Chairman Rangel, Ranking Member McCrery and Members of the House Ways and Means Committee:

On behalf of the Federal Managers Association (FMA) and the nearly 1,000 managers in the Social Security Administration’s Office of Disability Adjudication and Review (ODAR), please allow us to take a moment and thank you for this opportunity to present our views before the Committee. As federal managers, we are committed to carrying out the mission of our agency in the most efficient and cost effective manner while providing those necessary services to millions of Americans. 

Established in 1913, the Federal Managers Association is the largest and oldest association of managers and supervisors in the federal government. FMA was originally organized to represent the interests of civil service managers and supervisors in the Department of Defense and has since branched out to include some 35 different federal departments and agencies including many managers and supervisors within the Social Security Administration (SSA). We are a nonprofit professional membership-based organization dedicated to advocating excellence in public service and committed to ensuring an efficient and effective federal government. FMA members and their colleagues in the SSA Office of Disability Adjudication and Review are responsible for ensuring the success of the administration of Social Security’s disability determination process and in providing needed services to American customers.

As you are keenly aware, the Social Security Administration plays a vital role in serving over 160 million American workers and their families. Each month, SSA pays out benefits to 48 million beneficiaries. Over 7 million low-income Americans depend on the agency’s Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program to stay afloat in a cost-inflating world, and nearly 7.2 million disabled Americans receive benefit payments through Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI). At the February 28, 2008 hearing, Commissioner Astrue testified that SSA’s productivity has increased over 15% since fiscal year 2001. Considering the magnitude of its mission, the Social Security Administration does a remarkable job administering critical programs. 

In the Office of Disability Adjudication and Review, however, there currently exists a backlog of over 757,000 requests for a hearing. It already takes over 500 days to process a typical request for hearing and these delays tarnish SSA’s otherwise strong record of service to the American public. At the beginning of 2002, SSA had 468,262 pending hearing requests. In six years, that number increased to over 750,000, despite the fact that dispositions are at record levels. Although clericals in hearing offices prepared 472,168 cases in FY07, claimants submitted almost 557,970 new requests during the same period. As such, the backlog of files simply awaiting preparation for review by an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) at the close of January 2008 totaled 442,399 cases; an increase of 3,116 cases since the beginning of fiscal year 2007. Unless something is done to reverse this trend, the backlog could realistically reach one million by 2013 with the aging Baby Boom generation. 

As managers and supervisors within ODAR, we are acutely aware of the impact these backlogs are having on our ability to deliver the level of service the American public deserves. We are here to confirm what you’ve heard several times before - that the ongoing lack of adequate staffing levels and resources have contributed to these backlogs. If these inadequacies continue, clearing the backlogs will be impossible and service delivery will continue to deteriorate.

We at FMA appreciate the attention the Committee is placing on examining the reasons for the backlog and addressing remedies to the problem. ODAR began fiscal year 2008 with 419,752 pending cases awaiting preparation for a hearing.  In all likelihood, those cases will realistically wait at least one year before any action is even initiated to prepare the case for review and hearing in front of an Administrative Law Judge. In January, processing times across the nation ranged from a low of 343 days in the Boston region to a high of 649 days in the Chicago region. The American public deserves better service.

Within ODAR, production is measured by the number of dispositions completed per day by an Administrative Law Judge. In FY05 and FY06, this record-level figure was 2.2 dispositions per day per ALJ. A work year is approximately 250 work days, yielding a reasonable expectation that an ALJ can produce an estimated average of 550 dispositions a year given the current staffing limitations. At the end of January 2007, SSA employed 1,088 ALJs, resulting in a best case scenario of 557,150 dispositions for FY07, which is about the same number of new cases filed in a given year.   

Earlier this year, hiring letters went out to 144 of the 175 administrative law judges SSA plans to employ this fiscal year. Already 136 judges have accepted. A total of 175 ALJs could translate into an additional 82,500 dispositions, but only if adequate staff is available to prepare the cases for review. While this is certainly a step in the right direction, Administrative Law Judges alone will not solve the problem. Without additional staffing, the current level of prepared work would be distributed among more judges, essentially resulting in the same dispositional outcome. Without adequate support staff to prepare cases for the judges, both existing and new, we will not achieve an increase in hearing dispositions – the only solution to reducing the backlog.

Undoubtedly, adequate clerical support is necessary to prepare cases for hearing. As it stands, hearing offices do not even have the staff to accommodate the current judges, let alone enough staff to process the nearly new 47,000 cases the Office of Disability Adjudication and Review receives each month.  If receipts remained flat, the backlog will remain at over 700,000 cases, almost one-third of which are over 365 days old. At the beginning of FY07, ODAR had over 63,000 cases which were over 1,000 days old; a number which is both unacceptable to the agency as well as the American people it serves. Commissioner Astrue identified these cases as ODAR’s number one priority and this backlog has since been eliminated. FMA applauds the Commissioner for his efforts; however, the 900 day old cases are now approaching this milestone. Currently, just fewer than 54,000 cases will be over 900 days old by the close of FY08. We are committed to working with the Commissioner as he tackles this challenge.

