USDA bureau CIO takes early retirement

Linda Burek, CIO for the Agriculture Department’s Rural Development bureau, confirmed to Federal Computer Week that she is taking early retirement.

Burek’s move is evidence of the department’s decision to offer early outs for some employees due to a tight budget.

USDA received approval on May 13 from the Office of Personnel Management to offer voluntary separation and retirement packages to certain agency workers, Government Executive reported at the end of May.

In a July 25 email to FCW, Burek said she plans to retire on Sept. 30.

“When USDA offered the [Voluntary Early Retirement Authority], it gave me the opportunity to retire … sooner than I originally expected,” she wrote. Burek said her next venture will be helping her husband run a business they own.

According to the Office of Personnel Management, VERA allows agencies that are “undergoing substantial restructuring, reshaping, downsizing, transfer of function, or reorganization to temporarily lower the age and service requirements in order to increase the number of employees who are eligible for retirement.”

Burek said in her email that she is happy in her current CIO position and will miss the people she works with. “But, I’m ready to take on very different challenges,” she wrote. 

What do you think about USDA offering early retirement? Have you heard of other agencies (maybe even your own) doing the same thing?