Some may decry the current lame-duck Congress, but federal workers and anyone who cares about reducing pollution might want to watch how they describe lawmakers. They just approved an important bill for this region, and now it heads to the president’s desk.

That’s the Telework Enhancement Act, a bipartisan measure sponsored by our own Reps. Frank R. Wolf and Gerald E. “Gerry” Connolly, who together represent almost all of the Prince William area, and by Rep. John Sarbanes, a Maryland Democrat.

The legislation expands telework in the federal government, requires every agency to designate senior-level employees to implement telework, makes telework a central element of agencies’ emergency plans, and requires annual reports from agencies to ensure that the program is meeting expectations.

Or, as Wolf described it in a statement Thursday after the bill passed the House: “This legislation will bring the federal government into the 21st century.”

The Republican has long been an advocate of telecommuting, so his shepherding of the bill was almost a given, as was Connolly’s. Before serving in Congress, the Democrat was a longtime Fairfax County supervisor, and 20 percent of county employees there telecommute regularly, compared to 6 percent to 10 percent of federal workers.

“We can get people out of their cars and increase productivity at the same time with a robust federal telework program,” Connolly said in a statement. “We saw the benefits earlier this year during the back-to-back snowstorms when federal workers, who teleworked while the federal government shut down for 4½ days, saved $30 million a day by avoiding productivity loss.”

He also mentioned that this is a case where less actually could mean more: less driving equals less pollution from cars and less dependence on foreign oil.

Not to be outdone, the third member of the Prince William area’s House delegation, Rep. Robert J. Wittman, co-sponsored the Telework Enhancement Act, as did 11 of the Republican’s colleagues. As has been mentioned in this space before, if anyone could benefit from not having to take to the road, it would have to be Wittman, who commutes to Washington from the Northern Neck.

This newspaper was glad to proclaim the telework bill’s initial House passage in July, and the president ought to sign it as soon as possible. It was good policy when introduced, it was good policy when the Senate approved it and it remains so now that the House has concurred with Senate amendments.

http://www2.insidenova.com/news/2010/nov/21/editorial-telework-bill-moving-along-ar-666515/