A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and water utility industry groups, communities will need as much as $1 trillion during the next 20 years to repair, replace, or upgrade aging drinking water and wastewater facilities; accommodate a growing population; and meet new water quality standards. GAO found that the amount of funds obtained from user charges and other local sources of revenue was less than the full cost of providing service--including operation and maintenance, debt service, depreciation, and taxes--for more than a quarter of drinking water utilities and more than 4 out of 10 wastewater utilities in their most recent fiscal year. GAO also found that more than a quarter of utilities lacked plans recommended by utility associations for managing their existing capital assets, but nearly all had plans that identify future capital improvement needs. A privatization agreement's potential to generate profits is the key factor influencing decisions by private companies that enter into such agreements with publicly owned utilities or the governmental entities they serve, according to the companies GAO contacted."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "For fiscal year 2002, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) will pay $25 billion in cash disability benefits to 3.3 million disabled veterans and their families. Veterans who are dissatisfied with VA's 57 regional offices' decisions may file appeals with VA's Board of Veteran's Appeals. In about half of such appeals, the Board has either granted the benefits denied or returned the cases to regional offices for rework. Additionally, VA reported an accuracy rate of less than 70 percent for regional office disability decisions when it tested a new quality assurance program in fiscal year 1998. When the Board itself denies benefits, veterans may appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims. In over half of these appeals, the Court has either granted the benefits denied by the Board or returned the decisions to the Board for rework. In fiscal year 1998, the Board of Veteran's Appeals established a quantitative evaluation program to score its decisionmaking accuracy and collect data to improve decisionmaking. The accuracy measure used by the Board understates its true accuracy rate because the calculations include certain deficiencies, such as errors …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense (DOD) is pursuing a policy that promotes performance-based logistics at the platform level as the preferred product support strategy for its weapon systems, based in part on DOD's perception that this is an industry best practice. GAO was asked to compare industry practices for activities using complex and costly equipment with life-cycle management issues similar to those of military systems to identify lessons learned that can be useful to DOD. This is the first of two reports addressing DOD's implementation of performance-based logistics and is intended to facilitate DOD's development of new guidance on the use of this approach."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This letter responds to congressional interest in the communications between Curt Hebert, Jr., Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and Kenneth Lay, Chairman of Enron Corporation which were discussed in an article in the New York Times on May 25, 2001. Concerns were raised these communications might have violated federal criminal statutes or ethics regulations. GAO found that there was no evidence that the Chairman attempted to use public office for private gain or that Mr. Lay offered anything of value to Mr. Herbert."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) efforts to address GAO's recommendations to improve VA's information technology (IT) program."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program introduced specific work requirements and benefit time limits. However, the Family Violence Option (FVO) requires states that adopt the FVO to screen TANF clients for domestic violence and grant waivers from program requirements for clients in domestic violence situations. TANF also allows the use of TANF funds for marriage and responsible fatherhood programs. Given states' broad discretion in implementing the TANF program, including most aspects of the FVO and marriage and responsible fatherhood programs, this report examines (1) how states identify victims of domestic violence among TANF recipients, (2) how states address domestic violence among TANF recipients once they are identified, and (3) the extent to which states spend TANF funds on marriage and responsible fatherhood programs, and how, if at all, these programs are addressing domestic violence."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Using performance measures, the Coast Guard explains how well its programs are performing. To do so, it reports one "primary" measure for each program (such as percent of mariners rescued) and maintains data on other, "secondary" measures (such as percent of property saved). Concerns have been raised about whether measures for non-homeland security programs accurately reflect performance, that is, they did not rise or fall as resources were added or reduced. For the six non-homeland security programs, GAO used established criteria to assess the soundness of the primary measures--that is, whether measures cover key activities; are clearly stated; and are objective, measurable, and quantifiable--and the reliability of data used to calculate them. GAO also used these criteria to assess the soundness of 23 selected secondary measures. Finally, through interviews and report review, GAO assessed challenges in using measures to link resources to results."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the status of the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) computer security efforts, focusing on: (1) FAA's history of computer security weaknesses, as described in GAO's May 1998 and December 1999 reports, and GAO's prior recommendations to address those weaknesses; (2) FAA's progress in implementing GAO's recommendations and its own personnel security policy, including GAO's assessment of the adequacy of these actions; and (3) the preliminary results of GAO's ongoing work."