Chairwoman's Introduction

This is our second Annual Performance Report under the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993. We have been able to continue our successes from fiscal year 1999. This has been a great accomplishment by all of our dedicated staff in every office throughout the United States.

Since I became Chairwoman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in October 1998, we have been implementing an innovative agenda to increase the fairness, quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of all aspects of agency operations. We have focused on expanding outreach, education and technical assistance to a broad range of stakeholders to ensure that EEOC is the nation's premier civil rights enforcement agency. In particular, we placed special emphasis on reaching out to small businesses and under-served minority communities to promote understanding and voluntary compliance with the laws enforced by the Commission. Although we sought to prevent discrimination in the first instance, we pursued fair and vigorous enforcement against those who violated workplace anti-discrimination laws.

EEOC has embraced a new vision and work strategy that has won the respect and praise of many who have criticized the agency in the past. The Commission has been on the cutting edge of enforcing the nation's anti-discrimination laws through a dynamic comprehensive enforcement approach. Our accomplishments have been embodied in quality settlements, major conciliations, inventory reduction, mediation, reductions in average processing time, significant trial victories, crucial policy guidance, and constructive rulemaking. In short, our work and impact is being recognized by stakeholders, Congress, the news media, and the general public as a critical element in achieving the American dream of equal opportunity for all.

Under our revised Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2000-2005, we have focused our resources and identified measures to continue our significant progress into the new century. This FY 2000 Annual Performance Report is an opportunity to provide our employees, Congress, stakeholders and the public with a concise report of our significant progress during the past fiscal year towards achieving our goals and, ultimately, our mission of eradicating employment discrimination at the workplace.

FISCAL YEAR 2000 KEY ACCOMPLISHMENTS

In fiscal year 2000, the Commission made important progress towards achieving its goals. Some highlights of our key fiscal year 2000 accomplishments include:

• Cutting the pending inventory of private sector charges (backlog) to 34,297 - a 15% decrease from the fiscal year 1999 level of 40,234.
• Lowering the average charge processing time for private sector charges to 216 days - a reduction of almost 50 days from fiscal year 1999.
• Increasing the number of successful resolutions handled through the National Mediation Program to 7,438 -a 54% increase from fiscal year 1999 -and mediating cases on average of 96 days.
• Obtaining substantial monetary benefits of $292.6 million for victims of employment discrimination through the enforcement process.
• Expanding outreach, education, and technical assistance to small and mid-sized employers and under-served minority communities-including a record 2,961 events attended by 218,000 people nationwide.
• Reducing the federal sector appeals inventory by 14% and the hearings inventory by 13% from their fiscal year 1999 levels.

MAJOR PROGRAM ACTIVITIES

We continued several major projects and program activities and instituted others that led to our extraordinary successes in fiscal year 2000. In the attached Annual Performance Report our major program activities and accomplishments are described more fully.

Comprehensive Enforcement Program

One of my key initiatives after I became Chairwoman was to improve all components of agency operations in both the private and federal sectors using a Comprehensive Enforcement Program (CEP) strategy. The CEP builds on the success of the Priority Charge Handling Procedures (PCHP) and the National Enforcement Plan, the Commission's strategy for prioritizing its caseload and focusing resources on issues of national significance, respectively. In fiscal year 2000, the first full year of the agency-wide CEP, the Commission utilized the Private Sector CEP to strategically focus agency resources on goals and increase collaboration among front-line functions, from outreach and intake through case resolution. As a result, the CEP has sharply increased charges resolved that deliver relief to charging parties and focused limited litigation resources on the most egregious cases and on cases benefitting multiple charging parties.

