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Disabled Military Retiree Relief Act Of 2009

Floor Speech

Date: June 24, 2009
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Military Personnel

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Mr. LYNCH. Madam Speaker, I would like to thank Chairman Towns and Chairman Skelton for their leadership on this bill, H.R. 2990, and I am pleased to be a cosponsor of this bill. There is a saying which is true, that we can never fully repay our men and women in uniform for what they have given to our Nation. We can never fully repay them for their sacrifice and their service. But I am happy to say that Chairman Skelton is trying his best, along with Chairman Towns and the ranking member, to do just that.

As chairman of the Subcommittee on the Federal Workforce, Postal Service and the District of Columbia, I am delighted that key civil service retirement provisions are also approved by this Chamber included in the measure being considered today.

Federal employee and postal unions, as well as employee retiree and management groups, all support these provisions. These provisions will improve the Federal Employee Retirement System by providing workers with retirement credit for unused sick leave. Additionally, the civil service retirement annuity calculations problem for those employees who wish to phase down to part-time work at the end of their Federal careers will also be rectified. The Office of Personnel Management has long supported this fix as a way to retain the skilled and knowledgeable employees who are nearing the end of their careers at a time of a more mature Federal workforce. The government, as an employer, must take the lead in addressing these workplace realities.

This bill will also provide retirement credit for hundreds of D.C. Government employees who now serve as Federal employees. I would like to make it clear that these retirement provisions are paid for by treating Federal workers in Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Northern Mariana Islands the same as all other Federal employees, and I look forward to working with the respective delegates of those areas on this issue.

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