Mike Nartker
WC Monitor
5/23/2014
Thanks to a boost in funding, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management is looking to add more than 100 new staff in “several mission critical areas,” according to a memorandum issued late this week by EM’s new No. 2 official, Mark Whitney. While EM’s workforce has fallen below 1,400 employees “due to a combination of falling budgets and rising attrition rates,” a number of analyses have found that at least 1,500 full-time equivalents (FTEs) are needed “for EM to execute its mission and oversee its contractor workforce more effectively,” the memo states. With Congress having provided almost an additional $20 million in program direction funds this fiscal year, EM is now looking to bring on 133 additional FTEs at headquarters and various field offices by early Fiscal Year 2015.
Among the areas where is EM looking to additional staff is the field of contract specialists. “Several independent entities, including the Government Accountability Office, the Army Corps of Engineers, and outside consultants have concluded that EM’s current acquisition workforce is too small,” the memo states, adding that EM plans to add 27 FTEs to the field offices “with the greatest need to additional contracting experts.” An additional 20 cost estimators will be hired and added across the DOE complex “to augment EM’s ability to determine independently the fair value of the services for which it contracts and to provide the cost forecasts needed for effective budgeting and resource planning,” the memo says.
To help prepare for the future and address challenges posed by an aging workforce, EM plans to bring in 20 “recent graduates” in a variety of disciplines, the memo says. It also goes on to state, “EM will fill the additional positions with critical disciplines such as nuclear safety, fire protection, security, quality assurance, emergency management, and information technology. These new Federal FTEs will better enable their host sites to manage the complex, often first-of-its-kind work for which they are responsible, and to resolve the technical challenges that work presents.”
