A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 directs the Department of the Interior (Interior) to manage lands for multiple uses while also taking any action to prevent "unnecessary or undue degradation" of the land. To do this, Interior's Bureau of Land Management (BLM), among other things, requires oil and gas operators to reclaim the land they disturb and post a bond to help ensure they do so. Despite these requirements, not all operators perform reclamation. If the bond is not sufficient to cover well plugging and surface reclamation and there are no responsible or liable parties, the well is considered "orphaned," and BLM uses federal dollars to fund reclamation. The 12 western states where most oil and gas production occurs and other Interior agencies also require bonds to ensure reclamation. GAO was asked to (1) determine the number, value, and coverage of bonds held by BLM for oil and gas operations; (2) determine the amount that BLM has paid to reclaim orphaned wells over the past 20 years and the number of orphaned wells BLM has identified but has not yet reclaimed; and (3) …

Correspondence issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The Department of Defense (DOD) relies on thousands of suppliers to ensure it has the weapons and supporting equipment needed to meet U.S. national security objectives. Congress has provided DOD with a variety of authorities to allow it to maintain information on its suppliers and to take actions to ensure that its suppliers can deliver needed items. In October 2008, we reported on our assessment of DOD's efforts to monitor the health of its supplier base and identify and address gaps and recommended that DOD develop a departmentwide framework and consistent approach, which DOD has begun to implement. In light of increased globalization in the defense industry and consolidation of the defense supplier base into a few prime contractors, Congress requested that we review DOD's efforts to assess supplier-base availability for future defense needs."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The federal government invests in the education of children, in part, to help ensure that the United States has a well-educated and skilled workforce to compete in the global marketplace. The federal government accounts for about nine percent of the total investment in K-12 education, with state and local sources covering the rest. Over the last two decades there have been a number of efforts to catalogue and determine how much is spent on federal education programs. However, because education programs are administered by agencies throughout the federal government, and there is no standard definition of a federal education program, there currently is no single source that legislators and policymakers can refer to for an accounting of federal education programs. To address Congressional interest in these issues, we answered the following questions: (1) What is the federal expenditure on K-12 and early childhood education programs? (2) What are the characteristics of these programs? (3) To what extent have these programs completed evaluations?"

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The December 25, 2009, attempted bombing of flight 253 raised questions about the federal government's ability to protect the homeland and secure the commercial aviation system. This statement focuses on the government's efforts to use the terrorist watchlist to screen individuals and determine if they pose a threat, and how failures in this process contributed to the December 25 attempted attack. This statement also addresses the Transportation Security Administration's (TSA) planned deployment of technologies for enhanced explosive detection and the challenges associated with this deployment. GAO's comments are based on products issued from September 2006 through October 2009 and selected updates in January 2010. For these updates, GAO reviewed government reports related to the December 25 attempted attack and obtained information from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and TSA on use of the watchlist and new technologies for screening airline passengers."

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), whose reauthorization is the subject of today's hearing, plays a vital role in advancing transportation safety by investigating accidents, determining their causes, issuing safety recommendations, and conducting safety studies. To support the agency's mission, NTSB's Training Center provides training to NTSB investigators and others. NTSB's 2006 reauthorization legislation mandates an annual review by GAO, and from 2006 through 2008, GAO made 21 recommendations to NTSB that address its management, information technology (IT), accident investigation criteria, safety studies, and Training Center use. This testimony addresses NTSB's progress in implementing GAO's recommendations that it (1) follow leading management practices, (2) conduct aspects of its accident investigations and safety studies more efficiently, and (3) increase the use of its Training Center. The testimony also discusses (4) changes NTSB seeks in its 2010 reauthorization proposal. This testimony is based on GAO's assessment from July 2009 to January 2010 of plans and procedures NTSB developed to address these recommendations. NTSB provided technical comments that GAO incorporated as appropriate."