Bush to Overhaul Civil Service Starting with DHS

Wow, this is huge news for federal government workers. Tom Ridge, retiring Secretary of Homeland Security, announced yesterday that the long-established, nigh-sacred and untouchable Civil Service system is being dismantled at DHS in favor of performance-based compensation plans, HR management that more closely resembles that of private industry, and hefty limits to collective bargaining and the ability of the unions' to force CB situations with the Department.

The article from Federal Computer Week can be found here.

My guess is this is a harbinger of things to come -- starting with Social Security, continuing on with the federal government workforce, and ending with perhaps the privatization of national parks and interstate highways -- the Bush Administration is slowly and surely re-making the federal government and its programs in its own image. Is it a conservative/small-government image? No, not exactly. It's the status quo with privatization tweaks.

Despite myself, I think it may not be a bad idea what they're proposing to do with DHS. My aunt and uncle, both lifelong civil servants, I'm sure would vehemently (and rightly, from their perspective) disagree.