The Department of Interior discovered in 2016 that “widespread” sexual misconduct had taken place at its Grand Canyon National Park, according to the agency watchdog, with more than three-dozen employees experiencing or witnessing misconduct.
The Office of Inspector General subsequently opened 22 investigations into sexual misconduct at the agency and a Work Environment Survey administered to all employees in 2017 found that 35 percent of respondents had experienced some form of sexual harassment or misconduct in the last year.
“We have uncovered sexual misconduct in parks as large as Yellowstone, and as small as Canaveral National Seashore; in a remote Bureau of Indian Affairs office and at the DOI headquarters; in locations stretching across the country from Georgia to Oregon; and involving behavior ranging from disturbing, inappropriate touching to outright sexual assault,” Mark Greenblatt, inspector general for the Department of Interior, testified in an Oct. 30 House Natural Resources Committee hearing.
The agency then instituted several policies to educate supervisors and employees about sexual misconduct rules and avenues to report such misconduct, as well as deal with the employees that had perpetuated such behavior.
“What was especially troubling was that 60.2 percent of employees who reported that they had suffered from harassment indicated that these events occurred more than once, and often times the victim had to continue working with the harassing individual,” Susan Combs, assistant secretary for policy, management and budget at the Department of Interior, testified. Combs added that the results of the 2016 and 2017 reports were “eye-opening” and “resulted in soul searching” for the agency’s leadership.
“Furthermore, many stated that they felt that making a complaint did not produce any real result — either no action was taken, or they were encouraged to drop the issue.”
The agency then created its first comprehensive policy on the Prevention and Elimination of Harassing Conduct and a Workplace Culture Transformation Advisory Council, alongside instituting a system for tracking reports of sexual misconduct.
According to Combs, the agency will also be offering training for employees in late summer about what to do when experiencing and witnessing sexual misconduct.
The 2019 Federal Employee Viewpoint survey included department-specific, harassment-related questions for the Department of Interior, which found that employees experiencing such harassment dropped from 35 percent to 18 percent and the number of employees who knew where to report harassing conduct went from 62.3 percent to 94 percent.
Greenblatt said that though the IG has found positive progress in the agency’s approach to addressing harassment, “there is more work to do,” more specifically to make sure that investigation reports contain all of the detail necessary to inform corrective action, track the timeliness of investigations and ensure that investigation costs aren’t preventing employees from coming forward.
“At the top people have to protect people who come forward. They can’t be viewed as troublemakers. So even when people who go through the motion of addressing the problem, but they’re still totally ostracized in the workplace —nobody hires them, nobody promotes them because they’re labeled as troublemakers — that’s still too real,” said Rep. Debbie Dingell, D-Mich.
The Department of Interior agreed with the recommendations, and Combs noted that current plans, such as those to move the Bureau of Land Management out to Colorado, could also help to make sure that harassers are held accountable, as the agency’s many spread out work sites mean that there are fewer leadership personnel to keep an in-person eye on subordinates.
“Getting decision-makers out in the field where they can take hold of things immediately is obviously desirable and it does make a difference,” said Combs.
But Rep. TJ Cox, D-Calif., disagreed, saying that if a culture of respect is important for ensuring that harassment is prevented and dealt with, forcing employees to move across the country against what they think is best does little to foster such a culture.
Ultimately, Greenblatt stressed that the agency needed to make it possible for employees to come forward with reports of harassment.
“I commit to you that the OIG, under my watch, will continue to aid the department in its efforts to foster a safe work environment free of sexual harassment and assault,” Greenblatt said.
“And to all survivors and witnesses who may be listening today, please come forward through the OIG hotline or the departmental avenues available to you. OIG investigators take this work to heart and understand that this is a very personal issue.”
