Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "We evaluated fiscal year 2002 activity affecting distributors to the Airport and Airway Trust Fund (AATF)."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "We evaluated fiscal year 2002 activity affecting distributions to the Unemployment Trust Fund (UTF)."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "We evaluated fiscal year 2002 activity affecting distributions to the Highway Trust Fund (HTF)."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO reviewed the appropriateness of a termination of a 1997 request by the Indian Health Services (IHS) for proposals to provide computed tomographic scanning services for the Blackfeet and Crow Service Units in Montana. GAO found no indication that IHS negotiated in bad faith. GAO's Office of Special Investigations had looked into the case in December 1998. GAO determined that the case was not within the scope of ongoing work and referred the case to the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General (OIG). A June 1999 report by the OIG concluded that the allegations were unwarranted."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "There is a growing understanding that the federal government needs to fundamentally rethink its current approach to pay and to better link pay to individual and organizational performance. Federal agencies have been experimenting with pay for performance through the Office of Personnel Management's (OPM) personnel demonstration projects. GAO identified the approaches that selected personnel demonstration projects have taken to implement their pay for performance systems. These projects include: the Navy Demonstration Project at China Lake (China Lake), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the Department of Commerce (DOC), the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), the Naval Sea Systems Command Warfare Centers (NAVSEA) at Dahlgren and Newport, and the Civilian Acquisition Workforce Personnel Demonstration Project (AcqDemo). We selected these demonstration projects based on factors such as status of the project and makeup of employee groups covered. We provided drafts of this report to officials in the Department of Defense (DOD) and DOC for their review and comment. DOD provided written comments concurring with our report. DOC provided minor technical clarifications and updated information. We provided a draft of the report to the Director of OPM for …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The core mission of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is to promote monetary cooperation and exchange rate stability and provide resources to IMF member countries that experience balance-of-payment difficulties. Because it is an international organization, IMF is generally exempt from US law; however, Congress can seek to influence IMF policy by passing laws that direct the Secretary of the Treasury to direct the Executive Director to vote on certain issues within the Board of the Fund. Through three case studies, GAO found that the Treasury and the U.S. Executive Director actively promoted U.S. policies related to (1) sound banking principles, (2) labor issues, and (3) audits of military expenditures. It is difficult to determine whether IMF's adoption of a policy is due solely to U.S. influence because other countries generally support the same policies."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "U.S. policymakers and industry groups are concerned that some foreign textile and apparel imports are entering the United States fraudulently and displacing U.S. textile and apparel industry workers. Congress mandated GAO to assess U.S. Customs and Border Protection's (CBP) system for monitoring and enforcing textile transshipment and make recommendations for improvements, as needed. Therefore, GAO reviewed (1) how CBP identifies potential illegal textile transshipment, (2) how well CBP's textile review process works to prevent illegal textile transshipment, and (3) how effectively CBP uses its in-bond system to monitor foreign textiles transiting the United States."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Since 1994, the CALFED Delta-Bay and Central Valley Project Improvement Act has provided more than $63 million to buy private lands in California for wetlands mitigation and wildlife enhancement. Federal agencies and nonprofit organizations have acquired 101,800 acres--94,300 acres in full ownership and 7,500 acres in partial interest or easements that restrict how land may be used. The three federal agencies and nonprofit organization GAO reviewed use the Uniform Standards for Federal Land Acquisitions for appraisals. All the entities developed and used supplemental appraisal guidance, which was generally consistent across the entities. The agencies and nonprofit organization used similar methodologies with one exception. The National Resources Conservation Service does not consider the land's residual value when making its appraisals as specified in the Uniform Standards."