The Foreign Service Journal, April 2007

A s you read this, AFSA is gearing up for this year’s Day on the Hill, May 3. We wish you all could be here. Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, regardless of the dangers, proud, talentedAmericans tookup the challenge to serve their country as members of the Foreign Service. We now look toCongress to acknowledge this loyalty, patriotismand person- al sacrifice. The FS community has two objectives for Day on the Hill. The first andmost important is simply to present the face of the Foreign Service to our elected representatives. You have already served on America’s first line of defense overseas, but there are thosewhodon’t understand your service ormischaracterize your achievements. Somemembers of Congress brag that they don’t hold a passport. Other congressional offices tell us they have no FS constituents. Yet over my last two years as AFSA retiree vice president, I have communicated with many of you who have taken the initiative to expand the views ofmembers of Congress and their staffers, locally or inWashington, as educators and vol- unteers. Join us in this job of making the Foreign Service com- munity a real force. Our second interest is to honor your service to the country. Nothing increases the spending of the State Department and diminishes your professionalismmore than the use of contrac- tors. The enormous, security-cleared, talented and experienced pool of retirees is often overlooked because Congress places a cap, calculated in either time or salary, on retiree availability. It eliminated these same restrictions for the retired military a few years ago. AFSA asks, “Why not the Foreign Service commu- nity, too?” AFSA works for the elimination of the WAE cap. Won’t you join us? In 1980, a new Foreign Service Act made an FS career sim- ilar to that of the uniformedmilitary. This act shortened careers, forcingmany to retire earlier than they expected. Talented and skilled, most are close now to completing a second career dur- ing which they earned Social Security credits. A painful e-mail recently reminded me that the Windfall Elimination Provision deprives a Foreign Service retiree of approximately 60 percent of his or her Social Security earnings. On Jan. 4, Representative Howard Berman, D-Calif., and 103 bipartisan cosponsors introduced the Social Security Fairness Act of 2007 (H.R. 82). A Senate bill (S. 206) was introducedby SenatorDianne Feinstein, D-Calif., with cosponsors Senators Susan Collins, R-Maine, Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, and Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J. During Day on the Hill, AFSA will high- light the elimination of the WEP penalty. Won’t you join us? Wewill alsohighlight theGovernment PensionOffset, which mandates, for example, that awidowwho receives a $900 FSRDS monthly annuity andwho normallywould be eligible for a $400 Social Security survivor benefit, would receive no Social Security benefit because two-thirds of her annuity exceeds the Social Security benefit. If AFSAdoesn’t raise these issues onbehalf of the retired FS community, who will? Won’t you join us? Consider this: active-duty federal employees pay health insur- ance premiums with pretax earnings. Retirees lose the premi- um-conversionbenefit on the date of retirement, at a timewhen the tax savings (estimated at more than $400 per year) would be of great benefit. If AFSA isn’t there to raise this issue for the retired FS community, who will? Won’t you join us? If you can’t join us in person, join us by writing your repre- sentatives and senators a letter coinciding withDay on the Hill. Tell them that you are proud to have served the American peo- ple overseas and that the Foreign Service community should be treated the same as the uniformedmilitarywhen it comes to the WAE cap, and that there is a need to revisit the punitive WEP and GPOprovisions. All these issues, along with talking points and congressional addresses, are on AFSA’s Web site, at www. afsa.org/congress.cfm . You served with distinction. Retire proud. Join us by interacting with your local congressional office. Join us by writing your representatives and senators May 3. Join us by using the automatic annuity deduction to pay your AFSA membership dues. AFSA: Your Voice, Your Advocate V.P. VOICE: RETIREES BY DAVID REUTHER AFSA Goes to the Hill, With You! 64 F OR E I GN S E R V I C E J OU R N A L / A P R I L 2 0 0 7 A F S A N E W S Retirees, do you think the department terminated your membership in AFSA? If you want to carry your payroll deduction membership into retirement, you have to clear a hurdle. The payroll deduction for AFSA membership doesn’t automatically transfer. State has two payroll offices, one for active-duty personnel and one for retirees. You have to separately file a new form for automatic deduction from your annuity. For forms, go to www.AFSA.org , hit the Retirees tab, or call Retiree Coordinator Bonnie Brown or Membership Director Janet Hedrick at 1 (800) 704-2372.