Section 359 of Public Law 106-346 requires each Executive agency to establish a policy under which eligible employees may participate in telecommuting to the maximum extent possible without diminished employee performance. It further instructs the Director of OPM to assure that the requirements of section 359 are applied to 25 percent of the Federal workforce by April 2001 and to an additional 25 percent each year thereafter. The accompanying conference report directs OPM to evaluate the effectiveness of the telework program and report its findings to Congress. Although the law requires only one report to Congress (provided in January 2002) to be in compliance with these directives, this report is consistent with our plan to issue annual reports detailing agency progress in increasing telework participation.

OPM surveyed Federal agencies in April 2001, November 2001, and again in November 2002 to determine the status of telework within the Federal Government and gauge agency progress in implementing the requirements of the public law. The survey asked agencies to provide data on the number of teleworking and telework-eligible employees, agency policy development, barriers to implementing telework, and steps being taken to overcome those barriers and increase the number of teleworkers (see Appendix, Table 6).

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