A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The National Strategy for Homeland Security calls for preventing the entry of foreign terrorists into our country and using all legal means to identify; halt; and, where appropriate, prosecute or bring immigration or other civil charges against terrorists in the United States. GAO reported in October 2002 that the Department of State had revoked visas of certain persons after it learned they might be suspected terrorists, raising concerns that some of these individuals may have entered the United States before or after State's action. Congressional requesters asked GAO to (1) identify the policies and procedures of State, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) that govern their respective visa revocation actions and (2) determine the effectiveness of the process."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Each year, the Department of Defense (DOD) spends billions of dollars to house unmarried junior enlisted servicemembers, primarily in military barracks. Over the next several years, the Army, Navy, and Air Force plan to spend about $6 billion to eliminate barracks with multi-person bathroom facilities and provide private sleeping rooms for all permanent party members. Given the cost of the program, GAO looked at (1) the status of efforts to examine the potential for private sector financing, ownership, operation, and maintenance of military barracks; (2) the opportunity to reduce the construction costs of barracks through widespread use of residential construction practices; and (3) whether opportunities exist to make better use of existing barracks."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The transfer of technology from government-funded medical research laboratories to the private sector aims to have new pharmaceuticals brought to market more efficiently than would be possible for a federal agency acting alone. Much of the pharmaceutical-related technology transfer originates with research funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). GAO was asked to examine the legal and financial issues involved in technology transfers as illustrated by the research, development, and commercialization of Taxol. Taxol was developed through a cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA) between NIH and the Bristol-Meyers Squibb Company (BMS) and by 2001 had become the best-selling cancer drug in history. Specifically, GAO examined (1) how the technology transfer partnership affected the research and development of Taxol, (2) what NIH's financial investment was in Taxol-related research, and what the financial outcomes were of the technology transfer process related to Taxol, and (3) what factors influenced how NIH exercised its authority in Taxol-related technology transfer activities. GAO reviewed relevant materials and statutes governing technology transfer, reviewed the patent history of Taxol, interviewed NIH and BMS officials, and reviewed data on NIH's financial investment and …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Privacy Act regulates how federal agencies may use the personal information that individuals supply when obtaining government services or fulfilling obligations--for example, applying for a small business loan or paying taxes. GAO was asked to review, among other things, agency compliance with the Privacy Act and related guidance from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The fees and other costs that investors pay as part of owning mutual fund shares can significantly affect their investment returns. As a result, questions have been raised as to whether the disclosures of mutual fund fees and other practices are sufficiently transparent. GAO reviewed (1) how mutual funds disclose their fees and related trading costs and options for improving these disclosures, (2) changes in how mutual funds pay for the sale of fund shares and how the changes in these practices are affecting investors, and (3) the benefits of and the concerns over mutual funds' use of soft dollars."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "After the events of September 11, 2001 led to the defeat of the Taliban, the United States and the international community developed an assistance program to support Afghanistan's new government and its people. Key components of this effort include food and agricultural assistance. GAO was asked to assess (1) the impact, management, and support of food assistance to Afghanistan and (2) the impact and management of agricultural assistance to Afghanistan, as well as obstacles to achieving food security and political stability."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO audited the financial statements of the Capital Preservation Fund for fiscal years 2002 and 2001. GAO found that the financial statements (1) were presented fairly in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, (2) contained no material weaknesses in internal control over financial reporting and compliance with laws and regulations, and (3) complied with the provisions of laws and regulations tested."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "A 1981 U.S. District Court decision found that the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) had discriminated against African American special agents in a number of personnel practices. Over the years, the plaintiffs and DEA had agreed to remedies in many of these areas. However, minority representatives continued to raise issues in three areas--hiring, promotion, and discipline. GAO was asked to examine DEA's current processes for hiring, promoting, and disciplining special agents, and provide information about racial, ethnicity, and gender differences in these three areas."