There are several key components of the Private Sector CEP:

• Fiscal year 2000 was the first full year of EEOC's groundbreaking National Mediation Program. The program has won the endorsement of a broad range of agency stakeholders, including business and labor advocates, civil rights groups, and representatives of the employer and plaintiff bars. A report prepared by a consortium of professors from Maryland colleges and universities showed that the overwhelming majority of employers (96%) and charging parties (91%) participating in the program said they would use it again and that both employers and charging parties expressed strong satisfaction with the EEOC mediation process as a highly effective dispute resolution mechanism. We have made the report available on our Web site at www.eeoc.gov.
• Another significant component of the Private Sector CEP is EEOC's Small Business Initiative (SBI), initially launched in fiscal year 1999 with key input from the employer community. In fact, in recognition of its small business efforts in fiscal year 2000, the EEOC received a rating of "Excellent" by the Small Business Administration's National Ombudsman for Regulatory Fairness.
• Through its Litigation Program, EEOC obtained several major litigation victories and settlements in a wide variety of occupations addressing discrimination against vulnerable recent-immigrant communities, women in non-traditional jobs, people with disabilities, older workers, and minority individuals. The agency also filed several high-profile lawsuits addressing egregious discrimination and hostile work environments. In addition, the agency increased the percentage of policy and multiple party cases in the active litigation docket to 36%, up from 28.5% in fiscal year 1999. Consolidating claims against an employer results in more efficient service to the public and greater consistency in remedies on the same or similar issues.

Under the Federal Sector CEP, the agency significantly expanded its efforts to prevent discrimination as well as reduce the hearings and appeals inventories. Significant achievements in the federal area include the following:

• The Commission initiated a strategic approach to Federal Sector Reform by linking improved data analyses, prevention activities aimed at the root causes of discrimination, and a streamlined process for addressing EEO complaints. Key to the Federal Sector CEP are the revised federal sector regulations (29 C.F.R. Part 1614) streamlining procedures governing the discrimination complaint process for federal employees (which became effective in the beginning of fiscal year 2000 on November 9, 1999).
• The Commission improved the overall hearings program and cut the hearings inventory to 11,153, a 13% reduction from the fiscal year 1999 ending inventory of 12,808.
• In fiscal year 2000, the EEOC was able to stem the growth of its appeals inventory through the use of innovative case management techniques and pilot programs. It reduced the appeals inventory to 9,975, the first reduction since implementation of the original Part 1614 regulations in 1992, and a 14% reduction from the fiscal year-end 1999 inventory of 11,548.

Outreach, Education, and Technical Assistance

The agency's outreach, education and technical assistance efforts are vital components of our work to eradicate employment discrimination. Key accomplishments in this area include:

• EEOC field offices conducted a record 2,961 outreach, educational, and technical assistance events in fiscal year 2000, reaching 218,000 people nationwide-including 242 events geared toward small business audiences attended by 8,628 people.
• We continued offering specialized and in-depth technical assistance through a series of Technical Assistance Program Seminars (TAPS) providing practical, "how-to-do-it" guidance for private employers and government agencies. In fiscal year 2000, EEOC conducted a total of 296 for-fee training events reaching a total audience of over 23,200 individuals nationwide, as well as other specialized seminar programs and on-site training programs.
• We commemorated our 35^th Anniversary by conducting a series of anniversary events at field offices across the country; held an art and essay contest for students; worked with the American Bar Association's Section on Labor and Employment Law to produce a joint 35^th anniversary publication reviewing the history of the Commission; and joined with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to create an Attorney Honors Program to recruit qualified entry level attorneys and train them for highly skilled legal work in each agency.
• We held a special Commission Meeting commemorating the 10^th Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), reviewing the history of ADA enforcement and looking ahead at challenges in the 21^st century workplace.
• We upgraded and expanded our industry-acclaimed Internet Home Page on the World Wide Web (www.eeoc.gov) in fiscal year 2000, adding features about our landmark 35^th anniversary, a special report on the 10^th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, and a user-friendly search engine to locate information on the site. Use of the Internet site increased 88% last year-from 82,714 average number of visitors per month in fiscal year 1999 to 155,496 in fiscal year 2000. We also established an internal EEOC Intranet Web Site, providing a one-stop shop for information for agency employees.

