The Domestic Partnership Benefits and Obligations Act (S. 1910) is scheduled to go before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee for a vote.

As Joe Davidson wrote last week in the Federal Diary, some federal contractors got a 10 percent raise in April, while federal workers are in the midst of a pay-freeze.

President Abraham Lincoln signed legislation establishing the department on May 15, 1862, in the midst of the Civil War. The creation of the department was part of an enormous expansion of the federal government during the war.

In a Friday memo to government officials, Jeffrey D. Zients, acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, said, “Each agency shall spend at least 30 percent less on travel expenses covered by this memorandum than in FY 2010.”

The week is supposed to be filled with events acknowledging these workers, and educating the public on all that they do. It’s exciting stuff, right? Well, according to some federal workers, not so much.

House Republicans on Thursday criticized the Obama administration’s delay in nominating inspectors general for several key agencies.

There are currently 10 inspector general vacancies, including five at cabinet-level agencies. Some have been vacant for longer than three years.

Postal officials, who have forecast a record $14 billion loss by the end of the year, used the bad financial news to step up pressure on Congress to pass legislation allowing the agency’s cost-cutting efforts to move forward.

The rules, which establish three separate Pathway Programs, are in response to an executive order issued by President Obama in December 2010 that shut down the Federal Career Intern Program. Critics said the intern program was not limited to students, was often used to fill civil service vacancies and undermined the hiring preferences for veterans.

The social media giant is joining with the Department of Veterans Affairs and the military family advocacy group Blue Star Families to launch a new “military crisis” service that will seek to connect friends and families with concerns about veterans and military family members with resources such as the Veterans Crisis Line.

Separate letters from the legislative director of the American Federation of Government Employees and the president of the National Treasury Employees Union argue that federal employees are being targeted disproportionately in the budget process.