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Pursuant to legislative direction, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), now part of the Department of Homeland Security, plans to acquire and deploy an entry exit system to assist in monitoring the flow of foreign nationals in and out of the United States. By separate legislative direction, INS must submit to the Senate and House Committees on Appropriations a plan for this system that meets certain conditions, including being reviewed by GAO, before funds can be obligated. This report satisfies GAO's mandated review obligation by (1) addressing whether the plan submitted by INS, along with related INS documentation and plans, meets required conditions and (2) providing observations about the plan and INS's management of the system."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Law enforcement use of closed-circuit television (CCTV) as a tool to fight crime and terrorism has become more prevalent over time. Civil liberties advocates have raised privacy concerns about its use. This report describes (1) the Metropolitan Police Department's and the United States Park Police's implementation of CCTV to monitor public spaces in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area such as the National Mall and (2) the management controls they established to address privacy concerns. GAO also identified experiences of selected CCTV users that provide insights to help ensure the proper CCTV use."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense's (DOD) annual appropriation totals billions of dollars for spare parts. In addition, it has received supplemental funding totaling $1.5 billion since fiscal year 1999 to increase the availability of spare parts. However, DOD continues to experience critical spare parts shortages that impact military readiness. GAO examined whether (1) DOD's logistics strategic plan addresses the mitigation of critical spare parts shortages that adversely affect readiness, (2) DOD's logistics initiatives are likely to mitigate spare parts shortages that affect readiness, and (3) DOD has the ability to identify the effect of increased investments for spare parts on readiness."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The ongoing transition (or restructuring) of electricity markets from regulated monopolies to competitive markets is one of the largest single industrial reorganizations in the history of the world. While information is becoming more critical for understanding how well restructuring is working, there are troubling indications that some market participants deliberately misreported information to manipulate prices. GAO was asked to describe (1) the electricity information collected, used, and shared by key federal agencies in meeting their primary responsibilities and (2) the effect of restructuring on these federal agencies' collection, use, and sharing of this information."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The southern Africa food crisis threatened 15.3 million people in six countries (Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zambia, and Zimbabwe) with famine. GAO was asked to look at (1) factors that contributed to the crisis, (2) how well the populations' needs were met, (3) obstacles to the food aid effort, and (4) challenges to emerging from crisis."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense (DOD) uses contractors to provide a wide variety of services for U.S. military forces deployed overseas. We were asked to examine three related issues: (1) the extent of contractor support for deployed forces and why DOD uses contractors; (2) the extent to which such contractors are considered in DOD planning, including whether DOD has backup plans to maintain essential services to deployed forces in case contractors can no longer provide the services; and (3) the adequacy of DOD's guidance and oversight mechanisms in managing overseas contractors efficiently."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Over the past several years, large increases in medical malpractice insurance premium rates have raised concerns that physicians will no longer be able to afford malpractice insurance and will be forced to curtail or discontinue providing certain services. Additionally, a lack of profitability has led some large insurers to stop selling medical malpractice insurance, furthering concerns that physicians will not be able to obtain coverage. To help Congress better understand the reasons behind the rate increases, GAO undertook a study to (1) describe the extent of the increases in medical malpractice insurance rates, (2) analyze the factors that contributed to those increases, and (3) identify changes in the medical malpractice insurance market that might make this period of rising premium rates different from previous such periods."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) needs up-to-date information on voluntary compliance in order to assess and improve its programs. IRS's last detailed study of voluntary compliance was done in the late 1980s, so the compliance information IRS is using today is not current. IRS is now carrying out the National Research Program (NRP), through which IRS auditors are reviewing about 47,000 randomly selected tax year 2001 individual tax returns. In June 2002, GAO reported that NRP was necessary, that its design was sound, and that it appeared to meet IRS's goals of acquiring useful compliance data while minimizing burden on taxpayers with returns in the sample. GAO was asked to review IRS's implementation of NRP. GAO reviewed IRS's method of gathering internal and third-party data (casebuilding) and IRS's process of reviewing casebuilding materials to determine if audits are necessary (classification) and assessed IRS's plans to ensure consistent data collection while minimizing burden on taxpayers."