The Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) announced recently that it is providing temporary measures to ease the compliance burden on companies that have contracts and subcontracts with the federal government to provide relief to victims of Hurricane Harvey, as well as to contractor establishments located within Harvey’s impact zone.
Exercising his authority under federal law to act “in the national interest,” Acting OFCCP Director Thomas Dowd has issued a memorandum to all federal contracting agencies allowing them to enter into supply and service contracts for Harvey relief that will not trigger OFCCP’s written affirmative action program (AAP) obligations.
Through at least the end of November, federal contracting agencies will be permitted to amend the required EO clauses by adding prescribed language exempting the contractor from the obligation to develop written AAPs. As a practical matter, this will exempt companies that hold these Harvey relief contracts, and only Harvey relief contracts, from an OFCCP audit, providing non-contracting companies with incentive to pitch in. OFCCP also reserves the right to extend the initial three-month period if the agency deems it necessary.
In addition to the written AAP waiver, OFCCP has also announced a three-month moratorium on the scheduling of new compliance audits of facilities in areas impacted by the hurricane beginning September 1, 2017, again reserving the right to extend.
Last but not least, OFCCP announced that it will contact contractors with open audits at facilities in the impacted areas regarding the status of their review and “next steps,” hinting that the agency is willing to provide Harvey-impacted contractors some degree of latitude with regard to existing audits.
Members of the Center for Workplace Compliance (CWC) can read more here.