Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The U.S. Postal Service's (USPS) financial condition and outlook deteriorated significantly during fiscal year 2009. USPS was not able to cut costs fast enough to offset declining mail volume and revenues resulting from the economic downturn and changing mail use. Facing an unprecedented cash shortfall, USPS stated that it would have insufficient cash on hand to make its mandated $5.4 billion payment to prefund postal retiree health benefits that was due by the end of the fiscal year. In July, 2009, GAO added USPS's financial condition to the list of high-risk areas needing attention by Congress and the executive branch to achieve broad-based transformation. GAO stated that USPS urgently needs to restructure to address its current and long-term financial viability. GAO also stated that USPS needs to use its flexibility to generate revenue through new or enhanced products. This testimony will (1) update USPS's financial condition and outlook, (2) describe changes made by the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act (PAEA) of 2006 that provided USPS with greater flexibility to generate revenues, (3) outline USPS's revenue-generation actions and results using this flexibility, and (4) discuss options for USPS to …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since 2001, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has been working to develop a modern Electronic Records Archive (ERA) system, a major information system that is intended to preserve and provide access to massive volumes of all types and formats of electronic records. The system is being developed incrementally over several years, with the first two pieces providing an initial set of functions and additional capabilities to be added in future increments. NARA plans to deploy full system functionality by 2012 at an estimated life-cycle cost of about $550 million. NARA originally planned to complete the first segment of ERA in September 2007. However, software and contracting problems led the agency and its contractor Lockheed Martin to revise the development approach. The revised plan called for parallel development of two different increments: a "base" ERA system with limited functionality and an Executive Office of the President (EOP) system to support the ingestion and search of records from the outgoing Bush Administration. GAO was asked to summarize NARA's progress in developing the ERA system and the ongoing risks the agency faces in completing it. In preparing this testimony, …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In March 2009, out of concern that the overall security situation in Afghanistan had not improved after more than 7 years of U.S. and international efforts, the administration completed a 60-day strategic review of U.S. policy and the security environment in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Based on this review, and recognizing the vital U.S. interest in addressing security threats posed by extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the administration announced a strategic goal of disrupting, dismantling, and eventually defeating these extremists and eliminating their safe havens in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. Subsequently, in August 2009, the United States issued an integrated civilian-military campaign plan for support to Afghanistan. The strategy and campaign plan call for, among other things, the execution of an integrated counterinsurgency mission and continued efforts to build the capacity of military and civilian elements of the Afghan government to lead counterinsurgency and counterterrorism efforts and provide internal security for the Afghan people. Accordingly, the focus for U.S. forces in Afghanistan will be to (1) secure Afghanistan from insurgent and terrorist threats and (2) rapidly train Afghanistan National Security Forces (ANSF) to lead military and law enforcement operations."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "We have performed the procedures described in this letter, which we agreed to perform and with which the Inspector General of the Department of Transportation concurred, solely to assist the Inspector General's office in ascertaining whether the net excise tax revenue distributed to the Airport and Airway Trust Fund (AATF) for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2009, is supported by the underlying records. As agreed with the Inspector General's office, we evaluated fiscal year 2009 activity affecting excise tax distributions to the AATF."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Army has three government-owned and operated manufacturing arsenals that it considers vital to the Department of Defense's (DOD) industrial base because they provide products or services that are either unavailable from private industry or ensure a ready and controlled source of technical competence and resources in case of national defense contingencies or other emergencies. These three arsenals are Pine Bluff Arsenal, Arkansas; Rock Island Arsenal, Illinois; and Watervliet Arsenal, New York. Pine Bluff's core mission is the production of conventional ammunition and other types of munitions. Rock Island's core mission is weapons manufacturing, and the arsenal is home to the Army's only remaining foundry. Watervliet is the Army's only cannon maker and also produces other armaments and mortars. Historically, the Army's arsenals have generally had vacant or underutilized space. For many years the Army has not provided the capital investment needed to keep pace with modern manufacturing requirements and retain core skills in the arsenal workforce. Additionally, the arsenals have generally had lower workloads during peacetime, but since the onset of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan they have experienced a surge in workloads to provide vital …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has performed the procedures to which we agreed upon to perform and with which you concurred, solely to assist your office in ascertaining whether the net excise tax revenue distributed to the Highway Trust Fund (HTF) for the fiscal year ended September 30, 2009, is supported by the underlying records. GAO evaluated fiscal year 2009 activity affecting excise tax distributions to the HTF. GAO conducted the engagement in accordance with U.S. generally accepted government auditing standards, which incorporate certain financial audit and attestation standards established by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA)."