Cheney Freezes Hiring to Ease Cuts in Civilian Staff

Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, launching an effort to reduce the Defense Department’s civilian employment rolls by 18,000 over five years without massive layoffs, on Friday announced a freeze on hiring of civilian workers.

The department’s hiring freeze took effect immediately and will stay in force at least until October. It can be waived only with approval from the Pentagon’s most senior leaders, Cheney ordered.

“As the armed forces are reduced over the long term in light of limited budgets, a changing world and future negotiated agreements,” Cheney said, “the department must make corresponding reductions in the size of the civilian work force that supports the armed forces.”

The move is almost certain to have a powerful impact on California, whose civilian Defense Department workers received combined wages of $4 billion in 1988. With an average of 8% of the department’s civilian work force leaving or retiring each year, the move could mean the loss of $320 million in federal payroll outlays statewide.

Friday’s announcement is the first step taken by the Defense Department to prepare to put into effect Cheney’s “Defense Management Review.” Cheney said the reforms, which promise savings of $2.3 billion next year and $39 billion over the next five years, would produce “major cultural changes” in the way the Pentagon does business.

It is the first time since 1982 that the Defense Department has attempted to reduce its civilian work force, which now numbers 1,050,000 full-time and part-time employees, by halting new hires.

Under Cheney’s reform package, the Pentagon will aim to reduce its civilian work force by 8,000 in the fiscal year beginning October, 1990.

“A prohibition on the hiring of civilian personnel . . . will assist in reducing the civilian work force in an effective fashion,” a statement released by the Pentagon said.

Officials said almost all of the prospective manpower cuts could be made by not replacing current employees who retire or leave. The department said in those instances where transfers or layoffs may appear necessary, “displaced employees will be assisted in finding appropriate positions in the department.”

As many as 80,000 civilians normally leave or retire from Defense Department jobs each year.

In a notable exception to the hiring freeze, Cheney said he and Deputy Defense Secretary Donald J. Atwood may continue to fill civilian positions that are essential to the department’s reform efforts and its drug interdiction mission.

Cheney also noted other exceptions to the freeze, such as hiring commitments made by appointed officials before announcement of the freeze, those positions deemed by top defense officials to be essential to “maintain an important national defense capability” and those positions essential to meet “medical, safety or security requirements.”

The civilian hiring freeze comes as the military services also brace for reductions of 8,000 next year and 24,000 over the next five years under Cheney’s new management blueprint. An additional 290,000 servicemen and women are expected to be cut over the next five years in reductions that are driven principally by increasing budget pressures and by changes in worldwide military threats.