Task Forces to Improve Enforcement and Outreach Efforts

EEOC created several internal task forces and an initiative to address specific areas of the Commission's responsibilities to improve customer service and enforcement of the laws:

• The Equal Pay Task Force provides assistance to field enforcement staff in their development of cases involving equal pay and employment discrimination in compensation.
• The National Origin Task Force has developed a strategy to guide and coordinate EEOC's overall efforts to address national origin bias more effectively, particularly for recent immigrant and refugee populations, through education and outreach at the grassroots level, collaboration with community groups, extensive research, and data analysis.
• The Asian American and Pacific Islander Initiative implemented Executive Order 13125 to improve Asian Americans' and Pacific Islanders' access to participation in federal programs. EEOC developed an inventory of Asian American and Pacific Islander participation in agency programs, developed a strategic plan for fiscal years 2001-2003, which includes increasing the number of agency publications in languages other than English, and identified resources for distributing EEOC publications to this community.
• The Low Wage Earner Task Force is building a coalition of stakeholder representatives and contacts and to develop an enforcement plan addressing low-wage earner issues by focusing on outreach to immigrants, border workers, and farm laborers, identifying issues pertinent to each community.
• EEOC's Cash Balance Task Force guides the Commission's review of cash balance pension plans and will be recommending whether cash balance pension plans- which reduce the "expected" retirement benefits of older employees, while increasing the benefits to younger workers-are unlawful under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA).

Policy Guidance and Rulemaking

Another important Commission responsibility is to provide guidance to our own employees and the employer and employee-representative communities. Several important policy guidance and rulemaking accomplishments occurred in fiscal year 2000:

• Guidance on Remedies for Undocumented Workers explains that the anti-discrimination laws enforced by the Commission protect all workers in the United States, regardless of their work status. Undocumented workers are entitled to the full range of remedies provided under the anti-discrimination statutes, except for limited exceptions where such remedies would conflict with the immigration laws.
• EEOC issued a new Compliance Manual Section on Threshold Issues outlining the requirements an individual must satisfy to have a legal claim under the EEO statutes. The new chapter continues the Commission's ongoing effort to update its Compliance Manual to enhance enforcement and compliance with the anti-discrimination laws.
• EEOC issued comprehensive Guidance on Disability-Related Inquiries and Medical Examinations explaining the circumstances under which an employer can ask current employees disability-related questions or require medical examinations under the ADA and Rehabilitation Act.
• Also, EEOC issued Guidance on Executive Order 13145: To Prohibit Discrimination in Federal Employment Based on Genetic Information, implementing Executive Order 13145 which prohibits genetic discrimination by the federal government. This guidance represents a major step in the ongoing development of the legal analysis of how to address genetic discrimination in the workplace.

CONCLUSION

Our achievements in fiscal year 2000 demonstrate that the agency is working diligently to provide enhanced customer service to all of our stakeholders. Our comprehensive enforcement approach and strategic utilization of resources have allowed us to capitalize on the major progress made in fiscal year 1999 and sustain and build upon our accomplishments in fiscal year 2001.

EEOC will continue to strengthen its enforcement efforts through improvements in customer service to deliver fair, efficient and effective service to the public. Equally important, we aspire to prevent discrimination through outreach and education efforts that promote understanding and voluntary compliance with anti-discrimination laws.

Discrimination in the workplace on account of race, color, national origin, gender, age, religion or disability deprives the nation of the skills and talents needed to sustain economic growth and deprives families of the quality of life they deserve. EEOC has helped open the doors of opportunity for countless Americans - enabling our nation to grow, prosper, and reap the rewards of a diverse workforce. While we have made considerable progress, more remains to be done. EEOC stands ready to do its part to ensure the promise of equal opportunity to all

Sincerely,

Ida L. Castro
Chairwoman

This page was last modified on May 3, 2001.

Return to Home Page