A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "In November 1997, the President called for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the Department of Defense (DOD) to create an interface that would allow the two agencies to share patient health information. By allowing health care providers to electronically share comprehensive patient information, computer-based patient record's (GCPR) should help VA, DOD, and the Indian Health Service (IHS) to improve the quality of care for their beneficiaries. But without a lead entity, a clear mission, and detailed planning to achieve that mission, it is difficult to monitor progress, identify project risks, and develop appropriate contingency plans to keep the project moving forward and on track. Critical project decisions were not made, and the agencies were not bound by those that were made. The VA and DOD Chief Information Officers' (CIO) action to focus on short-term deliverables and to capitalize on existing technologies is warranted and a step in the right direction. However, until problems with the two agencies' existing systems and issues regarding planning, management, and accountability are resolved, project costs will likely continue to increase and implementation of the larger GCPR effort--and its expected …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The District of Columbia is acquiring a new financial management system to improve its accountability over government expenditures. This report assesses the status of the District of Columbia's implementation of important components of this system, including its new core general ledger System of Accounting and Reporting (SOAR). GAO found that although the District is in its fourth year of implementing its new financial management system, essential elements of the system are not yet operational. Two components of SOAR have not been fully implemented: the budget module is on hold, and the fixed assets module is incomplete. The implementation of the systems that feed into SOAR--personnel and payroll, procurement, and tax--is incomplete and the systems lack electronic interfaces with SOAR. Because the financial management system is incomplete, much of the District's financial management and budget information is produced through cumbersome, manual processes and the extraordinary efforts of a few key staff. District officials need to take time to assess the current status of the city's financial system, to identify problems, and to establish a disciplined process to address these problems through the completion of its financial systems …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report discusses the facts surrounding the ability of the Clinton White House to preserve certain electronic mail (e-mail) deemed official government records. GAO found that two malfunctions occurred in the White House e-mail system that prevented official records from being properly recorded in the Automated Records Management System (ARMS). The first problem involved an anomaly with incoming Internet e-mail users of the "Mail2" e-mail server. The second problem surfaced while the contractor was trying the resolve the first problem. During its efforts to determine the cause of the Mail2 e-mail errors, the letter D was deleted from a key piece of software, causing the ARMS scanner to skip e-mail accounts of users with first names beginning with the letter D. The White House began a costly and time-consuming project to recover e-mail records that had not been effectively managed. Several factors contributed to the cost and scope of the tape restoration project, including the contractor's performance of tape management and systems maintenance and legal scrutiny of e-mail malfunctions by external authorities."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Army is acquiring a new, state-of-the-art radar countermeasures system--called the Suite of Integrated Radio Frequency Countermeasures to help helicopters and other aircraft identify, track, and defeat radar-guided missiles in complex electronic environments where many radar systems could be operating simultaneously. The Army has identified software and hardware modification needed for its new radar countermeasures system. The Army expects that future tests will enable it to determine whether the modified software performs as required before the planned low-rate initial production decision in early 2002. However, the testing of the modified hardware is not scheduled for completion until September 2002. By deferring low-rate initial production decision, the Army would reduce the risk of incurring anticipated costs to retrofit articles if the system does not work as expected."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO audited the financial statements of the Capitol Preservation Fund for fiscal years 2000 and 1999. GAO found that the financial statements were presented fairly in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, contained no material weaknesses in internal control over financial reporting (including safeguarding assets) and complied with the provisions of laws and regulations tested."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The use of incorrect or unreliable data and inappropriate assumptions in the Research and Special Program Administration's (RSPA) calculation of the minimum Pipeline Safety Fund (PSF) balance caused RSPA to overstate the necessary minimum balance. Crucial to a reasonable calculation of the PSF minimum balance is an analysis of expected receipts as compared to expected obligations. Until RSPA does this type of analysis, it will be unable to reasonably estimate the required minimum PSF balance. In addition, the timing of the Office of Pipeline Safety's (OPS) cash receipts is affected by OPS' slow data collection and verification process. This process results in delayed billings and likely delays cash receipts, resulting in a larger required minimum PSF balance. OPS' current efforts to implement a new Internet-based data collection and billing system could shorten what is now an extended billing process. Finalizing the operator data on which the fee assessments are based at an earlier date would allow billing to take place shortly after the agency received its appropriation for the fiscal year. Accordingly, fee revenue would likely be available for obligation in a more timely manner and …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Although the criteria used to rate the bonds of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and other electric utilities are the same, they are weighted differently and, as a result, the basis for TVA's bond rating is more nonfinancial in nature than that for other electric utilities. According to bond analysts, TVA's high bond rating is largely based on the perception that its debt is federally backed because of its ties to the federal government as a wholly owned government corporation and its legislative protections from competition. If these conditions were to change, TVA's bond rating would likely be lowered, which, in turn, would affect the cost of new debt. This would add to its already high interest expense and corresponding financial challenges in a competitive market."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) administers the Airport Improvement Program (AIP), which provides billions of dollars in federal grants to airports for planning and development projects. The total funds awarded by FAA was consistent with the total amount of AIP funds available for obligation for fiscal years 1996 through 2000. FAA also made available or awarded AIP grant funds in accordance with the statutory formulas and set-asides contained in the authorization acts for the five fiscal years reviewed. In some cases, FAA awarded more funding than required to some airports and projects when it distributed the remaining AIP discretionary funds, which are not subject to statutory formulas or set-asides. GAO also found that small airports received greater amounts than large airports."

