time requirements for each stage of the complaint process. Under EEOC regulations, before filing a formal complaint, employees who believe that they have been discriminated against must first contact an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) counselor within 45 days of the alleged discrimination to attempt to informally resolve the complaint. If this effort is unsuccessful, USDA employees can file a formal complaint with OCR, which either accepts or dismisses it. OCR may dismiss a complaint if it was improperly filed—for example, if it was not first brought to the attention of an EEO counselor or formally filed within prescribed time limits. If OCR accepts the complaint, it investigates and issues an investigation report. Under EEOC regulations, OCR must generally complete these activities within 180 days from the date of the complainant’s formal filing. After receiving the investigation report, an employee who pursues a complaint has 30 days to either (1) request a hearing before an EEOC administrative judge, who issues a recommended decision that the agency can accept, reject, or modify in making its final decision or (2) forgo a hearing and ask for a final agency decision. When there is no EEOC hearing, regulations require that the complaint be decided within 270 days from the filing date; with an EEOC hearing, the complaint must be decided within 450 days from the filing date. An employee dissatisfied with an agency decision to dismiss a complaint or with a final agency decision may appeal to EEOC or file a civil action in a federal district court. Figure 2 shows the process and time frames for federal employment complaints as prescribed in EEOC regulations. While OCR has categorized its employment cases into backlog cases and new cases, all employment cases are to be processed according to EEOC regulations. As of October 1, 1998, OCR had 761 employment complaint cases remaining in the backlog and 701 new cases, for a total of 1,462 cases in its employment complaint inventory. The largest percentage (about 21 percent) of these cases were from the Forest Service, USDA’s largest agency, followed by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, which accounted for 14 percent. OCR has about 30 staff members responsible for processing employment complaints. Currently, these complaints are processed along functional lines, with staff specializing in various phases of the complaint process, such as acceptance/dismissal, report of investigation, and adjudication (drafting a final agency decision). Since the early 1990s, both the federal and private sectors have seen a dramatic increase in the number of workplace discrimination complaints and the cost and time involved in trying to resolve them. To address these complaints, private companies and federal agencies, including USDA, have turned to alternative dispute resolution (ADR) as a way of resolving workplace problems. ADR includes a variety of dispute resolution techniques that usually involve intervention or facilitation by a neutral third party. Examples of ADR techniques include mediation, arbitration, and dispute resolution boards. OCR is not processing discrimination complaints within its own deadlines for program complaints or within the EEOC requirements for employment complaints. OCR did not meet the original goal of resolving its backlog of program and employment complaints within 120 days after the issuance of the Civil Rights Action Team’s report, and its deadline for closing the backlog of complaints has been extended several times. In addition, (1) OCR’s new program cases are often missing interim milestones and are not on track for being closed in a timely manner and (2) employment cases are continuing to exceed EEOC time frames. As of October 1, 1998, OCR had closed only 477 (or 44 percent) of its backlog of 1,088 program cases and 1,381 (or 64 percent) of its backlog of 2,142 employment cases. OCR’s goal was to close all remaining backlog cases by December 31, 1998—its fourth deadline for backlog program cases and its third deadline for backlog employment cases.