Comment from Anonymous
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Summary: The commenter argues that the proposed regulation should be expanded to include administrative leave for employees relocating for new appointments or assignments. They contend that this is a common practice used to prevent pay gaps and is more frequent than the relocation of spouses.
The examples of acceptable uses of administrative leave proposed in 5 C.F.R. § 630.1403(c) should include leave for an existing employee to effectuate a change in his or her residence to a different geographic area in order to begin a new appointment or assignment. Such administrative leave is currently provided in many agency policies "as a matter of course." Such administrative leave is often necessary to avoid a gap in pay status that would otherwise arise from absurdly insisting that an appointment in one city end and a new appointment begin in another city across the country on the very next working day or within 3 calendar days. The volume and scale of new appointments where existing employees effectuate a change in residence dwarfs the number of appointments where agencies expressly authorize retention and relocation incentives, notwithstanding recent OPM efforts to increase the use of those incentives. In any event, an agency classifying an appointment as eligible for retention or relocation incentives is not and has never been the exclusive means of addressing this issue. Accordingly, agencies are authorized to use, have used, and currently do use administrative leave to address the foregoing policy concerns and prevent pay status gaps that would otherwise result from existing employees accepting new appointments or assignments that require them to change their residence to a new geographic area. The proposed regulation should recognize that reality and include administrative leave for an existing employee to effectuate a change in his or her residence to a different geographic area in order to begin a new appointment or assignment in the list of examples of acceptable uses in 5 C.F.R. § 630.1403(c).
Further, it makes no sense to address the executive order providing administrative leave for relocation of qualifying spouses without also addressing the far more common general case where existing employees themselves accept new appointments and assignments and require time to change their residence.
PROPOSED LANGUAGE: "to provide administrative leave to a civilian employee who needs time off to effectuate a change in his or her residence to a different geographic area to begin a new appointment or assignment."