September 3, 1992
MEMORANDUM FOR DESIGNATED AGENCY ETHICS OFFICIALS
FROM: STEPHEN D. POTTS
DIRECTOR
SUBJECT: Developing written procedures for the public and
confidential financial disclosure systems
Pursuant to Section 402(d) (1) of the Ethics in Government Act
of 1978, as amended, the Director of OGE is required to ensure that
each executive branch agency establish written procedures for
collecting, reviewing, evaluating, and where applicable, making
publicly available, financial disclosure reports filed by the
agency's officers and employees. This memorandum provides
guidelines for developing written procedures required by that
section.
Written procedures must be consistent with the new uniform
regulation on financial disclosure (57 FR 11800-11830, of April 7,
1992). Agencies may develop a single set of procedures covering
the public and confidential financial disclosure systems, or
separate procedures for each system. The procedures should also
cover any alternative or supplemental reporting formats approved by
OGE. Additionally, agencies should describe any special procedures
to be used by component organizations, bureaus, regional and field
offices. Agencies should address the following topics in these
written procedures:
-- Identifying incumbent, new entrant and termination (public
reports only) report filers, including a determination of
who will be responsible for identifying filers and maintaining and
updating master listings of filers. For the confidential system,
identifying officials who will designate positions for filing and
how the designations will be documented.
-- Distributing blank report forms (SF 278 and SF 450).
-- Filing instructions. (Where and when to file reports,
including any internal agency due dates).
-- Identifying who filers should contact for assistance in
completing the reports.
-- Requesting and granting individual filing extensions from the
agency and OGE and announcing blanket extensions for groups of
employees or the entire agency.
-- Granting exclusions from the filing requirements, including how
to obtain approval from OGE for exclusions from the public
financial disclosure requirements.
-- Designating officials authorized to review and certify reports.
-- Reviewing process (i.e. for completeness, conflicts of interest,
violations of law, regulation or executive order).
-- Levels of review and approval.
-- Obtaining additional information from the filer when the
report is incomplete, ambiguous, or raises conflict of
interest issues and establishing an allowable timeframe
within which the filer must provide the additional
information.
-- Amending and revising reports based on additional
information obtained from the filer.
-- Maintaining custody of reports.
-- Providing for public access to public financial disclosure
reports and security for confidential financial disclosure
reports.
-- Requiring remedial actions to resolve conflicts of
interest or violations of laws, regulations or executive
orders.
-- Pursuing administrative or disciplinary actions where
appropriate.
-- Following-up on delinquent reports.
-- Collecting the $200 late filing fee and requesting waivers
of the $200 late filing fee (public reports only).
Agencies are not required to submit these procedures for OGE
review or approval. Additionally, because these written procedures
should establish the agency's internal procedural guidance, they
should not be submitted to OGE as part of any agency supplemental
regulations to the uniform financial disclosure regulation to be
codified at 5 C.F.R. Part 2634 (57 FR 11800-11830, April 7, 1992)
or the standards of conduct to be codified at 5 C.F.R. Part 2635
(57 FR 35006-35067, August 7, 1992). In most cases, these written
procedures should eliminate the need for supplemental regulations.
Please note that each agency's written procedures will be
examined during OGE's agency ethics program reviews in order to
ensure that they are in conformance with all applicable laws,
regulations and executive orders as required by the Act. However,
each agency will determine who will issue these procedures, the
format that will be used and who should receive them. You may
direct any questions on developing these internal written
procedures to your OGE desk officer.