When Will We See New Regulations for Veterans and Persons with Disabilities?

In April of 2011, OFCCP released proposed changes to its regulations regarding veterans.  Later that year, in December, OFCCP released proposed changes to its regulations regarding persons with disabilities.  Each set of proposed changes has significant revisions to the current affirmative action regulations for these groups.  OFCCP had hoped to publish these regulations in final form during 2012, but this did not occur.

The Department of Labor (DoL) in its regulatory agenda published in December of 2012 stated that OFCCP's new regulations regarding veterans and persons with disabilities would be released in final form in April of 2013.  We believe that DoL is not going to meet this timeframe.  Among the reasons we believe these regulations will be further delayed are the following:

• The Department of Labor is going to be hesitant to publish extensive new regulations while a new Secretary of Labor is being confirmed and is starting in the position.  Hearings have not yet begun for the Obama administration's nominee for Secretary of Labor, Thomas Perez, and these hearings may be contentious because of positions Mr. Perez took while at the Department of Justice.
• OFCCP already has too many regulatory initiatives on its plate.  Most notably, the agency just released a new directive regarding compensation that will require extensive training for OFCCP compliance officers and extensive oversight from OFCCP officials.
• The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) may have concerns over the costs and burdens that would be imposed under OFCCP's proposed changes to its regulations.  Federal contractors and their representatives have made it very clear to OMB that OFCCP grossly underestimated the cost both in terms of dollars and time that would be required to implement the proposed changes.

At this point, any guess on when revised regulations regarding veterans and persons with disabilities will appear is simply speculation.  Revised regulations may appear later in the year, sometime in 2014, or never.  Even if revised regulations do appear, they may take a significantly different form than the regulations proposed by OFCCP in 2011.

The proposed regulations and the DoL's December 2012 regulatory agenda can be found on the documents page on our website.  Our thoughts on the proposed regulations can also be found on our website as part of our "older news" page.