Office of Government Ethics 2013 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The U.S. Office of Government Ethics (OGE) proposes to modify existing routine uses (a.) and (l.) to OGE/GOVT-1, Executive Branch Personnel Public Financial Disclosure Reports and Other Name-Retrieved Ethics Program Records (OGE/GOVT-1 System of Records). This action is necessary to comply with the requirements of the Privacy Act to publish in the Federal Register notice of the existence and character of records maintained by the agency (5 U.S.C. 552a(e)(4)). OGE last published OGE/GOVT-1 at 68 FR 3098-3109 (January 22, 2003), as corrected at 68 FR 24744 (May 8, 2003). An additional routine use was added to OGE/GOVT-1 at 76 FR 24489 (May 2, 2011) and modified at 77 FR 45353 (July 31, 2012).

The Office of Government Ethics is issuing this final rule to provide notice of the revocation of certain regulatory exemptions of senior employee positions at the Securities and Exchange Commission from the one-year post-employment restrictions of 18 U.S.C. 207(c) and (f).

After publication of this first round notice and public comment period, OGE intends to submit a modified OGE Form 278 Executive Branch Personnel Public Financial Disclosure Report to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval of a three-year extension under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. chapter 35).

The U.S. Office of Government Ethics (OGE) is providing notice of request for public comment on its draft FY 2014-2017 Strategic Plan (Plan). The Plan describes OGE's priorities for the next four years. OGE will consider all comments received by the deadline. You may access the Plan at www.oge.gov, or you may obtain a copy of the Plan by sending an email request to OGEStrategicPlan@oge.gov.

After this first round notice and public comment period, OGE plans to submit an unmodified OGE Form 450 Executive Branch Confidential Financial Disclosure Report to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval of a three-year extension under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. chapter 35).

The Office of Government Ethics is issuing this final rule to amend the regulation that describes financial interests that are exempt from the prohibition in 18 U.S.C. 208(a). These final rule amendments would revise the existing regulatory exemptions by: Creating a new exemption that permits Government employees to participate in particular matters affecting the financial interests of nonprofit organizations in which they serve in an official capacity as officer, director or trustee, notwithstanding the employees' imputed financial interest under 18 U.S.C. 208(a); and revising the existing exemption for interests in the holdings of sector mutual funds to clarify that it applies to interests in the holdings of sector unit investment trusts.