Other written product issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Floyd D. Spence National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2001 (the Act) required that the Comptroller General of the United States convene a panel of experts to study the policies and procedures governing the transfer of commercial activities for the federal government from government personnel to a federal contractor. The Panel held a total of 11 meetings over the period of May 2001 to March 2002, including three public hearings in Washington, D.C., Indianapolis, Indiana, and San Antonio, Texas. In these hearings, panelists heard first-hand both about the current process, primarily the cost comparison process conducted under Office of Management and Budget Circular A-76, as well as alternatives to that process. Panel staff conducted an extensive amount of additional research, review, and analysis in order to supplement and evaluate the public testimony. This report includes the findings of the Panel as a whole, as well as a written statement from each Panel member as the Panel's report and recommendations."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) reported that a shortage of spare parts has caused a decline in the military services' readiness, particularly in aviation readiness. In response, Congress provided $1.1 billion in additional funding to purchase spare parts. According to DLA, shortages are a result of aging systems and high operational tempo, which increase the total number of spare parts required. The number of spare parts the military services ordered declined between 1996 and 2000, but the dollar value increased by 18 percent. Further, spare parts purchased were drawn from 70 of 78 stock groups. Defense officials told GAO that military downsizing was the primary reason for the decline and that credit card usage and contractor maintenance support also contributed. The reasons cited for the increase were (1) DLA shifts to a mix of more expensive spare parts and (2) price increases due to inaccurate initial price estimates, long periods between procurements, and substantial changes in the quantity of spare parts purchased."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Air Force expeditionary aerospace force concept seeks to spread deployments more evenly across its forces and increase the predictability of deployments. By dual-tasking some fighter squadrons the Air Force could fulfill two requirements as the 2010 Concept envisions. Although significant challenges could impede the ability to maximize these benefits, the Air Force has not specifically analyzed what is needed to implement dual-tasking by 2010. Dual-tasking would result in more efficient use of squadrons and greatly reduce the need to use squadrons for more than one 90-day deployment every 15 months. Dual-tasking would provide theater commanders with the same number of aircraft to meet requirements as under current practice; however, the aircraft would come from fewer squadrons. Because a larger proportion of a squadron's aircraft would be used to meet requirements, and because dual-tasking uses fewer squadrons to meet requirements, the need to repeatedly use the same squadrons would be reduced. The number of squadrons needed for more than one 90-day period over a 15-month period would decline from 26 squadrons to five. More training would be required under dual-tasking. Yet, the Air Force has not …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Education's Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA) administers more than $53 billion in financial aid for more than 8.1 million students. Since 1990, GAO has included student financial aid on its high-risk list. To address these and other long-standing management weaknesses, Congress established FSA as a performance-based organization (PBO) within Education in 1998. To develop and implement a strategic direction, FSA set three strategic goals, created indicators to measure progress toward these goals, and developed a tool to link employees' day-to-day activities to these goals. The goals are to (1) increase customer satisfaction, (2) increase employee satisfaction, and (3) reduce unit cost. FSA's efforts have generally improved customer and employee satisfaction scores. FSA has begun to implement some human capital practices to better organize its services and manage its employees. But gaps exist, and FSA has not yet implemented performance management initiatives to develop and assess its employees. To better serve customers, FSA reorganized to reflect its different customers--students, schools, and financial partners. To encourage accountability, FSA is linking staff bonuses to FSA's strategic goals. Education continues to clarify FSA's level of independence …

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The national school lunch and breakfast programs provide inexpensive or free meals to more than 27 million children each day. During the 1990s, nearly 300 outbreaks of foodborne illness at the nation's schools sickened 16,000 students. The rise in the number of school outbreaks mirrors a rise in the number of outbreaks in the overall population, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Because the CDC data include outbreaks attributable to food brought from home or other sources, GAO could not determine the extent to which food served in the school meal programs caused reported outbreaks. Data from 1998 and 1999 do show, however, that most of the outbreaks during those years were caused by foods served through the school meal program. Foods contaminated with salmonella and Norwalk-like viruses were the most common causes of outbreaks. GAO found that the Department of Agriculture has not developed security measures to protect foods served at schools from deliberate contamination. The existing food safety system is a patchwork of protections that fall short in addressing existing and emerging food safety threats."

