The ability of the Peace Corps to listen to, respect, and empower Volunteers depends in large part on the quality of its management and other personnel. The Peace Corps faces tough competition in recruiting both American and host country nationals. If the Peace Corps salary and benefits do not compare well with competing agencies, the quality of the personnel and the quality of the support for Volunteers will suffer. Accordingly, the legislation should be amended to provide that the Peace Corps retain an independent human resources/compensation consulting firm to analyze the salary and benefits of Peace Corps managers and personnel to determine whether the current system enables the Peace Corps to recruit and retain top talent to support the Volunteers.
20. Testimony of Chuck Ludlam and Paula Hirschoff on S. 732: The Peace Corps Volunteer Empowerment Act: Proposed Additions to the Legislation
Proposed Additions to the Legislation
The legislation is comprehensive and well crafted, but we would like to suggest some additional provisions as amendments.
1. Analysis of Salary and Benefits of Peace Corps Managers: The ability of the Peace Corps to listen to, respect, and empower Volunteers depends in large part on the quality of its management and other personnel. The Peace Corps faces tough competition in recruiting both American and host country nationals. If the Peace Corps salary and benefits do not compare well with competing agencies, the quality of the personnel and the quality of the support for Volunteers will suffer. Accordingly, the legislation should be amended to provide that the Peace Corps retain an independent human resources/compensation consulting firm to analyze the salary and benefits of Peace Corps managers and personnel to determine whether the current system enables the Peace Corps to recruit and retain top talent to support the Volunteers.
In terms of "direct hires" (USDH, i.e. American citizens) the Peace Corps uses the Foreign Service salary scale (or the special scale for medical professionals) and provides all standard insurance coverage, access to Flexible Spending Accounts and Dependent Care Spending Accounts (which are ways that employees can deduct these funds for health care and dependent care from salary prior to taxes), and civil service retirement. In addition overseas staff are provided housing and dependents' education. In terms of the competitiveness of their salary and benefits, the independent consultants should examine the impact of the "five year" limit on employment33 with the Peace Corps. It should also examine the impact of the fact that Peace Corps employees overseas are not provided hardship differential (which can be anywhere from 5% to 30%) nor a cost of living allowance (which usually runs from 20% to 40% and is designed to reimburse employees for certain excess costs that they incur as a result of their employment overseas). State Department and many other US personnel in country are granted both. Also, it should examine the impact of the fact that Peace Corps employees overseas have limited access to management-level training and are not entitled to annual home leave/R&R. (Peace Corps only provides home leave/R&R between tours or once in a 5-year cycle as opposed to annually for most other agencies.)
In terms of "Host Country National" (HCN) staff, most Peace Corps posts rely on a Local Compensation Plan (LCP) developed by the American Embassy. It is validated on a regular basis with an annual United Nations Development Program (UNDP) survey of local salaries and benefits. The LCP is designed to ensure that the various US agencies are paying competitive salaries. Within the LCP, the HCNs are paid according to a grade and step similar to the US Government system. They are eligible for step increases annually and receive bonuses as required by local law and can also receive awards. Most LCPs provide better benefits than required by the local labor law and are usually quite competitive, but it depends on the country, development level of the private sector, and volume of international organizations in that country. The independent consultants should examine whether the Peace Corps posts are handicapped by the lack of both in-country human resources (HR) personnel and an "objective" entity/body to whom the HCNs can raise larger HR issues similar to the function of the Foreign Service Nationals (FSN) committee at US Embassies or an HR department serves in most offices in the US. The consultants should also examine the issues that arise for Peace Corps employees who are contractors with non-standardized grade levels, a situation that can lead to inconsistencies in grades across posts for the same position or sometimes within a post for positions that are similar in nature. Finally, the consultants should examine the impact of the workload typical for Peace Corps employees, which substantially exceeds that of most US or other comparable agencies.
Because of the budget pressures placed on the Peace Corps from the Office and Management and Budget, only an independent personnel consulting firm should perform this critical analysis.
2. Annual survey by Congress: We've already mentioned the feasibility and desirability of the Senate and House Authorization and Appropriations Committees annually or biannually surveying Volunteers in the field about the effectiveness of Peace Corps management and possible reforms. This will give the Committees direct testimony from those who know best about how the Peace Corps is faring—the Volunteers.
