A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the potential differences in treatment patterns for health maintenance organizations (HMO) patients treated by specialists and those treated by generalist physicians, focusing on: (1) the proportion of Medicare heart attack survivors enrolled in HMOs who take cholesterol-lowering drugs, beta-blockers, and aspirin; and (2) whether Medicare heart attack survivors in HMOs regularly treated by a cardiologist are more likely to take cholesterol-lowering drugs, beta-blockers, and aspirin than those who do not have regular cardiology appointments."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Department of Agriculture's (USDA) progress in streamlining its administrative operations, focusing on USDA's efforts to: (1) reduce the number of administrative staff departmentwide; (2) consolidate and streamline administrative support structures for seven field-based agencies, particularly at the state office level; and (3) measure the savings and efficiencies realized as a result of its departmentwide reorganization and streamlining efforts."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO examined several issues related to the Department of Defense's (DOD) administration of its animal research programs, focusing on: (1) the extent to which DOD's research using animals addresses validated military objectives, does not unnecessarily duplicate work done elsewhere, and incorporates methods to reduce, replace, and refine the use of animals; and (2) problems with the accuracy of information in the Biomedical Research Database (BRD)."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on: (1) the number of able-bodied adults without dependents who are receiving food stamp benefits, the number who are required to meet the work requirements, and the number who are exempted from the requirements; (2) the number of able-bodied adults without dependents participating in qualifying employment and training or Workfare programs; and (3) the amounts of federal grant funds that states spent through the first three quarters of fiscal year 1998 for employment and training or workfare programs for food stamp recipients."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) progress in correcting serious computer security weaknesses at five IRS facilities, focusing on: (1) additional security weaknesses identified at the five facilities and at an IRS facility not included in GAO's previous report; and (2) steps IRS has taken or plans to take to implement a service-wide computer security management program."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the types of activities undertaken by U.S. contractors to meet offset obligations associated with the sale of defense equipment to various foreign governments."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Defense's (DOD) Defense Export Loan Guarantee (DELG) Program, focusing on: (1) the level of program activity to date; (2) the program's financial status; (3) other sources of financing available to borrowing countries; (4) comparing DELG Program characteristics with other U.S. government export financing programs; and (5) examining issues related to the planned fiscal year 1999 transfer of DELG Program responsibilities within DOD."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO: (1) identified practices that are both used in selected state programs at sites that may be contaminated enough to qualify for long-term cleanup under the Superfund program and that are believed by state officials to reduce the time and expense of cleanups; and (2) obtained the views of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), environmentalists, and other stakeholders about whether the states' practices may be applicable to the Superfund program."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO determined whether the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) must enforce grant assurance as a condition of providing noise mitigation grants to the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO reviewed the Department of Agriculture's (USDA) efforts to improve the safety of meat and poultry products, focusing on whether: (1) the system adopted by USDA in its regulations is consistent with the seven Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) principles endorsed by the National Advisory Committee on Microbiological Criteria for Foods; (2) the HACCP training program for USDA inspectors is adequate and science-based; and (3) there is an adequate dispute resolution (appeals) process between plants and USDA under the new HACCP inspection system."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the financial operations of the Air Force depot maintenance activity group, focusing on the: (1) Air Force depot maintenance activity group's price increase between fiscal year (FY) 1994 and FY 1999 and the primary reasons for it; (2) activity group's financial losses during FY 1994 through FY 1998 and the primary reasons for them; and (3) Air Force's methods for recovering these losses."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on alternative land uses that could save water at Fallon Naval Air Station, Nevada, focusing on: (1) the aviation safety and operational requirements for the runway protection zone at Fallon Naval Air Station (NAS); (2) the alternative land use strategies Fallon NAS identified in response to congressional direction and how it evaluated them; and (3) the land use strategies at five military facilities and two commercial airports that operate in similar environments."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the mechanisms of coordination between Medicaid and the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), focusing on: (1) how Medicaid and IDEA interact to meet the needs of low-income school-aged children with disabilities; and (2) issues that have arisen in coordinating Medicaid and IDEA services in schools."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on: (1) how many students with limited English proficiency are being served through targeted and schoolwide Elementary and Secondary Education Act Title I programs; (2) how students with limited English proficiency are being served through targeted and schoolwide Title I programs; (3) how many Title I teachers in schools serving students with limited English proficiency are bilingual or have other specialized training in teaching these students; and (4) what accommodations do states allow for students with limited English proficiency in taking academic assessments, including offering tests in their native language, and to what extent are these students participating in academic assessments."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Year 2000 census, focusing on: (1) the need to boost the declining level of public participation in the census; and (2) the Census Bureau's need to collect timely and accurate data from nonrespondents."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on improvements needed to track and archive trade agreements, focusing on: (1) the number of trade agreements the United States is party to; (2) the way in which the executive branch notifies Congress when trade agreements are entered into; and (3) the extent to which the public has ready access to information from government sources about trade agreements."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a legislative requirement, GAO reported on the: (1) status of the development and use of alternative fuel technologies in transit buses, particularly the use of compressed natural gas (CNG) as a fuel; (2) air quality benefits of such technologies; (3) costs incurred by transit operators to use CNG buses, as well as other alternative fuels, compared with the costs to use diesel buses; and (4) primary incentives and disincentives for using these technologies."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Agriculture's (USDA) reports on how the pork industry's sharp decline in prices does not reflect pork prices at the retail level, focusing on the: (1) structural changes in the pork industry that have occurred since the 1980s and their effect on production and marketing; (2) reasons for the sudden and rapid decline in prices paid to farmers in late 1998; and (3) extent to which USDA's methods for obtaining and reporting on prices at the farm and retail level for hogs and pork products result in accurate estimates of these prices."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on skilled nursing facilities, focusing on: (1) the initial effect of the skilled nursing facility (SNF) prospective payment system (PPS) on Medicare beneficiaries' access to care; (2) the initial effect of the SNF PPS on providers; and (3) the role the SNF PPS has played in the poor financial performance of large nursing home chains."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed how the Department of Veterans' Affairs' (VA) manages its national formulary and how drugs other than those on the formulary are made available to veterans."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO assessed the Army's implementation of the Land Warrior system, focusing on: (1) the status of the system; (2) whether the level of monitoring and oversight is sufficient based on projected Land Warrior development costs; (3) how the Army is ensuring that Land Warrior will be able to operate with other digitized battlefield systems; and (4) whether technical and human factor problems still need resolution."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Custom Service's Modernization efforts, focusing on: (1) the status of Customs' implementation of the informed compliance strategy; and (2) whether trade compliance under the new program had improved."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the construction of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) facility for its Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN) in College Park, Maryland, focusing on: (1) the General Services Administration's (GSA) authority to construct a new facility for FDA in College Park; (2) whether the requirements for building on a floodplain had been met; and (3) the planned placement of computers in the basement of the new building, specifically whether; (a) steps had been taken or will be taken to mitigate the risk of damage from water entering the basement of the building, and (b) CFSAN staff were involved in the decision to place the computer operations in the basement."

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to a congressional request, the GAO discussed the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) performance during the 1999 tax filing season, focusing on: (1) telephone service; (2) availability of walk-in services; (3) other taxpayer service efforts; (4) Earned Income Credit (EIC) noncompliance; (5) electronic filing; (6) implementation of recent tax law changes; and (7) implementation of a new return and remittance processing system."