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As of April 29, 2024, there are 5091 open recommendations that still need to be addressed. 416 of these are priority recommendations, those that we believe warrant priority attention. Learn more about our priority designation on our Recommendations page.

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5081 - 5091 of 5091 Recommendations, including 416 Priority Recommendations

Government Performance and Accountability: Tax Expenditures Represent a Substantial Federal Commitment and Need to Be Reexamined

GAO-05-690
James (Jay) R. McTigue, Jr
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5 Open Recommendations
2 Priority
Agency Recommendation Status
Office of Management and Budget To ensure that policymakers and the public have the necessary information to make informed decisions and to improve the progress toward exercising greater scrutiny of tax expenditures, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), in consultation with the Secretary of the Treasury, should resume presenting tax expenditures in the budget together with related outlay programs to show a truer picture of the federal support within a mission area.
Open

As of March 2024, OMB does not plan to implement this recommendation. OMB did not present tax expenditures in the fiscal year 2025 budget with the related outlay programs, as GAO recommended in September 2005. OMB did not agree that GAO's recommendation was necessary and stated that presenting information on tax expenditures together with related outlay programs was not useful for budgeting, and that such a presentation is not part of the congressional budget process. However, the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 requires a list of tax expenditures, including special tax credits, deductions
Office of Management and Budget To ensure that policymakers and the public have the necessary information to make informed decisions and to improve the progress toward exercising greater scrutiny of tax expenditures, the Director of OMB, in consultation with the Secretary of the Treasury, should require that tax expenditures be included in the PART process and any future such budget and performance review processes so that tax expenditures are considered along with related outlay programs in determining the adequacy of federal efforts to achieve national objectives.
Open – Partially Addressed

OMB made some progress in including tax expenditures along with related outlay programs in the executive branch's budget and performance review processes, as GAO recommended in September 2005. However, as of March 2024, OMB had not developed a systematic approach for conducting such reviews. The GPRA Modernization Act of 2010 (GPRAMA) requires OMB and the agencies to identify the relevant tax expenditures that contribute to each crosscutting priority goal (31 U.S.C. Sec. 1115(a)(2)). Beginning with its August 2012 update to Circular No. A-11 with guidance for implementing GPRAMA and continuing
Department of the Treasury
Priority Rec.
To ensure that policymakers and the public have the necessary information to make informed decisions and to improve the progress toward exercising greater scrutiny of tax expenditures, the Director of OMB, in consultation with the Secretary of the Treasury, should develop and implement a framework for conducting performance reviews of tax expenditures. In developing the framework, the Director should (1) determine which agencies will have leadership responsibilities to review tax expenditures, how reviews will be coordinated among agencies with related responsibilities, and how to address the lack of credible performance information on tax expenditures; (2) set a schedule for conducting tax expenditure evaluations; (3) re-establish appropriate methods to test the overall evaluation framework and make improvements as experience is gained; and (4) to identify any additional resources that may be needed for tax expenditure reviews.
Open

Treasury did not submit comments on this report and deferred to OMB. OMB agreed that this recommendation had promise and also said that tax expenditure evaluations were the responsibility of Treasury, which had access to the necessary data. As of March 2024, the Director of OMB had not taken action to develop a framework for reviewing tax expenditure performance, as GAO recommended in June 1994 and again in September 2005. Since their initial efforts in 1997 and 1999 to outline a framework for evaluating tax expenditures and preliminary performance measures, OMB and the Department of the
Office of Management and Budget
Priority Rec.
To ensure that policymakers and the public have the necessary information to make informed decisions and to improve the progress toward exercising greater scrutiny of tax expenditures, the Director of OMB, in consultation with the Secretary of the Treasury, should develop and implement a framework for conducting performance reviews of tax expenditures. In developing the framework, the Director should (1) determine which agencies will have leadership responsibilities to review tax expenditures, how reviews will be coordinated among agencies with related responsibilities, and how to address the lack of credible performance information on tax expenditures; (2) set a schedule for conducting tax expenditure evaluations; (3) re-establish appropriate methods to test the overall evaluation framework and make improvements as experience is gained; and (4) to identify any additional resources that may be needed for tax expenditure reviews.
Open

As of March 2024, the Director of OMB had not taken action to develop a framework for reviewing tax expenditure performance, as GAO recommended in June 1994 and again in September 2005. Since their initial efforts in 1997 and 1999 to outline a framework for evaluating tax expenditures and preliminary performance measures, OMB and the Department of the Treasury have ceased to make progress and retreated from setting a schedule for evaluating tax expenditures. The President's fiscal year 2012 budget stated that developing an evaluation framework is a significant challenge due to limited data
Department of the Treasury To ensure that policymakers and the public have the necessary information to make informed decisions and to improve the progress toward exercising greater scrutiny of tax expenditures, the Director of OMB, in consultation with the Secretary of the Treasury, should require that tax expenditures be included in the PART process and any future such budget and performance review processes so that tax expenditures are considered along with related outlay programs in determining the adequacy of federal efforts to achieve national objectives.
Open – Partially Addressed