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Interior and Related Agencies, Committee on Appropriations, and the Ranking Minority Member, House Subcommittee on Legislative, Committee on Appropriations, requested that we review the Library's Special Events Gift Fund. As agreed, we focused on the Library's analysis supporting its June 2000 decision to increase suggested room contributions associated with the Great Hall effective January 2001, and key policies, procedures, and controls associated with holding the approximately 120 fiscal year 2001 special events that were accounted for in the Gift Fund. Specifically, we agreed to (1) review and comment on the analysis behind the Library's January 2001 increase in the suggested room contributions from outside sponsors of events held in the Great Hall of the Jefferson Building; (2) identify key policies and procedures applicable to requesting, approving, and planning those special events accounted for through the Gift Fund and determine whether the Library is following those policies and procedures; and (3) identify key accounting and control policies and procedures over receipts, expenditures, and the fund balance of the Gift Fund and determine whether the Library is following those policies and procedures."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has subsidized the development of over 23,000 properties by offering owners favorable long-term mortgage financing or rental assistance payments in exchange for owners' commitment to house low-income tenants. When owners pay off mortgages--the mortgages "mature"--the subsidized financing ends, raising the possibility of rent increases. GAO was asked to determine the number of HUD mortgages that are scheduled to mature in the next 10 years, the potential impact on tenants, and what HUD and others can do to keep these properties affordable."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Cruise missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) pose a growing threat to U.S. national security interests as accurate, inexpensive delivery systems for conventional, chemical, and biological weapons. GAO assessed (1) the tools the U.S. and foreign governments use to address proliferation risks posed by the sale of these items and (2) efforts to verify the end use of exported cruise missiles, UAVs, and related technology."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Meeting the requirements of tax rules can be especially burdensome to small business sole proprietorships that independently own their businesses. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) data show that, compared to other taxpayer groups, sole proprietorships have more problems complying with their tax obligations. Simplifying how sole proprietorships account for and report expenses may ease their burden and increase compliance. Because of the requesters' interest in alleviating any unnecessary burden that federal tax requirements impose on small businesses, we were asked to provide information on the expenses that sole proprietorships report on IRS's Form 1040 Schedule C--Profit or Loss from Business and on Form 1040 Schedule F--Profit or Loss from Farming. By having information on the expenses reported by sole proprietorships, policymakers may be in a better position to develop alternatives for simplifying how these taxpayers account for and report their expenses."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Transportation (DOT) lacks sufficient and reliable data to fully identify its acquisition workforce needs and assess progress in addressing shortfalls over time. Over the last 3 years, the Office of the Senior Procurement Executive—the office within the Office of the Secretary of Transportation responsible for department-wide acquisition workforce management—has submitted acquisition workforce plans that reported progress in increasing the size of the workforce and the number of personnel certified to meet education, training, and experience requirements. However, GAO identified data limitations due to a lack of internal controls to maintain, compare, and reconcile the data compiled from DOT’s 11 operating administrations (OA), and determined that the department-level data were not sufficient to assess progress over time. For example, DOT did not maintain the data it used to prepare the 2010 and 2011 plans and in some cases the data were also not available from the OAs. By contrast, GAO obtained the data DOT used to prepare the 2012 plan, compared it with data from the OAs, and interviewed OA officials about the sources and methods they used to report the data. GAO found …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Actual trust-fund revenues fell short of FAA’s revenue forecasts for 9 of the past 11 years, contributing to a decline in the trust fund’s uncommitted balance from over $7 billion in fiscal year 2000 to $770 million in fiscal year 2010. Inaccurate forecasts for the taxes related to domestic passenger tickets, which account for over 70 percent of trust-fund revenues, drove the aggregate overforecast, but inaccurate forecasts for other taxes also had an effect. This inaccuracy is largely attributable to unexpected events affecting aviation, such as the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and the recession in 2009; the budget process requiring the forecasts to be developed over a year in advance of the fiscal year; and lags in recognizing structural changes in the airline industry, such as airlines’ increased reliance on ancillary fees for which excise taxes for the trust fund are not collected. Changes in the methodology for forecasting trust-fund revenues and the assumption of forecasting responsibility by Treasury, begun in fiscal year 2011, may also affect the future accuracy of forecasts, but it is too soon to tell what effect the changes will …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Recognizing