{"id":28230,"date":"2024-04-03T15:13:46","date_gmt":"2024-04-03T15:13:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/federaltimes\/uncategorized\/2024\/04\/03\/locality-pay-is-a-focus-of-senate-bill-aimed-at-tracking-fed-telework\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T05:08:57","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T05:08:57","slug":"locality-pay-is-a-focus-of-senate-bill-aimed-at-tracking-fed-telework","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/federaltimes\/home\/2024\/04\/03\/locality-pay-is-a-focus-of-senate-bill-aimed-at-tracking-fed-telework\/","title":{"rendered":"Locality pay is a focus of Senate bill aimed at tracking fed telework"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Two U.S. senators added a bipartisan telework bill to the stack of legislation seeking more oversight of federal agencies\u2019 work-from-home policies, claiming that some government workers may be getting locality pay they don\u2019t deserve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sens. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa,<\/a> and Gary Peters, D-Mich., introduced legislation on Wednesday requiring the federal government make its telework policies public and add auto-tracking of telework use in federal payroll systems. Some of that recordkeeping is done already by the Office of Personnel Management, but Ernst said these reports are outdated by the time they\u2019re published.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In particular, the bill takes issue with federal employees who may be collecting locality pay based on their office location but work from home in a different city.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor too long, Americans have been on hold while bureaucrats phone it in,\u201d Ernst said in a statement. \u201cSince \u2018temporary\u2019 telework policies went into effect over four years ago, the remote lifestyle comes at the expense of the people federal agencies are meant to serve.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\t