3. Survey of Early Terminating Volunteers: Early terminations are a plague on the Peace Corps. When Volunteers ET, the reason is reported to the Country Director. However, the Volunteer might not have a positive relationship with the CD or fear an unfavorable recommendation if the real reason for the ET were reported. The Peace Corps should be required to send these Volunteers a confidential survey to complete a month or more after they have ETed that is not shared with the Country Director. Such surveys would be especially helpful in determining the special challenges faced by older Volunteers. The surveys should be forwarded to the Inspector General for review.
4. Switching Sectoral Programs: The legislation should provide that the Peace Corps honor the offers made to Volunteers and not switch a Volunteer to a different sectoral program without his or her consent. The Peace Corps application process leads to an "offer" of an assignment in a specific country and the applicant's "acceptance" of this offer—forming a contract. The Peace Corps should be required to honor this contract unless the sectoral program ceases to exist in that country. In that case, the Volunteer should be consulted respectfully and given options about how to proceed to complete his/her service.
To explain the need for this provision, let us recount the experience of one Volunteer. He was invited to serve in one program and then, one week into training, was switched to a second program. He was told that he had only two choices: acquiesce in the switch or ET (early terminate). Faced with this fait accompli, he acquiesced. Six months later, the Country Director and APCD visited his village to complain that he was not implementing the second program even though he was working hard on many projects. When he complained that he'd been shanghaied into the new program, the CD and APCD accused him of lying about the switch. When he produced the official Peace Corps invitation letter, they didn't apologize for the false accusation and continued to push him to concentrate on the new program. The CD denied his petition to be restored to the program in which he'd been invited to serve and would not give him information on how to file an appeal with the placement staff in Washington.
No Volunteer should be subjected to this kind of treatment. The Peace Corps placement staff in Washington has a vital interest in this issue; if applicants come to believe that the official Peace Corps offer is meaningless and, as in this case, they can be randomly reassigned to another program, Peace Corps recruiting may suffer.
5. Use of Diplomatic Pouch: The Peace Corps should be required to permit Volunteers to ship work related items and valuables to their country of service using the diplomatic pouch. When Volunteers have asked to use the pouch, they have encountered hassles or refusals.
It took one Volunteer nearly three months to secure approval to ship a special agriculture commodity (non-toxic) for use in a controlled experiment to determine if it would enhance the survival rate of tree seedlings. Another Volunteer was denied use of the pouch to ship a small key duplicating machine for use in a small enterprise development project.
In terms of valuables, Volunteers are sometimes permitted to ship themselves laptop computers and electronic equipment, cash, credit cards, airline tickets, and other items that might well be stolen in the mail.
Peace Corps staff use the pouch to ship themselves foodstuffs, personal household goods and myriad other non-work items. It seems inappropriate to deny shipment of work-related items to Volunteers. This hierarchy and double standard undermines confidence and trust between the staff and Volunteers.
6. Medical Support for Volunteers
a. Malaria Prophylaxis Regardless of Cost: The legislation should require the Peace Corps to utilize the most effective anti-malarial prophylaxis for malaria regardless of the cost.
Cost should not be a factor in determining which anti-malarial to make available to Volunteers. Peace Corps no longer uses Malarone as the last line of treatment for those who contract malaria; the new Chinese anti-malarial Cortem plays that role. So there is no need to hold Malarone in reserve, as in current Peace Corps practice. At present, PCVs can obtain Malarone as a prophylaxis only by securing approval in Washington. Cost seems to be the main reason. However, Malarone apparently has fewer side effects than either Lariam or Doxycycline, the currently used Peace Corps malaria drugs. If in response to this provision, the Peace Corps continues to deny Volunteers access to Malarone, it should explain why.
b. Annual Gynecological Exam: The legislation should require that PCV women have annual gynecological exams by gynecologists and, as appropriate, mammograms, PAP smears, and Human Pamplona Virus tests. Women Volunteers are often denied access to gynecologists and have to visit non-gynecologists for gynecological services—including PCMOs or Peace Corps Medical assistants. Older Volunteers are not routinely given mammograms. Women with abnormal PAP smears should be given HPV tests, not additional PAP smears. These are issues for more experienced/older Volunteers.
c. Prostate Specific Antigen Tests: The Peace Corps should be required to give male Volunteers, as appropriate, annual Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) tests. Older male PCVs should be given annual PSA tests, which is not now the Peace Corps practice. This is an issue for older Volunteers.
