Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "On April 8, GAO testified before the Subcommittee on Civil Service and Agency Reform, House Committee on Government Reform and the Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce, and the District of Columbia, Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs at a hearing on "The Human Capital Challenge: Offering Solutions and Delivering Results". This letter responds to requests from Chairman Voinovich, Chairwoman Davis, and Senator Carper that we provide answers to follow-up questions from the hearing."

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The General Accounting Office has completed a review of selected agencies' compliance with veterans' preference and the "Rule of 3" in federal hiring. This review was requested by Congressman Lane Evans, Ranking Minority Member of the House Committee on Veterans Affairs, and Senator Tom Daschle. As agreed with the requesters, because of continuing oversight of agencies' delegated examining units (DEU) and ongoing review of veterans' preference, we are providing the results of our review for possible follow-up. The requesters specifically asked us to review the results of job announcements for fiscal year 2001 for five selected agency personnel offices in the Washington Metropolitan Area: the National Aeronautics Space Administration (NASA) headquarters, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) and the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). As agreed with the requesters, we reviewed: (1) advertised full-time positions (both permanent and temporary) at the GS-7,9,11,13, and 15 levels as identified by the selected agency, (2) the use of multiple certificates in filling these positions, (3) the resulting certificates of eligibilities, including how often veterans headed these certificates and were …

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense (DOD) spent about $93 billion in fiscal year 2002 to acquire various types of services, such as base operations, logistical support, and information technology. To achieve greater cost savings and better outcomes when agencies acquire these and other services, Congress and the executive branch have encouraged greater use of performance-based contracting. Performance-based contracts specify the desired outcomes and allow the contractors to determine how best to achieve those outcomes, rather than prescribe the methods contractors should use. In October 2000, Congress sought to provide an incentive for the use of performance-based contracts through legislation giving DOD temporary authority to treat certain performance-based service contracts as contracts for commercial items. Contracts for commercial items may be awarded using streamlined procedures under Part 12 of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR). This authority is scheduled to expire in October 2003. As required by the October 2000 legislation, we reviewed DOD's implementation of the temporary authority, including the interim and final implementing regulations, public comments on the interim regulation, and other DOD documents. We also discussed with DOD officials the extent to which the authority had been used. …

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) is a retirement savings and investment plan for federal employees, governed by the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board (Board). The TSP is a defined contribution retirement plan available to eligible federal employees. The TSP had about 2.6 million participants and held about $100.6 billion in Net Assets Available for Benefits as of December 31, 2001, and about 3 million participants and $102.3 billion in Net Assets Available for Benefits as of December 31, 2002. In 1997, the Board awarded a contract to American Management Systems, Inc. (AMS) to develop and implement a new record-keeping system for the TSP. In 2001, after several implementation delays, the Board terminated the contract, and the Board's former Executive Director filed a lawsuit against the contractor on behalf of the TSP. On June 20, 2003, 2 days after we provided a draft of this report to the Board for its review, a settlement between the parties was reached. Then, on June 23, 2003, the net unrecovered cost from the system development failure was allocated to participant account balances as recommended in our draft report. While the loss has …

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This testimony discusses the results of our review and assessment of bankruptcy court-weighted case filings, the workload measure the Judicial Conference first considers in assessing the need for additional bankruptcy judgeships. Weighted filings are a statistical measure of the estimated judge time that specific types of bankruptcy cases are expected to take. Congress asked us to assess whether weighted case filings are a reasonable means of measuring bankruptcy judges' case-related workload and to assess the methodology of any proposal to update the current case weights."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "With the aging of the veteran population, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is likely to see a significant increase in long-term care need. VA uses noninstitutional long-term care services, such as home health care and adult day health care, and institutional care to meet this need. GAO identified limits in veterans' access to six noninstitutional long-term care services and factors that contribute to these limitations in its report VA Long-Term Care: Service Gaps and Facility Restrictions Limit Veterans' Access to Noninstitutional Care (GAO-03-487, May 9, 2003). The report is based, in part, on a survey of all 139 VA facilities. Today's testimony discusses conclusions and highlights recommendations GAO made in the report to improve access to VA noninstitutional long-term care services."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "It is important to ensure that longterm spending on transportation programs meets the goals of increasing mobility and improving transportation safety. In this testimony, GAO discusses what recently completed work on four transportation programs suggests about challenges and strategies for improving the oversight and use of taxpayer funds. These four programs are (1) the federal-aid highway program, administered by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA); (2) highway safety programs, administered by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA); (3) the New Starts program, administered by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA); and (4) the Essential Air Service (EAS) program, administered out of the Office of the Secretary of Transportation. Differences in the structure of these programs have contributed to the challenges they illustrate. The federal-aid highway program uses formulas to apportion funds to the states, the highway safety programs use formulas and grants, the New Starts program uses competitive grants, and the EAS program provides subsidies. For each program, GAO describes in general how the program illustrates a particular challenge in managing or overseeing long-term spending and in particular what challenges and strategies for addressing the challenges GAO and others …