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Small businesses, which are important to the U.S. economy for their roles in job creation and technological development, must be able to protect and profit from their innovations. One way to protect their innovations on a global basis is to obtain U.S. and foreign patents. These businesses, however, face numerous impediments when trying to patent their goods or processes abroad. These impediments, which GAO identified in a July 2002 report, include high costs, limited resources, and limited knowledge among small businesses about foreign patent laws and systems. Because of concern that small businesses, particularly high technology firms, were not obtaining patent protection abroad and thus were losing potential sales in foreign markets, GAO was asked to (1) identify the factors that patent law experts believe small businesses should consider as they decide whether to seek patent protection abroad and provide information on how small businesses viewed these factors and (2) identify the steps that small businesses should take to improve their foreign patent efforts, according to our survey of patent law experts."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Ninety-three U.S. Attorneys serve 94 judicial districts (the same U.S. Attorney serves the District of Guam and the District of the Northern Mariana Islands) under the direction of the Attorney General. Among other things, the Attorney General expects U.S. Attorneys to lead or be involved with the community in preventing and controlling crime including efforts to secure Department of Justice (DOJ) grant funds and work with grantees. This report provides information about the guidance U.S. Attorneys are given in carrying out their responsibilities with regard to DOJ grants. It makes recommendations to assess compliance with guidance and to reduce the potential for conflicts of interest."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense (DOD) and its military services are responsible for complying with a broad range of environmental laws and other requirements that apply to the lands they manage, including more than 425 major military installations covering about 25 million acres across the United States. Through its environmental quality program, DOD spends about $2 billion per year to comply with these requirements. Although the services have made significant improvements in environmental management in recent years, DOD has not reached full environmental compliance. In response to the Senate Armed Services Committee's report on the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002, we assessed how DOD and the services identify, prioritize, and fund their environmental quality activities to determine whether the most important and appropriate activities are funded."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Despite reporting $10.5 billion in appropriations spent on spare parts since fiscal year 2000, the Air Force continues to report shortages of spare parts. The service has taken numerous actions to address these shortages. GAO examined whether the Air Force's strategic plan addresses the mitigation of spare parts shortages, whether key initiatives are likely to mitigate the shortages, and the impact on readiness identified from increased investments for spare parts."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Home and community-based settings have become a growing part of states' Medicaid long-term care programs, serving as an alternative to care in institutional settings, such as nursing homes. To cover such services, however, states often obtain waivers from certain federal statutory requirements. GAO was asked to review (1) trends in states' use of Medicaid home and community-based service (HCBS) waivers, particularly for the elderly, (2) state quality assurance approaches, including available data on the quality of care provided to elderly individuals through waivers, and (3) the adequacy of federal oversight of state waivers. GAO is recommending that the Administrator of CMS take steps to (1) better ensure that state quality assurance efforts are adequate to protect the health and welfare of HCBS waiver beneficiaries, and (2) strengthen federal oversight of the growing HCBS waiver programs. Although CMS raised certain concerns about aspects of the report, such as the respective state and federal roles in quality assurance and the potential need for additional federal oversight resources, CMS generally concurred with the recommendations."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Minority employees at the EPA reported for a number of years that the agency had discriminated against them based on their race and retaliated against them for filing complaints. These issues were aired at hearings held by the House Committee on Science at which EPA said it would take actions to ensure a fair and discrimination free workplace. GAO was asked to review (1) the accuracy of EPA's equal employment opportunity (EEO) data, (2) various issues about the processes used to resolve discrimination complaints, and (3) the disciplinary actions taken for managers who discriminate."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Concern about the implications of the Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA) debt on its future competitiveness prompted Representative Richard Baker to ask GAO to determine TVA's planned and actual use of nontraditional financing arrangements (which, to date, has consisted primarily of lease-leaseback arrangements), who is at risk under TVA's lease-leaseback arrangements, and whether TVA's accounting for the lease-leaseback arrangements complies with applicable standards and requirements."

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Department of Defense (DOD) spending on service contracts approaches $100 billion annually, but DOD's management of services procurement is inefficient and ineffective and the dollars are not always well spent. Recent legislation requires DOD to improve procurement practices to achieve savings. Many private companies changed management practices based on analyzing spending patterns and coordinating procurement in order to achieve major savings. This report evaluates five companies' best practices and their conduct and use of "spend analysis" and the extent that DOD can pursue similar practices."