Monday morning federal headlines – Aug. 6

The Morning Federal Newscast is a daily compilation of the stories you hear Federal Drive hosts Tom Temin and Emily Kopp discuss throughout the show each day. The Newscast is designed to give FederalNewsRadio.com users more information about the stories you hear on the air.

• Senior executives and political appointees get a temporary reprieve from the STOCK Act. Congress has delayed by a month parts of the new law aimed at preventing high level federal officials from using official knowledge for stock trading. The House and Senate both agreed to the halt just as the American Civil Liberties Union prepared a lawsuit. Plaintiffs included the Senior Executives Association. The law requires posting of executives’ financial information to a public web site. (Federal News Radio)
• Employees of the Department of Housing and Urban Development will come under more strict ethical rules starting Sept 5. HUD issued a final rule in today’s federal register detailing new requirements in its Supplemental Standards of Ethical Conduct for employees. Among the new requirements, HUD redefines the restriction of what types of projects employees can have a financial interest in. The rule also removes the specific restriction on employees having outside positions with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. HUD issued a proposed rule in March and received just one comment. It made no changes from the proposed rule. (Federal Register)
• Just before its probe lands on Mars, NASA has chosen three companies to help it get people into low orbit. Boeing Company, Space Exploration Technologies and Sierra Nevada Corporation will share $1.1 billion. They’ll develop competing designs for ships to take astronauts to the International Space Station. Until the new spacecraft are built in 2017, the United States will pay the Russian space agency $63 million per astronaut for taxi service. (Federal News Radio)
• As he departs the administration, regulations chief Cass Sunstein is getting mixed reviews. Sunstein, the director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, is headed back to Harvard Law School. The New York Times reports Sunstein personally edited most of the rules proposed by agencies, since joining the Obama administration in 2009. He rewrote 80 percent of the EPA’s proposed rules. Some environmental groups say he weakened them. Business groups praise Sunstein for recognizing that regulations have costs. The White House says Sunstein’s approach saved $100 billion. OMB General Counsel Boris Bershteyn becomes acting OIRA director. (New York Times)
• The General Services Administration launched its new procurement management system last week, known as SAM. And almost just as quickly it went down. A GSA spokesman confirms to Federal News Radio, the agency is working with its contractor, IBM, to address current issues stopping the System for Award Management from working. The spokesman says SAM should be back up today. The System for Award Management will consolidate eight acquisition databases. Eventually, GSA wants the system to be a single point of entry for contractor registration, and contract and performance data. It also wants information to be available to the public. (General Services Administration)
• A new report by a government watchdog group finds the General Services Administration’s ethics program received high marks in November 2010 study from the Office of Government Ethics — despite serious concerns about potential conflicts of interest. Cause for Action issued an investigative memorandum today highlighting what its calls warning signs that only came to light after the agency’s inspector general’s April 2012 report on the now infamous Western Regions conference. The group says OGE reviewed only five of 11 regional offices, and said at the time GSA had model practices for ethics. The Washington Post first reported this story. (Cause for Action)

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