the importance of child support, the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 requires that if a parent with child support obligations files for bankruptcy, a bankruptcy trustee must notify the relevant custodial parent and state child support enforcement agency so that they may participate in the case. The act also required GAO to study the feasibility of matching bankruptcy records with child support records to assure that filers with child support obligations are identified. GAO therefore (1) identified the percent of bankruptcy filers with obligations nationwide, (2) examined the potential for routine data matching to facilitate the identification of filers with child support obligations, and (3) studied the feasibility and cost of doing so. GAO interviewed child support enforcement and bankruptcy officials at the federal level and in six states. GAO also conducted a nationwide test data match and reviewed national bankruptcy filings for people with support obligations in Texas for an indication of whether filers are failing to provide this information."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense's (DOD) spending on goods and services has grown significantly since fiscal year 2000, to well over $314 billion annually. GAO has identified DOD contract management as a high-risk area for more than decade. With awards to contractors large and growing, DOD will continue to be vulnerable to contracting fraud, waste, or misuse of taxpayer dollars, and abuse. Prudence with taxpayer funds, widening deficits, and growing long-range fiscal challenges demand that DOD maximize its return on investment, while providing warfighters with the needed capabilities at the best value for the taxpayer. This statement discusses (1) the implications of DOD's increasing reliance on contractors to fill roles previously held by government employees, (2) the importance of the acquisition workforce in DOD's mission and the need to strengthen its capabilities and accountability, and (3) assumptions about cost savings related to the use of contractors versus federal employees. This statement is based on work GAO has ongoing or has completed over the past several years covering a range of DOD contracting issues."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The five federal agencies GAO reviewed--the General Services Administration (GSA) and the Departments of Energy (DOE), Homeland Security (DHS), the Interior, and Veterans' Affairs (VA)--reported fiscal year 2012 deferred maintenance and repair backlog estimates that ranged from nearly $1 billion to $20 billion. In accordance with Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board (FASAB) standards, agencies report backlog estimates in required supplementary information accompanying their financial statements in their annual financial reports. In addition, data reported by agencies and included in the Federal Real Property Profile (FRPP)--a database overseen by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in coordination with agencies comprising the Federal Real Property Council (FRPC)--provides information that can be used to estimate an agency's backlog. FASAB and FRPP guidelines do not share a common definition of deferred maintenance, and an agency can make different determinations when reporting information in its financial reports and to FRPP, resulting in dissimilar backlog estimates. In addition, agencies use different methods to determine and report backlogs, making estimates across agencies not comparable. For example, Interior excludes, while DHS includes, costs for some assets scheduled for disposal. In 2011 and 2012, …

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced an increase to its immigration and naturalization application fees by an average of 86 percent, effective July 2007, contributing to a surge in application volume that challenged the agency's pre-adjudicative operations. In July 2007, the incoming application volume increased an unprecedented 100 percent over the prior month and the processing of 1.47 million applications was delayed. GAO was asked to review USCIS's current fee design and compare it to the principles in GAO's user-fee design guide and USCIS's management of operations affected by the new fees, specifically in projecting application volumes and contracting for application processing services. To do so, GAO reviewed legislation and agency documentation; compared the fee design to GAO's principles of effective user-fee design (equity, efficiency, revenue adequacy, and administrative burden); visited processing centers; and interviewed agency officials at these locations and in headquarters."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Implementation of financial regulatory reform is ongoing. Although regulators have made progress in implementing some key reforms required by the Dodd- Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (Dodd-Frank Act), others remain incomplete. Moreover, the effectiveness of some implemented reforms, as illustrated below, remains to be seen."