With the aging Baby Boom population, it is reasonable to assume that receipts will continue to out-pace dispositions. As the requests for hearings continue to rise, more is demanded from ODAR staff on all levels. The bottom line is that the hearing offices lack sufficient staff to process the work on hand much less even begin to work on new cases. It should be evident that under the best case scenario, the current staffing levels in ODAR barely maintain the status quo. That means that the backlog stays the same and processing times continue at an estimated 500 days. 

The existing staff must make room for the new cases as they attempt to address the backlog. In recent years, however, budgetary constraints have forced the agency to hire additional Administrative Law Judges without providing adequate support staff to prepare the cases for hearing. We recognize that the Commissioner is trying to address the backlog by adding these judges; however, additional ALJs without the supporting clerical staff to prepare cases in a timely manner will not solve the problem. By following in his predecessor’s footsteps, Commissioner Astrue will encounter the same problems – no matter how many new judges come on board, without clerical staff to prepare cases for them, the backlog cannot be addressed.

As previously stated, there is currently insufficient support staff to ensure optimal ALJ productivity and to handle the backlog.  The accepted staff to ALJ ratio has been four to four and one half production staff per ALJ. However, this only ensures productivity necessary to handle incoming work, not the backlog. For offices with heavy backlogs, the four and one half to one standard is inadequate. Management and administrative employees should not be included in these figures, as they are not the employees performing the production work on hearing requests.  And, of course, staffing shortfalls cannot be remedied without adequate funding.

The solutions to the backlog problem are simply adequate staffing levels and timely budgets which will allow us to address the pending cases. As of last month, the backlog was at 757,221 requests for a hearing. However, it is worth noting that the agency can reasonably process 400,000 cases at any given time. As such, the actual “backlog” is around 350,000 cases. As noted earlier, a trained, productive ALJ, with adequate support staff, should be able to produce about 550 dispositions in a given year. Approximately 1,000 additional ALJs and 5,000 additional support staff would allow ODAR to work down the backlog in one year while providing timely processing of new cases as they arrive. We at FMA recognize that these numbers present a large funding challenge for Congress.

To enable SSA to meet the goals set forth in Commissioner Astrue’s testimony before your Subcommittee on February 28, 2008, Congress must approve a sufficient level of funding for the agency.  The Continuing Resolution (CR) which was signed into law in March 2007 was severely inadequate to address both the staffing and backlog problem at SSA for fiscal year 2007, despite the meager increase SSA received above the fiscal year 2006 appropriation. Since 2001, Congress has appropriated, on average, $180 million less than the President has requested each year.  The dollar value of this differential is equivalent to processing an additional 177,000 initial claims and 454,000 hearings. Over the last ten years (FY98 – FY07), Congress has appropriated nearly $1.3 billion less than the President’s request. Without a doubt, this has had a devastating effect on the services provided to the American public, as evidenced by the situation we are in today.

            Recognizing the needs of SSA, Congress appropriated $150 million above the President’s request for FY08 in an effort to bring down the backlog. Congress should be applauded for their commitment to serving the American people in this capacity. In fact, it is this increase which is allowing the agency to hire the additional 175 ALJs.

The President requested $10.327 billion for SSA’s administrative expenses in FY09, only $100 million below Commissioner Astrue’s request and six percent more than Congress appropriated this fiscal year. Furthermore, the House Budget Resolution (H.Con.Res. 312) provided for an additional $240 million for SSA’s administrative expenses. We applaud these efforts.

To remedy the unprecedented backlog situation, Congress should at a minimum pass the President’s 2009 budget request of $10.327 billion for SSA’s Limitation on Administrative Expenses account. Under his budget, the agency would be able to process 85,000 more hearings in FY09 than in FY08. In FY06 and FY07, SSA replaced one worker for every three that retired. The President’s budget will allow for a 1 to 1 replacement ratio.

In addition to having an immediate impact on the current backlog, underfunding the Social Security Administration will negatively impact every service area of the agency. Staffing at SSA will soon reach its lowest level since 1972; however, SSA today has nearly twice the number of beneficiaries it had in 1972. SSA officials estimate that more than 40% of its 65,000 employees will retire by 2014. Reversing this trend is a necessary step to reducing the backlog.

While the President’s budget request for FY09 is a start, it is certainly not a cure all solution.  Throwing money at the problem will not fully solve it without a well-trained, dedicated staff of federal employees willing to avert a crisis in the coming years. We believe this is the workforce we have now, strengthened under the leadership of former-Commissioner Barnhart and Commissioner Astrue. By fully funding the President’s request, we can continue this tradition.

In this era of shrinking budgets, SSA has attempted to maximize its use of scarce resources to provide the best possible service to the American public. The challenges faced by the managers and supervisors are not short term; they are a demographic reality. The same citizens putting stress on the Social Security trust fund because they are approaching retirement are also entering their most disability-prone years. ODAR is struggling to handle the current workload and will be hard pressed to manage the anticipated increase in hearing requests without additional staff. 

We are the men and women who work with disabled Americans everyday. We see people of all ages come in and out of our offices seeking the services they depend on for survival from the Social Security Administration.  We are committed to serving a community of Americans in need, but we need you to provide us with the necessary resources to help them.  Thank you for your time and consideration of our views.