A statement of record issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This testimony discusses group purchasing organizations (GPO) for medical devices and supplies used in hospitals. By pooling the purchases of their member hospitals, these specialized firms negotiate lower prices from vendors. GAO found that a hospital's use of a GPO contract did not guarantee that the hospital saved money: GPOs' prices were not always lower and were often higher than prices paid by hospitals negotiating directly with vendors. GAO studied price savings with respect to: (1) whether hospitals using GPO contracts received better prices than hospitals that did their own contracting, (2) the size of the hospital, and (3) size of the GPO. This data raises questions about whether GPOs, specially large GPOs, achieve consistent price savings."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Since the early 1970's, the federal government has provided a large share of the nation's capital investment in urban mass transportation. Much of this funding has come through the Federal Transit Administration's (FTA) New Starts Program, which helps pay for rail, bus, and trolley projects. The Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century authorized about $6 billion in "guaranteed" funding for the New Starts program through fiscal year 2003. FTA's evaluation process assigns candidate projects individual ratings for project justification and local financial commitments. The process also assigns an overall rating intended to reflect the project's merit. FTA recommended four projects for funding commitments for fiscal year 2003 in its New Starts report and budget proposal. FTA evaluated 50 proposed projects for fiscal year 2003 and developed ratings for 31 of them. Twenty-seven of these projects were rated as "highly recommended" or "recommended." Although FTA has faced transit budget crunches for years, the agency will end the act's authorization period with $310 million in unused commitment authority. Proposals to limit the amount of New Starts funds would allow more projects to receive such funding, but could …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Rigorous, realistic training is key to military readiness. All U.S. military forces conduct frequent training exercises to hone and maintain their war-fighting skills. Combat units stationed outside the continental United States are able to meet many of their training requirements but face constraints in such areas as (1) maneuver operations, (2) live ordnance practice, and (3) night and low altitude flying. Training constraints cause adverse effects, including (1) requiring workarounds that can breed bad habits affecting combat performance; (2) requiring military personnel to be away from home more often; and (3) preventing training from being accomplished. To address these concerns, military commands and services are negotiating with host governments to lessen restrictions on existing training areas, but such actions are often done at an individual-service level and sometimes create unforeseen problems for other services and for existing training capabilities."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The tremendous outpouring of charitable donations in response to September 11 has raised concerns about whether some charities are spending too much on fundraising and management and too little on the charitable purposes related to their tax-exempt status. GAO found that Form 990 expense data is inadequate for public oversight purposes because charities have considerable discretion in recording their expenses when it comes to fundraising, management, and charitable services. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) lacks data on the type and extent of possible compliance issues among charities. Moreover, IRS oversight of charities suffers from a lack of results-oriented goals and strategies. Concerns have also been raised that IRS's resources have not kept pace with the growth in the charitable sector, and some measures suggest that available resources may not be used as effectively as in the past. State officials consider inadequate the charity data IRS shares with them. IRS does not proactively share some data that states are permitted to receive, such as denials and revocations of charities' tax-exempt status. Federal law prohibits sharing some data that state officials believe would be valuable, such as the …

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Veterans Equitable Resource Allocation (VERA) system allocated $17.8 billion of its $20.3 billion health care budget to 22 regional health care networks in fiscal year 2001. Before Vera resources were allocated to facilities on the basis of their historical expenditures. By aligning resources with workloads VERA shifted about$921 million among VA's networks in fiscal year 2001. VERA's design is reasonable for equitably allocating resources, but improvements could better allocate comparable resources for comparable workloads. VERA's allocations are based primarily on network workload, with adjustments made for factors beyond the control of network management. These include the health care needs of veterans and some local cost differences. VERA's design also