Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) awards over one-half if its budget, or about $4 billion, annually in grants. At the end of fiscal year 2002, EPA was providing funding to 4,100 grant recipients, with $245.4 million, or nearly 6 percent of its awarded grant dollars, going to nonprofit grant recipients. Congressional hearings in 1996 and 1999 cited concerns with the grants management capabilities of nonprofit grantees. Specifically, the 1996 hearing raised questions about nonprofit grant recipients' use of federal funds for lobbying. The 1999 hearing cited concerns with the ability of nonprofit grantees to manage their grants, because, for example, many nonprofit organizations do not have staff with accounting backgrounds. Often, their grants are too small to be covered under the requirements of the Single Audit Act. In response to such concerns, EPA has included lobbying restrictions in grant agreements, issued guidance and policies on grantee oversight, and has attempted to improve nonprofit grantees' grants management with a 1-day training course and follow-up instructional videotape specifically designed for nonprofit grant recipients. However, as we reported in August 2003, nonprofit grant recipients continue to have problems managing their grants. …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Over the past two decades, the number of acres burned by wildland fires has increased, often threatening human lives, property, and ecosystems. The cost of responding to wildland fires has also grown, especially as more homes are built in or near wildlands, an area called the wildland-urban interface. Past management practices, including a concerted federal policy in the 20th century of suppressing fires to protect communities and ecosystems, unintentionally resulted in steady accumulation of dense vegetation that can fuel large, intense, and often costly wildland fires. GAO was asked to identify actions that federal wildland fire agencies need to take to help contain federal wildland fire expenditures. GAO has identified these actions in three of its reports addressing fuel reduction and cost-sharing efforts and as part of an ongoing review of federal agencies' efforts to contain wildland fire preparedness and suppression costs for this committee. Specifically, GAO focused on examining agencies' efforts to (1) reduce accumulated fuels and address wildland fire problems, (2) share with nonfederal entities the costs of responding to multijurisdictional fires, and (3) contain the costs of preparing for and responding to wildland fires."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "In late 2002, terrorists fired surface-to-air missiles at an Israeli airliner departing from Mombasa, Kenya--the first time man-portable air defense systems (MANPADS) had been used to attack commercial aircraft in a non-combat zone. Given concerns about the vulnerability of the commercial airline industry and the potential impact of an attack in the United States, the House Committee on Armed Services and the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Aviation Subcommittee, requested that we conduct an assessment of the federal government's efforts to address the MANPADS threat against commercial aircraft, including its nature and extent; the Department of Defense's monitoring of Stinger missiles exported to other countries; and U.S. bilateral and multilateral efforts to address international MANPADS proliferation. After we began work on this assessment, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) took steps to initiate a 2-year system development and demonstration program for a counter-MANPADS system and awarded the initial contracts in January 2004. On December 4, 2003, we briefed Congress on our views about DHS's approach to developing the system. This report summarizes that information and transmits the portion of the briefing related to DHS's counter-MANPADS development effort. …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Until mid-2008, prices for a broad range of physical commodities, from crude oil to crops such as wheat, had increased dramatically for several years--raising concerns and leading to a debate over the possible causes. Some market participants and observers have attributed the price increases to fundamental economic factors related to supply and demand. Others have suggested that the price increases resulted from speculation in the futures contracts by hedge funds and investors in commodity indexes. Like stock indexes, commodity indexes track the composite price of a basket of long futures positions in physical commodities. The indexes' investment strategy is passive, remaining the same regardless of whether prices are falling, rising, or flat. Two commonly referenced commodity indexes are the Standard & Poor's Goldman Sachs Commodity Index (S&P GSCI) and Dow Jones-American International Group Commodity Index (DJ-AIGCI), which are based on a broad range of physical commodities, including energy products, agricultural products, and metals. Since around the mid-2000s, pension plans, endowments, and other institutional investors increasingly have used investments in commodity indexes to obtain exposure to commodity prices as an asset class, typically to diversify their portfolios or hedge …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The federal government spends about $10 billion each year to provide meals to over 30 million students through the National School Lunch and Breakfast Programs. However, a 2007 study estimated that of this amount, $860 million (8.6 percent) in school year 2005-2006 was paid improperly because of errors in the number of meals counted and claimed for reimbursement. These programs are administered by the United States Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) through state agencies that, in turn, oversee local school food authorities (SFA). SFAs that participate in the lunch and breakfast programs receive federal cash reimbursements through the state agency for each meal served, and in the lunch program they also receive USDA commodity donations based on the number of meals served. In return, SFAs must serve meals that meet federal nutrition requirements and offer meals free or at a reduced price to students whose family's income falls below certain thresholds. While most of the roughly 13,700 SFAs in traditional public school districts in the United States manage their own programs, about 13 percent choose to contract with private companies known as food service …

