The White House Office of Management and Budget has again extended the deadline for the EEOC and other federal agencies to submit their Agency Action Plans on Race and Ethnicity Data. Agency Action Plans are now due March 28, 2027. The deadline for agencies to bring data collections into compliance is September 28, 2029.
The agency’s submission of their Agency Action Plans is a key step in implementing the revised federal race/ethnicity data standards announced by OMB in 2024. OMB’s 2024 revisions made major changes, including adding Middle Eastern or North African (MENA) as a minimum reporting category and moving toward a single combined race-and-ethnicity question that allows multiple selections.
Implementing agencies will decide many details later as they update their reporting forms and instructions, so the Agency Action Plans will be an early indicator of the type of changes that employers eventually could see. Employers should comply with existing agency data collection and reporting requirements until formal changes are made.
Members of the Center for Workplace Compliance (CWC), our affiliated nonprofit membership association, can read more here.