protects patients from the effects of network budget shortfalls. However, GAO found that $200 million annually that could be reallocated to better align network resources with workloads. First, VERA's measurement of network workload is not accurate enough to determine each network's allocation because VERA excludes most veterans with higher incomes who do not have service-connected disabilities--about one-fifth of VA's workload. Second, VERA does not accurately adjust for cost differences among networks for differences in patients' health care needs …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) nonintegrated financial management systems have weakened its ability to oversee its contractors, and its contract management has been on GAO's high-risk list since 1990. In April 2000, NASA began its Integrated Financial Management Program (IFMP), its third attempt in recent years at modernizing financial management processes and systems. GAO was asked to review whether NASA was following key best practices in acquiring IFMP components and implementing one of the first components--the core financial module."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Since 1997, federal spending on services has grown 11 percent and now represents more than 60 percent of contract spending governmentwide. Several significant changes in the government--including funding for homeland security--are expected to further increase spending on services. Adjusting to this new environment has proven difficult. Agencies need to improve in a number of areas: sustaining executive leadership, strengthening the acquisition workforce, and encouraging innovative contracting approaches. Improving these areas is a key goal of the proposed Services Acquisition Reform Act (SARA)."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "As of January 2003, Congress had provided a total of $38 billion to the Department of Defense (DOD) to cover emergency response costs related to the war on terrorism. Appropriated in different ways in fiscal years 2001, 2002, and 2003, these funds are meant to pay for expenses that DOD would not normally incur, such as contingency military operations and Pentagon building repairs. Because our prior work raised questions about DOD's oversight of contingency fund spending, GAO was asked to review DOD's management of emergency response funds, specifically: (1) DOD's adherence to OMB guidance in managing funds and the sufficiency of DOD's guidance on the use of these funds, and (2) DOD's ability to track the use of emergency response funds in general. We limited our review of DOD's guidance to the initial funds placed in the Defense Emergency Response Fund. We did not verify the accuracy of the data contained in DOD's obligation reports or the appropriateness of individual expenditures."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Between 1987 and 2002, the Department of Defense (DOD) downsized the civilian workforce in 27 key industrial facilities by about 56 percent. Many of the remaining 72,000 workers are nearing retirement. In recent years GAO has identified shortcomings in DOD's strategic planning and was asked to determine (1) whether DOD has implemented our prior recommendation to develop and implement a depot maintenance strategic plan, (2) the extent to which the services have developed and implemented comprehensive strategic workforce plans, and (3) what challenges adversely affect DOD's workforce planning."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The federal government, comprised of more than 60 agencies and nearly 1.7 million civilian workers, acquires most of its goods and services through contracts. Recent changes in what the government buys, its contracting approaches and methods, and its acquisition workforce have combined to create a dynamic acquisition environment. Many of these recent changes enhance contracting efficiency and offer a number of benefits, such as reduced administrative burdens. However, GAO's past work has found that if these changes are not accompanied by proper training, guidance, and internal controls, agency procurements may be at greater risk. While effectively managing contracts is always a key management responsibility, this responsibility is more acute in those agencies that rely heavily on acquisitions to accomplish their missions. The goal of this report is to identify for Congress, the administration, and accountability organizations those procurement-related trends and challenges that may affect federal agencies. Specifically, GAO analyzed recent federal procurement patterns, the use of various procurement methods, and changes in the acquisition workforce."

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The five Great Lakes, which comprise the largest system of freshwater in the world, are threatened on many environmental fronts. To address the extent of progress made in restoring the Great Lakes Basin, which includes the lakes and surrounding area, GAO (1) identified the federal and state environmental programs operating in the basin and funding devoted to them, (2) evaluated the restoration strategies used and how they are coordinated, and (3) assessed overall environmental progress made in the basin restoration effort."