General Accounting Office's GAO report, Emerging Benefits from Selected Agencies' Use of Performance Agreements, centered on the implementation of performance agreements in three agencies - Veterans Health Administration, the Department of Transportation, and the Office of Student Financial Assistance within the Department of Education. Each agency uses performance agreements to...
Attorney General Shurtleff quotes the U.S. General Accounting Office as estimating about 750,000 Internet fraud complaints nationally in 2002, at a loss of over $1 thousand-million. Shurtleff acknowledges that even one person with evil intent can cause untold millions of dollars in damages. Recently, Shurtleff was appointed by the National...
SEVILLE, Spain (Reuters) - The head of European aerospace group EADS EAD said on Thursday he was committed to sustaining a deal to supply mid-air tankers to the U.S. Air Force after auditors upheld a challenge by rival Boeing BA. Washington's General Accounting...
Small businesses are disproportionately burdened by a law that requires public companies to prove they've got adequate controls in place to prevent accounting mistakes, a Government Accountability Office report found. The report comes two days before a roundtable meeting, to be hosted by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the...
The Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im) provides loans, loan guarantees, and insurance to support U.S. exports. Its level of support for small business has been a long-standing issue of congressional interest. Most recently in 2002, Congress increased the proportion of financing Ex-Im must make available for small business to 20 percent. GAO...
Since 2002, employer spending on benefits has shot up faster than wages, with the rise largely fueled by the rising costs of health insurance and retirement benefits. Since productivity growth won't support the rising cost of health-care and other benefits, the entire "Employer-sponsored system of benefits in its current form...
The Chairman, Committee on Veterans' Affairs, U.S. House of Representatives, asked GAO to report on the claims processing challenges and opportunities facing the Department of Veterans Affairs VA disability compensation and pension program. VA's outdated disability determination process does not reflect a current view of the relationship between impairments and...
This paper consist of a document which reports that the Secretary of the Treasury, in coordination with the Director of the Office of Management and Budget OMB, is required to annually prepare and submit audited financial statements of the U.S. government to the President and Congress. GAO was asked to...
The Chairman, former Chairman, and Ranking Minority Member, Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs asked GAO to review the Veterans Benefits Administration's VBA efforts to realign its compensation and pension claims processing field structure to improve performance. This report identifies the actions VBA has taken to realign its compensation and pension...
The radio-frequency spectrum is a natural resource used to provide an array of wireless communications services, such as television broadcasting, which are critical to the U.S. economy and national security. In 1993, the Congress gave the Federal Communications Commission FCC authority to use competitive bidding, or auctions, to assign spectrum...
To address homeland defense needs and comply with government direction that agencies use the electromagnetic spectrum more efficiently, the Department of Defense DOD is deploying new Land Mobile Radios to military installations across the country. The new Land Mobile Radios operate in the same frequency range of 380 Megahertz MHz...
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration FMCSA is responsible for improving commercial vehicle safety and uses education and outreach as part of its efforts. The House report accompanying the fiscal year 2005 Department of Transportation DOT appropriations bill asked GAO to report on FMCSA's education and outreach programs to the...
Inflammatory Bowel Disease IBD affects an estimated one million Americans. IBD patients often have difficulty digesting food. As a result, they may require parenteral nutrition intravenous feeding or enteral nutrition tube feeding, medically necessary food products to supplement their diets, and medications. The Research Review Act of 2004 directed GAO...
The Department of Homeland Security's DHS Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate was established to focus on areas such as addressing countermeasures for biological threats. To do this, it hired experts from the national laboratories under the authority of the Intergovernmental Personnel Act IPA. This paper examines the management controls established...
Determining whether to obtain required services using government employees or through contracts with the private sector is an important economic and strategic decision for agency managers. This document consist of a report, the purpose of which is to convey an issue identified during the course of an ongoing review of...
People are critical to any agency transformation because they define an agency's culture, develop its knowledge base, promote innovation, and are its most important asset. Thus, strategic human capital management at the Department of Defense DOD can help it marshal, manage, and maintain the people and skills needed to meet...
In 1990, the Chief Financial Officers CFO Act, heralded as the most comprehensive financial management reform legislation in 40 years, was enacted. The Act's goal is to improve management through reliable, useful, and timely financial and performance information for day-to-day decision-making and accountability. This report outlines the legislative history of...
This report provides an overview of GAO's role in evaluating the contracting community with regard to disaster preparedness and response, GAO's plans for reviewing the performance of the federal government and its contractors in preparing for and responding to the hurricanes, and what GAO has learned so far about the...
The radiofrequency spectrum is a natural resource used to provide an array of wireless communications services, such as mobile voice and data services, radio and television broadcasting, radar, and satellite-based services, which are critical to the U.S. economy and national security. This paper examines the characteristics of the current spectrum...
Concern has been rising about the nation's preparedness to respond to vaccine shortages that could occur in future annual influenza seasons or during an influenza pandemic--a global influenza outbreak. This paper provides a statement on lessons learned from the 2004-05 vaccine shortage and their relevance to planning and preparing for...
