Here’s How We Can Help You To Set Up Shop At HQ In DC
So, you’re a USDA field employee, AND you’re on travel status, AND you’ve just arrived at USDA headquarters in Washington, DC, as part of a five-day workshop your agency is coordinating, AND you brought with you some job-related assignments that you need to work on while you’re there, SO you’re looking for an empty office where you can borrow a computer, a printer, a fax machine, a copier, a telephone, and an e-mail hookup to send some of your completed work back to your home office—BUT you can’t find any empty offices, AND you don’t want to disturb any of your agency colleagues at HQ who are immersed in their own assignments—SO you just give up and bag the whole idea of getting that extra work done while away from your home base.

BUMMER!

AND--these days--unnecessary.

That’s because the Department recently opened a fully-equipped, alternate work site for use by both HQ and field employees of participating agencies while away from their official duty stations or primary offices. It’s called the Telework Center, and it’s located in the Department’s George Washington Carver facility in Beltsville, Md.

According to Esther Edwards, acting manager of the Center with the Office of Operations, it consists of two rooms.

One room has 14 individual workstations with computers and three workstations available for employees to plug in laptop computers they may have brought with them.

“The second room,” she explained, “is set up for use by short term task groups and/or special project groups of 90 days or less.”

This 'Task Room’ offers a private office, one secretarial station, 10 individual workstations with computers, two workstations for employees with laptops, and a combination fax machine, copier, and printer.

In addition, she noted, two of the workstations within the Center are set up with features to accommodate employees with disabilities. That includes “JAWS,” or “Jet Access With Speech,” which is a software package that reads on-screen text and turns it into speech for visually impaired users; a keyboard with Braille imprint labels on the keys; “Zoom Text” software that offers enlarged print on the computer screen; and workstations that are hydraulically height-adjustable to accommodate wheelchairs.

“I’ve tested this and it works just fine,” concludes Terry Cagle (left), an NRCS realty/contract specialist. She and Esther Edwards, acting manager of USDA’s Telework Center in Beltsville, Md., are making sure that a software package to help visually impaired employees is functioning correctly at one of the workstations in the Center. --Photo by Edward Hicks

“My staff developed a single-sheet reference guide to help Esther ensure that the equipment in those two workstations is used properly and to its maximum advantage,” said Ophelia Falls. She is director of USDA’s TARGET Center, which helps USDA offices obtain equipment that can provide 'reasonable accommodation’ in the USDA workplace for employees with disabilities.

“USDA’s Telework Center has the capacity to accommodate up to 33 people,” Edwards noted.

She added that the Carver facility is currently accessible to USDA’s HQ in Washington, DC by a combination of subway and shuttle bus, and parking is also available.

Edwards said that arrangements for using the Center can be made by calling (301) 504-3783 or e-mail at gwctelework@usda.gov

“We’re currently not charging our employees to use USDA’s Telework Center,” she affirmed. 

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