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "In 1992 the United States ratified the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which was intended to stabilize the buildup of greenhouse gases in the earth's atmosphere but did not impose binding limits on emissions. In July 1997, when preliminary negotiations on a new climate agreement were under way, the Senate passed a resolution expressing the sense of the Senate that the Clinton administration should not agree to limits on U.S. greenhouse gas emissions if such an agreement did not include economically developing nations or if it could seriously harm the U.S. economy. In December 1997 the United States participated in drafting the Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement to specifically limit greenhouse gas emissions. The Protocol did not impose limits on developing nations' emissions, and its possible effect on the U.S. economy was the subject of numerous studies during that period, including the two studies that are the subject of this report. Although the U.S. government signed the Protocol in 1998, the Clinton administration did not submit it to the Senate for advice and consent, which are necessary for ratification. In March 2001, President Bush announced that …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The war in Iraq along with other overseas operations have led to significant stress on U.S. ground forces and raised questions about whether those forces are appropriately sized and structured. In 2005, the Department of Defense (DOD) agreed with GAO's recommendation that it review military personnel requirements. The Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) concluded in its 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) that the number of active personnel in the Army and Marine Corps should not change. However, the Secretary of Defense recently announced plans to increase these services' active end strength by 92,000 troops. Given the long-term costs associated with this increase, it is important that Congress understand how DOD determines military personnel requirements and the extent of its analysis. GAO has issued a number of reports on DOD's force structure and the impact of ongoing operations on military personnel, equipment, training, and related funding. This statement, which draws on that prior work, focuses on (1) the processes and analyses OSD and the services use to assess force structure and military personnel levels; (2) the extent to which the services' requirements analyses reflect new demands as …

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This testimony discusses the weakness in screening entrants into the United States. This work was completed in response to a request that agents of the Office of Special Investigations (OSI) attempt to enter the United States from Canada, Mexico, and Jamaica at land, air, and sea ports of entry using fictitious identities and counterfeit identification documents. The purpose was to test whether U.S. government officials conducting inspections at the port of entry would detect the counterfeit identification documents."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since 2001, Congress has provided the Department of Defense (DOD) with hundreds of billions of dollars in supplemental and annual appropriations for military operations in support of the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT). DOD's reported annual obligations for GWOT have shown a steady increase from about $0.2 billion in fiscal year 2001 to about $139.8 billion in fiscal year 2007. In fiscal year 2007, Congress provided DOD with about $161.8 billion in annual and supplemental appropriations3 for GWOT. To continue its GWOT operations, DOD has requested $189. billion in appropriations for fiscal year 2008. As of December 2007, Congress has provided DOD with about $86.8 billion for GWOT in fiscal year 2008, including $16.8 billion for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles. DOD has reported obligations of about $23.8 billion for GWOT for fiscal year 2008 through November 2007. The United States' commitments to GWOT will likely involve the continued investment of significant resources, requiring decision makers to consider difficult trade-offs as the nation faces an increasing long-range fiscal challenge. The magnitude of future costs will depend on several direct and indirect cost variables and, in some cases, decisions …

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a city may operate a commercial compost/mulch business that sells its products outside the city's limits.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Authority of a county attorney to represent the Texas Department of Aging and Disability Services, in prosecuting an application for placement under chapter 593, Health and Safety Code (RQ-0510-GA)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the requirements of section 265.004(a) of the Family Code apply to all prevention and early intervention programs funded by the Department of Family and Protective Services (RQ-0513-GA)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether a county may require an overweight vehicle to obtain an operating permit in addition to the permit required by the Department of Transportation (RQ-0517-GA)

Other written product issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "This report presents the highlights of GAO's fiscal year 2006 Performance and Accountability report. In short, fiscal year 2006 was an exceptional year for GAO. For example, we received a clean opinion from independent auditors on our financial statements. Senior GAO executives and the Comptroller General delivered testimonies at 240 hearings covering a range of topics, including the tax gap and tax reform, U.S. border security, Iraq and Hurricane Katrina activities, and issues affecting the health and pay of military servicemembers. Our testimonies significantly surpassed the fiscal year 2006 target we set as well as our actual performance over the last 4 years, and 92 percent of the congressional staff responding to our client feedback survey either strongly or generally agreed that our testimonies and written products were delivered on time to them. Though we were 6 percentage points shy of our timeliness target, we will continue our quest to improve the timeliness of our products. In addition, we also met or exceeded four of our eight performance measures that gauge how well we developed, challenged, and managed our workforce. We documented $51 billion in financial …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Although the overall safety record of the railroad industry, as measured by the number of train accidents per million miles traveled, has improved markedly since 1980, there has been little or no overall improvement over the past decade. Serious accidents resulting in injuries and deaths continue to occur, such as one in Graniteville, South Carolina, that resulted in 9 deaths and 292 injuries. The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) develops safety standards and inspects and enforces railroads' compliance with these standards. On January 26, 2007, GAO reported on FRA's overall safety oversight strategy. (See GAO-07-149.) The report discussed how FRA (1) focuses its efforts on the highest priority risks related to train accidents in planning its oversight, (2) identifies safety problems on railroad systems in carrying out its oversight, and (3) assesses the impact of its oversight efforts on safety. GAO recommended that FRA (1) put into place measures of the results of its inspection and enforcement programs and (2) evaluate its enforcement program. In reviewing a draft of that report, the Department of Transportation did not provide overall views on its contents or its recommendations. The statement is …