Although the person who will be the OFCCP Director for the Obama Administration hasn’t been announced yet, signs indicate that the President’s vision for the agency is one that will enhance its enforcement muscle and scope. At this point, we already know that Obama has requested a whopping increase to the agency’s budget and that this increase will be used to beef-up the OFCCP’s efforts to uncover compensation discrimination. We also know that the agency intends to audit significantly more construction contractors than it has in previous years in light of the increase in federal construction contractors resulting from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act).
Under President Obama's FY 2010 budget proposal, announced in May, the OFCCP would receive $109.521 million in funding. That amount is a $27.4-million increase over the estimated FY 2009 budget allotment (82.1 million) adopted by Congress – a striking increase of over 33 percent! The Labor Department has stated that this budget request includes $25,600,000 to fund 213 full-time equivalent employees and a new case management system. Moreover, the Labor Department has specifically stated that much of this increase is intended to support enforcement and outreach efforts related to compensation discrimination – including “improving the various approaches and investigative techniques used to evaluate compensation” and to “support litigation to amplify enforcement activities by funding external experts to verify OFCCP's allegations and assessments to solidify its commitment to strong enforcement.”
The Recovery Act adds $3 million more for the 2009 budget estimate and $5 million more to the 2010 request. Just last week, the OFCCP posted on its website its plan to conduct 450 compliance evaluations (from July 1, 2009 through September 30, 2010) of federal contractors in receipt of Recovery Act funds in addition to roughly 5,000 federal contractors per FY targeted for audits through the agency’s existing Federal Contractor Selection System (FCSS). Although the OFCCP will audit approximately 90 supply and service contractors receiving federal contracts through Recovery Act funding, it will place a special emphasis on the construction industry because the majority (estimated at roughly 80%) of Recovery Act contractors will be recipients of direct or federally assisted funds for construction projects. To this end, the OFCCP will utilize 50 full-time equivalent employees to complete at least 360 compliance evaluations of construction contractors. By way of comparison, of the 4,333 audits the OFCCP completed in FY 2008 under the FCSS, 204 were of construction contractors. These audits were conducted by a workforce of approximately 400 compliance officers who focused primarily on supply and service contractor audits.
These developments indicate that President Obama has indeed started to implement his vision for the OFCCP, but many elements remain a mystery. For example, given that it seems the agency will continue to increase its focus on systemic discrimination (particularly systemic compensation discrimination), does that mean (as it has in the past) a reduced focus on the affirmative action aspects of federal contractor obligations? Or do the increased funding levels signal an intent to intensify the agency’s focus on affirmative action in addition to systemic discrimination?
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