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Millions of people in the United States and Canada depend on the Great Lakes for drinking water, recreation, and economic livelihood. During the 1970s, it became apparent that pollutants discharged into the Great Lakes Basin from point sources, such as industrial and municipal facilities, or from nonpoint sources, such as air emissions from power plants, were harming the Great Lakes. Some of these pollutants, known as bioaccumulative chemicals of concern (BCC), pose risks to fish and other species as well as to the humans and wildlife that consume them. In 1995, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued the Great Lakes Initiative (GLI). The GLI established water quality criteria to be used by states to establish pollutant discharge limits for some BCCs and other pollutants that are discharged by point sources. The GLI also allows states to include flexible permit implementation procedures (flexibilities) that allow facilities' discharges to exceed GLI criteria. This testimony is based on GAO's July 2005 report, Great Lakes Initiative: EPA Needs to Better Ensure the Complete and Consistent Implementation of Water Quality Standards (GAO-05-829) and updated information from EPA and the Great Lakes states. This …

Other written product issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The United States has long been one of the most desired higher education destinations for international students. Students from other countries bring needed skills to the increasingly knowledge-based U.S. economy, build bridges between the United States and their own countries, and make other valuable contributions. Yet recent trends and changes after September 11, 2001, have raised concerns about whether the United States will continue to attract an appropriate share of talented international students to its universities and to its workforce after they graduate. In order to better understand issues related to global competitiveness and international students, the Comptroller General convened selected national leaders and experts in September 2006 to discuss current trends in international student enrollment in the United States and abroad. Participants were asked to explore (1) what is known about the potential impact of these trends, (2) challenges the United States faces in attracting international students, and (3) policies and strategies the country can pursue to compete for international students while also maintaining the nation's security. Invitees to the forum included experts from government, universities, research institutions, higher education organizations, and industry."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is responsible for granting or denying immigration benefits to individuals. USCIS charges fees for the millions of immigration applications it receives each year to fund the cost of processing and adjudicating them. In February 2007, USCIS completed a study to determine the full costs of its operations and the level at which application fees should be set to recover those costs. USCIS's new fee schedule increased application fees by a weighted average of 86 percent. Almost 96 percent of USCIS's fiscal year 2008 budget of $2.6 billion was expected to have come from fees. GAO was asked to review the methodology USCIS used in its fee review and controls in place over collection and use of fees. In this report, GAO addresses the consistency of the methodology with federal accounting standards and principles and other guidance, including whether key assumptions and methods were sufficiently justified and documented. The report also addresses internal controls USCIS has in place over the collection and use of fees."

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In the fourth year of implementation of the Improper Payments Information Act of 2002 (IPIA), major executive branch agencies reported a total improper payment estimate of about $55 billion for fiscal year 2007. This increase from the prior year estimate of $41 billion was primarily attributable to a component of the Medicaid program reporting improper payments for the first time totaling about $13 billion for fiscal year 2007. We view this increased reporting as a positive step to improve transparency over the full magnitude of improper payments across the federal government. As Congress requested, the objective of this report is to provide summary data and preliminary analysis of the improper payment estimates reported by federal executive branch agencies (federal agencies) in their fiscal year 2007 performance and accountability reports (PAR) or annual reports."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "According to one report, at the end of 2004, some 70 million U.S. adults logged on to access the Internet during a typical day. As public use of the Internet grew from the mid-1990s onward, Internet access became a potential target for state and local taxation. In 1998, Congress imposed a moratorium temporarily preventing state and local governments from imposing new taxes on Internet access. Existing state and local taxes were grandfathered. In amending the moratorium in 2004, Congress required GAO to study its impact on state and local government revenues. This report's objectives are to determine the scope of the moratorium and its impact, if any, on state and local revenues. For this report, GAO reviewed the moratorium's language, its legislative history, and associated legal issues; examined studies of revenue impact; interviewed people knowledgeable about access services; and collected information about eight case study states not intended to be representative of other states. GAO chose the states considering such factors as whether they had taxes grandfathered for different forms of access services and covered different urban and rural parts of the country."