Retiree VP Voice

BY JOHN O’KEEFE

I am grateful to outgoing Retiree Vice President John Naland, whose profoundly useful columns you have read the past eight years. He has passed the torch to me as he becomes the new AFSA treasurer in my place. As John’s successor in the VP role, I am pleased to know his deep knowledge and good judgment remain available to our AFSA member retirees.

Let me take a few lines to thank John and highlight some of the many things he has done for the Foreign Service and AFSA.

Before his eight-year stint as retiree VP, he headed the retirement division at State. He has also served as AFSA State vice president, negotiating promotion precepts, assignment policy, and a host of other subjects important to active-duty AFSA members. He served twice as AFSA president.

But titles barely touch all he has done. He guided the scholarship awards program for Foreign Service dependents for many years, ensuring the fairness of the process, both merit and need based, and its fiscal soundness.

As retiree VP, he, along with the excellent AFSA professional staff, intervened countless times on behalf of our retired members to correct foul-ups the system inevitably produces.

Beyond that, he saw the bigger policy picture as he advocated for overall positive changes to the management of State’s retiree services, including prodding State to find a way to efficiently and quickly communicate with the FS retiree and alumni community.

Our challenge in the coming months will be to proactively make our case to Congress.

I enter my duties as your new retiree VP with some trepidation given the issues AFSA faces as a (currently suspended) union and a professional association. But the AFSA staff and elected officials are simply superb, and we are up to the enormous task before us.

Work on the reconciliation tax bill is finished, and President Trump has signed it into law. The most onerous elements targeting the retirement system were dropped. The proposed change to the administration of the Federal Employees Health System requiring an audit of dependents on FEHB is a bipartisan effort and is not viewed as controversial. The only element that affects our members is that dependents enrolled in FEHB program may require verification.

Our challenge in the coming months will be to proactively make our case to Congress. This is an endeavor not just for our advocacy director and the AFSA Governing Board, but for you as well, our retired and alumni Foreign Service colleagues.

We are spread far and wide across the U.S., and members of Congress pay attention to their constituents. AFSA may need your help in the coming months.

The Friday updates on developments that affect the Foreign Service provide a good reading on the status of various initiatives. And through the monthly retirement newsletter, we will highlight changes of interest to you.

Thank you for allowing me the honor of serving you.