In the second of three directives issued late last week by Craig Leen, the Acting Director of the Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP), agency staff have been instructed to develop and implement a “verification process” to ensure that all federal contractors that are required to prepare affirmative action plans (AAPs) are meeting the most basic of those requirements, namely the annual preparation of written AAPs.
The new AAP verification directive notes that the new process will initially take the form of contractor self-certification, but could later take the form of mandated annual submission of AAPs to OFCCP for review, and instructs staff to begin developing information technology sufficient to collect and facilitate the review of AAPs.
The new directive notes further that there is an existing AAP certification requirement included within the federal procurement process and that OFCCP is exploring the extent to which this requirement is sufficient for OFCCP’s purposes. In the meantime, however, the directive instructs agency personnel to begin conducting “compliance checks” to verify contractors’ certifications.
In addition, the directive provides that if contractors selected for an audit request an extension of time to submit desk audit materials in response to an audit scheduling letter, compliance personnel should request a “proffer” of the written AAP before granting any additional time to prepare and submit supporting data, documents, reports, and analyses.
Members of the Center for Workplace Compliance (CWC) can read more here.