Military child care centers and Department of Defense schools are allowed to continue hiring workers with their exemptions from the civilian hiring freeze, according to Pentagon personnel officials.
In a memorandum released Wednesday outlining exemptions, Acting Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Jules W. Hurst III listed several quality-of-life programs among them. That includes child and youth programs staff, as well as instructors or facility support staff at child care centers and Department of Defense Education Activity schools. While positions at the DOD school level are exempt, it’s not clear how far beyond that the exemptions will go.
The memorandum also lists “installation positions that support and are essential for fire, life and safety,” as being exempt. Information was not immediately available from DOD about how far those exemptions might extend beyond police and fire. It’s not clear, for example, whether commissaries are included as being exempt from the hiring freeze.
The military services for several years have been working to build up the staffs of their child care centers, as part of an effort to increase the availability of child care for military families. They’ve increased salaries and benefits to attract more employees.
Other exemptions include employees who are paid from non-appropriated funds, not taxpayer dollars. Those include exchanges and many morale, welfare and recreation programs on military installations.
The memo also provides more information on exemptions at military medical treatment facilities, specifying the staff exempt are those who provide patient care or are essential to hospital operations.
The memo includes 18 categories of exempt positions, such as positions at the Military Entrance Processing Command, as well as at depots, shipyards, arsenals and maintenance facilities. Roles essential to immigration enforcement, national security, public safety and recruiting are exempt, as are career ladder promotions and positions that are required to be filled by Dual Status Military Technicians.
Jobs that are filled by foreign national employees are also exempt in countries with labor cost-sharing arrangements, or when they’re necessary to comply with host nation agreements.
Certain in-progress permanent change-of-station moves for civilians are allowed to continue. They must be moving from a less critical position to a more critical position, and the DOD must have initiated orders or a shipment of household goods before Feb. 28.
Karen has covered military families, quality of life and consumer issues for Military Times for more than 30 years, and is co-author of a chapter on media coverage of military families in the book "A Battle Plan for Supporting Military Families." She previously worked for newspapers in Guam, Norfolk, Jacksonville, Fla., and Athens, Ga.
