Here is your update from USAID Vice President Francisco Zamora. Please send any comments and questions to fzamora@usaid.gov.

1. Promotions Are Announced: We are happy to report that the promotions list for FS-01 and below has been issued, a week earlier than it was last year. We like this trend and hope it continues next year. It goes without saying that AFSA congratulates all those who were promoted. It’s a great accomplishment and you deserve recognition. The list has been posted on our web site: http://www.afsa.org/usaid/FSpromotions06.cfm. We now anxiously await the SFS promotions list. Some of you may be puzzled by the promotion process so we will give you an "in a nutshell" briefer. Basically, after AEFs are completed, Performance Boards are formed to review and rank about 1,200 FSOs as "A’s" (recommended for promotion), "B’s" (met the standards of the class), or "C’s" (standards of their class not met). The 2006 Foreign Service Performance Boards convened this year on May 30. The boards are as follows:

-Program Operations and Management A Board (technical backstops) reviewed officers for grade 02. There were 39 officers recommended for promotion and 17 were promoted.

-Program Operations and Management B Board (technical backstops) reviewed officers for grades 03 and 04. There were 33 officers in grade 03 recommended for promotion and 15 were promoted. There were 35 officers in grade 04 recommended for promotion and 35 were promoted.

-Program Support Board (administrative backstops) reviewed officers for grades 02, 03, and 04. There were 21 officers in grade 02 recommended for promotion and 9 were promoted. There were 15 officers in grade 03 recommended for promotion and 13 were promoted. There were 19 officers in grade 04 recommended for promotion and 18 were promoted.

-Program Direction and Development Board (program, policy backstops) reviewed officers in grades 02, 03, and 04. There were 26 officers in grade 02 recommended for promotion and 12 were promoted. There were 12 officers in grade 03 recommended for promotion and 4 were promoted. There were 17 officers in grade 04 recommended for promotion and 17 were promoted.

-Senior Threshold Board (all backstops) reviewed officers in grade 01 for consideration into the Senior Foreign Service. Officers must indicate in writing that they want to be considered for the SFS in order to "open their window". (Unfortunately, every year some officers are recommended for promotion but are not promoted because they have not opened their window). Officers must also meet the time overseas requirement to be promoted. There were 29 officers recommended for promotion and 14 were promoted.

-Lastly, there is the C Board (SFS members). These promotions are handled and announced separately.

Other helpful information: Neither the boards nor staff, with less than a handful of exceptions, know how many officers in each group will actually be promoted. Each year, workforce planning staff calculate how many employees are to be promoted so that business needs are met and the statutorily required flow through is ensured in each grouping. This means staff looks at the entire workforce, including new hires and actual attrition, evaluates the numbers in each FS level and backstop, and projects hiring and attrition trends and expectations to produce the recommended promotion numbers. (Any misestimating is corrected in the following year.) These staff recommendations are approved by the Administrator and then delivered in sealed envelopes to AFSA before any ratings or rankings are known. This process ensures that the promotion boards conduct their work without being influenced by known promotion target numbers. It also precludes any post-rating and ranking manipulation in favor of or against any particular employee. Promotion numbers are revealed after the ranking is established in a session between AFSA, HR and EOP where sealed envelopes are opened. It is noteworthy that officers need to be eligible for promotion to be promoted. Some officers ranked for promotion and within the number to be promoted are not promoted if they, for example, have not met the time overseas requirements. Some AFSA members were concerned that those serving in Critical Priority Countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan would automatically get a promotion for serving there regardless of their performance. In looking at the data, we have not seen that this is true. There were some officers who served in CPCs who were promoted but the numbers do not seem out of line. We can assume that the promotions were well deserved and based on good performance. Again, congratulations for those who were promoted. We hope this briefing has been helpful. I will be glad to answer any emails from you on this topic.

2. Credit Union Problems: AFSA recently sent out a broadcast message addressing irregularities with State Department FCU service to members overseas. No mention was made of Lafayette Federal Credit Union, which is overwhelmingly used by USAID members. We are keeping an eye on reports that LFCU is having problems with its disclosure documents, and will keep the membership updated. However, this is not the only worries being raised over LFCU. Over the last few days, word has spread that the board of directors is planning on converting Lafayette from a not-for-profit financial institution to a for-profit bank. We suggest this recent Washington Post article as a good primer on the issue: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/23/AR2006082301964.html. LFCU will be sending out an information booklet to all members, giving them the opportunity to vote on whether to proceed with this conversion. We urge you to read these materials thoroughly and cast an informed vote. In the meantime, we would like to hear from you on this issue. Please send those comments to me at fzamora@usaid.gov.

3. Cash Money: AFSA is pleased to see that enough wiggle room has been discovered in the USAID budget to authorize the On-the-Spot Award Program for this fiscal year. All the details can be found in Agency notice #11727 of August 14, 2006. Please make sure to send in nominations by September 1 to be eligible for payment during this fiscal year.

4. News Bulletins: Recent news items of interest for the Foreign Service community.

a) As a follow-up on the recent GAO study on the language gap at State, here is an article on the same issue: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/10/AR2006081001430.html.

b) USAID won’t head humanitarian aid efforts in Cuba. Apparently, Commerce is more qualified: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/10/AR2006081001562.html?nav=rss_politics.

c) More alarms raised on federal attrition numbers: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/13/AR2006081300573.html.

d) But most of these retirees aren’t ready financially: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/14/AR2006081401180.html.

e) Interesting Q&A on the nexus between business and diplomacy: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/14/AR2006081400938.html.

5. Open Doors: We continue to welcome visitors to the AFSA office in suite RRB 2.10-C. Please give me a call at 202-712-1631 or send me a line at fzamora@usaid.gov. Our Senior Labor Management advisor, Doug Broome, is on leave but always available on the phone. Please send a message to dbroome@usaid.gov if you need to get in touch with him. The general AFSA/AID number is 202-712-1941. If you need to reach our membership department, the Foreign Service Journal or other AFSA staff, the HQ number is 202-338-4045.