IEC Journal

August 13th Meeting

Our August 13th meeting will feature a panel discussion of the OGE informal opinions for the years 2007 and 2008.  Please note that the date of our August meeting is a departure from our usual first Thursday scheduling.  Our panel will include Jeff Green of DoD Standards of Conduct Office, Dave LaCroix of Navy Office of General Counsel and Pat Carney of FCC Office of General Counsel.  Those wishing to view digests of these opinions in advance of the meeting can do so at the DoD SOCO website.  The full opinions are, of course, viewable on OGE’s website.

 

As usual, we will meet from 12:15-1:30 in the OTS auditorium and, as always, individuals who are on the IEC roster need not pre-register for this meeting.  Ethics officials who are not on our roster but who wish to attend can pre-register by contacting Patrick.Carney@fcc.gov not later than Monday, August 10th.  Those who are neither on the IEC roster nor pre-registered can still be admitted by showing a Government ID to OTS Security personnel.

 

Please note:  We’d like to once again remind our membership to frequently check this website for word of future meetings, ethics job openings and other news of interest to the Federal ethics community.  As we’ve indicated previously, if you’ve noticed a lack of email notices lately, the RSS Feed service that a lot of us used was shut down a while back, so you need to resubscribe in order to receive future notices of postings.  Please read our April 1 posting regarding receiving email notices of IEC postings.  It describes one option called FeedBlitz that seems to work well for many of us.  You can get to the April 1 posting by clicking on the link associated with that date on the calendar on the top right side of our homepage.

July 9th Meeting

Our July 9th meeting will feature Chip Christopher, of the Office of Government Ethics, who will talk about the OGE agency program reviews.  If your agency has not had a program review in recent years, particularly if you’ve had significant office turnover since your last OGE review and are wondering if you’re prepared for your next one, this will be an extremely valuable opportunity to hear Chip’s insights into the process.

 

Please note that our July meeting is scheduled for the second Thursday of the month, a departure from our usual scheduling practice.  However, as usual, we will meet from 12:15-1:30 in the OTS auditorium and, as always, individuals who are on the IEC roster need not pre-register for this meeting.  Ethics officials who are not on our roster but who wish to attend can pre-register by contacting Patrick.Carney@fcc.gov not later than Monday, July 6th.  Those who are neither on the IEC roster nor pre-registered can still be admitted by showing a Government ID to OTS Security personnel.

June 4th Meeting

Following up on the excellent presentation at our May meeting by Erica Dornburg and Cheryl Kane Piasecki, which included an outstanding overview of the Public Financial Disclosure Report (SF-278) review process, our June 4^th meeting will continue to focus on the SF-278.   Our June meeting will feature Mr. Arthur Goldberg, U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Division, Federal Programs Branch.  Mr. Goldberg will address what happens when an agency can't get a public financial disclosure filer to file the required report report, i.e. going to court to enforce the requirement.  He will share with us what the Department of Justice looks for from the agencies to build their case.  He will also share some case stories with the community.  Mr. Goldberg is looking forward to questions from the ethics community on this timely topic.

 

As usual, we will meet from 12:15-1:30 in the OTS auditorium and, as always, individuals who are on the IEC roster need not pre-register for this meeting.  Ethics officials who are not on our roster but who wish to attend can pre-register by contacting Patrick.Carney@fcc.gov not later than Monday, June 1st.  Those who are neither on the IEC roster nor pre-registered can still be admitted by showing a Government ID to OTS Security personnel.

 

We’d also like to take a moment to remind our membership to frequently check this website for word of future meetings, ethics job openings and other news of interest to the Federal ethics community.  As we’ve indicated previously, if you’ve noticed a lack of email notices lately, the RSS Feed service that a lot of us used was shut down a while back, so it's necessary to resubscribe in order to receive future notices of postings.  Please read our April 1 posting regarding receiving email notices of IEC postings.  It describes one option called FeedBlitz that seems to work well for many of us.  You can get to the April 1 posting by clicking on the link associated with that date on the calendar on the top right side of our homepage.

