Recently the House of Representative unanimously passed a bill prohibiting new federal contracts with companies with seriously delinquent federal tax debts. However, the House failed to pass a similar measure, Federal Employee Tax Accountability Act (FETAA), which could have resulted in terminating government employees with seriously delinquent tax debts. It seems to us that retaining government employees with serious tax debt is equivalent to retaining employees who steal from their employer, but apparently in the view of Democratic Congress-persons (critics of the FETAA), it would be unfair to single out federal workers whose tax compliance is better than the general public. The last we checked, the general public does not work for the federal government and in any case, the specific federal employees who are seriously tax delinquent are not tax compliant so who cares if federal employees collectively are more tax compliant than the general public.
The Contracting and Tax Accountability Act, which has been previously passed by the House, but not considered by the Senate, could become law if the Senate considers it and incorporates into a Senate Bill. In any case, the government will continue to employ those with seriously delinquent tax debts; excuses, excuses.
Mike Steen is a Emeritus Advisor with Redstone Government Consulting, Inc. and a specialist in complex compliance issues to include major contractor cost accounting & business system regulations, financial compliance, resolution of DCAA audit issues, Cost Accounting Standards application, litigation support, and claims preparation. Prior to joining Redstone Government Consulting, Mike served in a number of capacities with DCAA for over thirty years, and upon his retirement, he was one of the top seven senior executives with DCAA. Mike Served as a Regional Director for two DCAA regions, and during that time was responsible for audits of approximately $25B and 800 employees. In October 2001, he was selected for the Senior Executive Service and in 2006 he received the Presidential Rank Award. During Mike’s tenure with DCAA, he was involved in conducting or managing a variety of compliance audits, to include cost proposals, billing systems, Cost Accounting Standards, claims, defective pricing, and then-evolving programs such as restructuring, financial capability and agreed-upon procedures. He directly supported the government litigation team on significant contract disputes and has prepared and presented various lectures and seminars to DCAA staff and business community leaders. Since joining Redstone Government Consulting in June 2007, Mike has developed and presented training and seminars on Government Contracts Compliance to NCMA, Federal Publications Seminars and various clients. Mike also is a prolific contributor of written articles to government contracting publications, as well as to our own Government Insights Newsletter. Mike also serves as the director of our training service offerings, with responsibilities for preparing and developing course content as well as instructing our seminars to clients and general audiences throughout the U.S. Mike also serves as a faculty instructor for the Federal Publications Seminars organization. Education Mike has a BS Degree in Business Administration from Wichita State University. He is also a graduate of the DCAA Director’s Fellowship Program in Management, and has a Masters Degree in Administration from Central Michigan University. Mr. Steen also completed a number of OPM’s management and executive development courses.