Big Story on the frontpage of today’s Washington Post about the White House’s efforts to overhaul the civil service system, starting with the Dept of Homeland Security. It sounds great to me for a few reasons. One, anyone who has lived in DC for any period of time knows that there’s an astounding amount of dead wood in the bowels of the federal government. I don’t want to pay for it. Second, many good ideas and talented people die from metaphorical brain death trying to work around the functionaries and bureaucrats. Maybe this will make things easier. Third, it’s Old School Republicanism: Civil Service Reform! Yes, yes, previous reforms created their own problems, but can’t ya just feel the nostalgia? Makes me wanna say “Bully!”

Four, it will make scads of the right people angry.

Five, hopefully there’s a little “strategery” in the background. There was a lot of conjecture that the original DHS reorganization was partly intended to keep Congress busy while Bush got other things done. I don’t have any 411 on this, but it’d be nice if something like that is going on.

Here’s the opener from the Washington Post:

The Bush administration unveiled a new personnel system for the Department of Homeland Security yesterday that will dramatically change the way workers are paid, promoted, deployed and disciplined — and soon the White House will ask Congress to grant all federal agencies similar authority to rewrite civil service rules governing their employees.
The new system will replace the half-century-old General Schedule, with its familiar 15 pay grades and raises based on time in a job, and install a system that more directly bases pay on occupation and annual performance evaluations, officials said. The new system has taken two years to develop and will require at least four more to implement, they said.
“We’re not rushing into it,” DHS Secretary Tom Ridge said.
Under the new plan, employees will be grouped into eight to 12 clusters based on occupation. Salary ranges will be based, in part, on geographic location and annual market surveys by a new compensation committee of what similar employees earn in the private sector and other government entities. Within each occupational cluster, workers will be assigned to one of four salary ranges, or “pay bands,” based on their skill level and experience.