Here's an email we received from an older Volunteer couple on this issue:
The PSA testing is important too. It took almost a year from the time we started the medical process until we went so it was over 2 1/2 years that [my husband] didn't have a PSA test. His COS physical was late June 2004 and in August 2004 he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He had surgery in January 2005 that didn't get it all and in January 2006 completed radiation treatments. What difference a PSA test at midterm physicals or COS would have made!
How can the Peace Corps resist this reform after this testimonial?
d. Skin Cancer Screening: The Peace Corps should require that a dermatologist check Volunteers for skin cancer at their annual and COS exams. Many Volunteers serve in countries with intense sun light so skin cancer checks are appropriate. This is an issue of special concern to older Volunteers.
e. Confidential AIDS Test: The Peace Corps should be required to give PCVs, at their request, HIV/AIDS and STD tests without being questioned about the reason. PCVs who request these tests are sometimes threatened with medical separation or administrative separation on the assumption they would not have requested the test unless they had engaged in unsafe sexual practices. This deters Volunteers from asking for the tests. The fact that the Peace Corps medical staff has a law enforcement role is a conflict of interest with their support for the medical well being of Volunteers.
f. Switching to Generics: The Peace Corps should be barred from changing the pharmaceutical prescription of a PCV's private physician without that physician's permission. Peace Corps frequently changes the brand of the pharmaceutical prescribed for a Volunteer without notifying the Volunteer or securing the permission of the Volunteer's physician. This is notoriously true for birth control pills. This issue applies to substitution of prescription drugs and substitution of generics.
g. Reimbursement for Prescriptions: The Peace Corps should be required to reimburse PCVs for the cost of prescription drugs they are required to bring with them as trainees and Volunteers. At present trainees are required to bring to training three months supply of their prescriptions for which they are not reimbursed. The Peace Corps is responsible for all trainee and Volunteer medical costs during their training and service, so trainees should be reimbursed for the cost of the three month's supply.
h. Tests for Tropical Diseases at Close of Service: The Peace Corps should be required at a Volunteer's Close of Service examination to test for all medical conditions prevalent in the country of service even if the Volunteer does not manifest the symptoms of these diseases. Volunteers are sometimes not tested for all medical conditions prevalent in their country of service.34
j. Long Term Health Consequences: The Peace Corps should be required regularly to conduct surveys of RPCVs to determine the long-term adverse medical consequences of their service.
j. Purchase of Post Close of Service Prescriptions: The Peace Corps should be required to permit Volunteers to purchase the prescription drugs they've been supplied during their service for use during post Close-of-Service travel. During service, all prescription drugs are provided to the Volunteers free of charge. Upon close of service, the Peace Corps pays for one month of health insurance with CorpsCare and then the Volunteer can purchase up to 17 more months of insurance (a COBRA-like right), which enables them to purchase the drugs at a discount. However, in preparing for a COS trip, Volunteers must buy their prescription drugs in advance, before their COBRA insurance kicks in. If the Peace Corps doesn't permit the Volunteers to purchase the drugs at the Peace Corps bulk discount prices, the Volunteers are forced to buy the drugs at full retail price. In most cases, they are also forced to buy them in the United States and ship them to themselves. To buy them in the U.S. they need a prescription, which is difficult to secure if one doesn't have a private physician who will cooperate. Some won't cooperate as they haven't seen the Volunteer in several years and may never have prescribed the product before (say a malaria prophylaxis). Thus, the Volunteer has no way to buy the drugs even at full retail price. (This scenario is not theoretical; it's exactly what happened to us.) Even post Close of Service, the Peace Corps has an interest in protecting the Volunteer's health. The best way to do this is to permit the Volunteers to buy their prescription drugs for use during post Close-of-Service travel at the Peace Corps' discount price. This issue is of particular interest to older Volunteers, many of whom take daily prescription drugs to maintain their health and may be more likely to travel post Close of Service.
7. Job-Related Travel Reforms: We're discussed the need for and terms of reform of the Peace Corps job-related leave policies above.
