Homeland Security Bill Talks Delayed
Meeting Postponed as Senators Seek More Time to Develop Compromise

October 3, 2002; Page A06

Another move toward a compromise on the stalled homeland security bill was postponed yesterday when a group of senators from both parties called off a meeting scheduled to discuss a deal on workers' rights.

The meeting was to have been a follow-up to discussions Tuesday about giving President Bush more flexibility in managing the 170,000 federal workers who would serve in a new Department of Homeland Security. Sens. John Breaux (D-La.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) were hoping to get talks moving on the issues of civil service and collective bargaining rights for those workers, which have stalled the bill in the Senate. The House approved a version favored by the White House in July.

The senators were working on a draft that would have given President Bush expanded management freedoms while providing some protections to union members, according to sources familiar with the discussions. The draft was intended to jump-start discussions yesterday by a larger group of senators that included Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) and Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.).

Bush has insisted that the legislation must give him authority to design a new personnel system that would make it easier to hire, fire, discipline and reassign employees of the new anti-terror department. The White House also wants to preserve Bush's current right to remove workers from unions if their primary responsibilities involve intelligence, counterintelligence, investigative or national security work.

Breaux, Nelson and Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee (R-R.I.), the only Republican to publicly break with the White House on the issue, earlier proposed giving Bush the authority to develop personnel changes with labor unions and take any disputes to a presidentially appointed impasse panel. The same proposal would have permitted Bush to remove workers from unions if their job duties changed so that they were primarily performing intelligence or investigative functions related to terrorism.

Breaux and Nelson need more time to develop a new compromise, staff members said yesterday. The talks were put off indefinitely as the Senate prepared to shift its focus to a resolution on the use of force in Iraq.

Ranit Schmelzer, a spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.), said that Democrats have not given up on finding a way to bridge differences, but that nothing appeared imminent. But Republicans remain much less confident that the Senate will break a four-week logjam and come up with a bill before it adjourns on Oct. 11.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35253-2002Oct2.html