IRS to cut 218 IT jobs

Computerworld - The Internal Revenue Service is cutting 218 IT workers in 10 tax processing centers nationwide as it looks to trim costs.
The cuts in the agency's IT Modernization and Information Technology Services division, slated to take place by June 1, 2005, will be made in the agency's high-speed printing division, according to IRS spokesman John Lipold. Currently, there are 278 IT employees at the 10 tax processing sites.
The affected employees are computer operators, computer specialists and tape librarians who print reports for managers, provide support for those managers and resolve systems problems, Lipold said.
The announcement, made yesterday, came as the result of a private/public sourcing competition for the jobs, which allows agency employees to vie for the positions against private-sector firms. Although the agency employees won the bid, they lost some jobs in the process.
"One thing that drove this is the new technology they're using at the centers," Lipold said. "About 80% of the reports that were previously printed will now be able to be viewed online. In a sense, the workload is decreasing."
Lipold said the IRS will attempt to place people at other jobs within the agency or elsewhere in the federal government. Some employees will be offered buyouts or early retirement.
The National Treasury Employees Union said the job cuts could have been avoided had the IRS used other means of reducing costs, such as reorganization, attrition and streamlining operations to save money, according to a statement released today by the group.
The NTEU argued that even though the IT jobs will remain in the IRS rather than going to a private vendor, the result is the same -- a large number of employees will still lose their jobs, and service to the public could be negatively affected.

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