FMA helped lead the effort that successfully culminated in providing paid parental leave to the federal workforce in 2019. However, a Government Accountability Office (GAO) study released last month shows only 4 percent used the benefit from 2020 to 2022. On February 5, a bipartisan group of lawmakers spearheaded by the House and Senate Paid Family Leave Working Group wrote Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Director Kiran Ahuja to urge the agency to take steps to actively promote the benefit.

The GAO report revealed that the public-facing webpages of agencies they examined, “did not reflect current paid parental leave policies.” Further, the report found OPM’s own Leave Administration webpage is not current and has no fact sheets about the benefit that took effect in 2019. “With greater awareness and information provided by OPM, we are confident that this number would be higher,” the lawmakers wrote.

“We are deeply concerned that when asked about this, OPM officials said they had not completed updating the Handbook on Leave and Workplace Flexibilities for Childbirth, Adoption, and Foster Care because ‘they had competing priorities and limited staff available,’” the letter states. “In our view, this explanation is inadequate to justify this long delay, and it is essential that OPM prioritize updating its handbook.”

The legislators “implore OPM to take action immediately and follow the recommendations of the GAO report.” They note OPM intends to update guidance related to paid parental leave by the end of 2024, however they requested the agency provide a status update by the end of July on that effort.

To read the full letter, click here. To read the GAO report for detailed findings, click here.