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The federal government invests over $11 billion in early childhood education and care programs. These programs exist to ensure that children from low-income families are better prepared to enter school and that their parents have access to early childhood education and care that allow them to obtain and maintain employment. The federal government invests more in Head Start, which was funded at $6.5 billion in fiscal year 2002, than any other early childhood education and care program. Head Start has served over 21 million children at a total cost of $66 billion since it began. The Chairman, Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions asked GAO to discuss Head Start--how it fits within the array of early childhood education and care programs available to low-income children and their families and what is known about its effectiveness."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "From 1975 through 2002, annual traffic fatalities decreased from 44,525 to 42,850, while the rate of fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles traveled decreased from 3.35 to 1.51. However, decreases in fatalities have leveled off since the early 1990s. Since 1999, the number of alcohol-related fatalities has risen. In 1998, the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century funded a series of highway safety programs. These programs, administered by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), increased funding to the states for activities designed to encourage, among other things, the use of seat belts and to prevent drinking and driving. The states establish highway safety goals and initiate projects to help reach those goals. NHTSA provides advice, training, and technical assistance to states and can use management reviews and improvement plans as tools to help monitor and strengthen the states' performance. This testimony is based on two recent GAO reports that discuss the causes of motor vehicle crashes and related research, provide highway saftey trend data and information on federal highway safety funds and the states' uses of those funds, and review NHTSA's oversight of state highway safety …

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether statutory county court judges in Denton County are entitled to receive benefit replacement pay as part of their annual compensation (RQ-0576-JC)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Assessment of costs and proper electorate for a proposal under chapter 253 of the Transportation Code that a county improve a road in a subdivision (RQ-0577-JC)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Effect of certain annexations on the extraterritorial jurisdiction of the City of San Antonio (RQ-0580-JC)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether the Employees Retirement System and the Teacher Retirement System must pay a share of the state employee workers' compensation claims costs allocated under Labor Code section 412.0123 (RQ-0001-GA)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, Greg Abbott, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether a county jail inmate may be employed privately by county jail personnel (RQ-0053-GA)

Transcript of the second public hearing held by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States held May 22, 2003 at the Hart Senate Office Building in Washington, D.C. This hearing addresses four topics, which include the commission mandate and objectives, intelligence oversight and the joint inquiry, affected constituencies, and the state of civil aviation security on September 11th.

Interview with Charles Albright, a U.S. veteran who served as part of the 69th Engineering Topographical Company during the Korean War. The transcript includes a brief list of questions with Albright's answers about his impressions while serving.

Interview with Antonio Amador, a veteran who was wounded in action as a sniper with the U.S. Marine Corps during the Vietnam War. The transcript includes a list of questions, which include a focus on Amador being shot and his experiences while serving and back at home.

Interview with Bernard Kubica, a crew chief in the US Marine Corps during the Vietnam War. He answers questions about his life prior to military service and his experiences overseas.

Interview with Gary Anderson, a veteran of the U.S. Army National Guard from Wausau, Wisconsin. The transcript includes a list of questions about Anderson's time as a medic in the late 1970s in Baltimore and Houston, where he was part of the 389th Transportation Battalion, as well as his opinions on Desert Storm and September 11th.

Interview with Luther Victory, an aerial gunner and POW for the US Air Force during WWII. He describes life in the military and being captured by the Germans.

The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an interview with Daryl Haerther. Haerther joined the Army in 1944 and was assigned to the 96th Infantry Division a few days after the beginning of the invasion of Okinawa. He was assigned to A Company, 383rd Infantry Regiment. While there, Haerther qualified as a medic and shares several anecdotes from his combat experiences. Eventaully, Haerther was wounded and evacuated to Guam. He was still in the hospital when the war ended and Haerther elected to be discharged in December 1945. Haerther indicates he continues to struggle later in life as a result of some of his combat experiences.

The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an interview with Charles Mellon. Mellon joined the Army in March of 1944. He was assigned to the 314th Infantry Regiment, 79th Infantry Division, and participated in active duty through France and into the Siegfried Line in December. They continued their combat duty into Germany, and served on occupation duty after the war ended. Mellon returned to the US and was discharged in October of 1945.

News release about the reduction or elimination of several DART bus routes and corresponding adjustments to the frequency of DART and the T rail services, due to dropping ridership rates.

News release about the reduction or elimination of several DART bus routes and corresponding adjustments to the frequency of DART and the T rail services, due to dropping ridership rates.