May 7th Meeting

Our May 7th meeting will feature Erica Dornburg, of the the DoD Standards of Conduct Office and Cheryl Kane Piasecki, of OGE, who will present an overview of the Public Financial Disclosure Report (SF-278) review process.   With most of us beginning to review SF-278 filings for CY 2008 and the deadline for these reports just a week after our May meeting, we can expect this presentation to be timely as well as informative.  Erica will be sharing with us some of the tricks of the trade, common problems confronting the reviewer, new financial instruments that you may encounter in the course of your review, where to obtain information helpful to your review, and best practices from an agency perspective.  Cheryl will address what OGE expects by way of conflicts reviews and technical sufficiency, and will be discussing the basics of process, itself – filing cycles, timely submission to OGE, timely response to requests for additional information, etc.  You won’t want to miss this session. 

 

As usual, we will meet from 12:15-1:30 in the OTS auditorium at 1700 G Street, NW, and, as always, individuals who are on the IEC roster need not pre-register for this meeting.  Ethics officials who are not on our roster but who wish to attend can pre-register by contacting Patrick.Carney@fcc.gov not later than Monday, May 4th.  Those who are neither on the IEC roster nor pre-registered can still be admitted by showing a Government ID to OTS Security personnel.

IEC April 9th Presentation

Attached please find the slide presentation from the April 9, 2009, IEC meeting. Download Contractors in the Federal Workplace IEC 3-09

REMINDER: April 9 Meeting

The guest speaker at the Thursday, April 9 meeting will be Steve Epstein, formerly of the DoD Standards of Conduct Office, now the Ethics and Compliance Leader for the PricewaterhouseCoopers Federal Practice.  Steve will speak on the topic, "Contractors in the Workplace: Things Your Employees Are Not Telling You."  Pat Carney's March 23 post has more information.

Thursday, April 9th Meeting

Our April 9th meeting will feature Steve Epstein, who left the DoD Standards of Conduct Office two years ago and is now the Ethics and Compliance Leader for the PricewaterhouseCoopers Federal Practice.  With a presentation entitled, "Contractors in the Workplace: Things Your Employees Are Not Telling You," Steve returns to the IEC to share his surprising, humorous, and sometimes disturbing discoveries about the interaction between contractor and Federal employees in the Federal workplace.   In his new role Steve says that he's discovering things that "I didn't know that I didn't know, when I was in DoD, because the DoD employees never told me about them."  This material provides feedback about old concerns and new risks – topics for you to consider incorporating into this year's ethics training.   

As usual, we will meet from 12:15-1:30 in the OTS auditorium and, as always, individuals who are on the IEC roster need not pre-register for this meeting.  Ethics officials who are not on our roster but who wish to attend can pre-register by contacting Patrick.Carney@fcc.gov not later than Thursday, April 2nd.  Those who are neither on the IEC roster nor pre-registered can still be admitted by showing a Government ID to OTS Security personnel.

IEC March 5th Presentation

Attached please find the slide presentation from the March 5, 2009, IEC meeting.  Download GSA Travel Presentation (Mar 09).

March 5th Meeting

Our March 5th meeting will feature Lenny Loewentritt, Deputy General Counsel, GSA, who will give us an update on the various travel regulations of import to ethics officials.  Lenny is always one of our most popular speakers, and his presentations are invariably well received by all in attendance.  You’ll want to make sure your agency is represented at this meeting. 

 

As usual, we will meet from 12:15-1:30 in the OTS auditorium and, as always, individuals who are on the IEC roster need not pre-register for this meeting.  Ethics officials who are not on our roster but who wish to attend can pre-register by contacting Patrick.Carney@fcc.gov not later than Monday, March 2nd.  Those who are neither on the IEC roster nor pre-registered can still be admitted by showing a Government ID to OTS Security personnel.

 

For planning purposes, please note that our April meeting will vary from our usual scheduling practice, taking place on Thursday, April 9th – the second Thursday of the month.  Please mark your calendar accordingly.

IEC Meeting Thursday, Feb. 5 - Presentation

Attached please find the slide presentation from the February 5, 2009, IEC meeting. Download Fraud Brief (02-05-09).