In October 2005, the Department of the Treasury responded that this recommendation did not relate to Treasury. OMB made some progress in including tax expenditures along with related outlay programs in the executive branch's budget and performance review processes, as GAO recommended in September 2005. However, as of March 2024, OMB had not developed a systematic approach for conducting such reviews. The GPRA Modernization Act of 2010 (GPRAMA) requires OMB and the agencies to identify the relevant tax expenditures that contribute to each crosscutting priority goal (31 U.S.C. Sec. 1115(a)(2))

Community Development: Federal Revitalization Programs Are Being Implemented, but Data on the Use of Tax Benefits Are Limited

GAO-04-306
William B. Shear
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3 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Internal Revenue Service To facilitate the administration, audit, and evaluation of the EZ/EC and RC programs, HUD, USDA, and IRS should collaborate to (1) identify the data needed to assess the use of the tax benefits and the various means of collecting such data; (2) determine the cost-effectiveness of collecting these data, including the potential impact on taxpayers and other program participants; (3) document the findings of their analysis; and, if necessary, (4) seek the authority to collect the data, if a cost- effective means is available.
Open – Partially Addressed

In response to GAO's recommendation, officials from HUD, USDA, and IRS met to identify data needed to assess the use of the tax benefits and identified three means of collecting such data. These methods include (1) using existing data to extrapolate an estimate of the use of some tax benefits; however, such data would be limited to the national level; (2) changing tax return forms to indicate the Empowerment Zone or Renewal Community in which each benefit is claimed; and (3) surveying businesses located in Empowerment Zones and Renewal Communities about tax benefit use. They also discussed the
Department of Agriculture To facilitate the administration, audit, and evaluation of the EZ/EC and RC programs, HUD, USDA, and IRS should collaborate to (1) identify the data needed to assess the use of the tax benefits and the various means of collecting such data; (2) determine the cost-effectiveness of collecting these data, including the potential impact on taxpayers and other program participants; (3) document the findings of their analysis; and, if necessary, (4) seek the authority to collect the data, if a cost- effective means is available.
Open – Partially Addressed

In response to GAO's recommendation, officials from HUD, USDA, and IRS met to identify data needed to assess the use of the tax benefits and identified three means of collecting such data. These methods include (1) using existing data to extrapolate an estimate of the use of some tax benefits; however, such data would be limited to the national level; (2) changing tax return forms to indicate the Empowerment Zone or Renewal Community in which each benefit is claimed; and (3) surveying businesses located in Empowerment Zones and Renewal Communities about tax benefit use. They also discussed the
Department of Housing and Urban Development To facilitate the administration, audit, and evaluation of the EZ/EC and RC programs, HUD, USDA, and IRS should collaborate to (1) identify the data needed to assess the use of the tax benefits and the various means of collecting such data; (2) determine the cost-effectiveness of collecting these data, including the potential impact on taxpayers and other program participants; (3) document the findings of their analysis; and, if necessary, (4) seek the authority to collect the data, if a cost- effective means is available.
Open – Partially Addressed

In response to GAO's recommendation, officials from HUD, USDA, and IRS met to identify data needed to assess the use of the tax benefits and identified three means of collecting such data. These methods include (1) using existing data to extrapolate an estimate of the use of some tax benefits; however, such data would be limited to the national level; (2) changing tax return forms to indicate the Empowerment Zone or Renewal Community in which each benefit is claimed; and (3) surveying businesses located in Empowerment Zones and Renewal Communities about tax benefit use. They also discussed the

Medicaid and SCHIP: Recent HHS Approvals of Demonstration Waiver Projects Raise Concerns

GAO-02-817
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1 Open Recommendations
1 Priority
Agency Recommendation Status
Department of Health and Human Services
Priority Rec.
To meet its fiduciary responsibility of ensuring that section 1115 waivers are budget neutral, the Secretary of Health and Human services should better ensure that valid methods are used to demonstrate budget neutrality, by developing and implementing consistent criteria for consideration of section 1115 demonstration waiver proposals.
Open – Partially Addressed

As of February 2024, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) had taken some action to address GAO's 2002 recommendation. In August 2018, HHS issued written guidance through a State Medicaid Directors Letter documenting four key changes it made in 2016 to its budget neutrality policy. These changes addressed some, but not all of the questionable methods GAO identified in its reports. To fully address this recommendation, HHS should also address these other questionable methods, such as setting demonstration spending limits based on hypothetical costs--what the state could have paid-

Food Safety and Security: Fundamental Changes Needed to Ensure Safe Food

GAO-02-47T
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Congress To provide more efficient, consistent, and effective federal oversight of the nation's food supply, Congress should consider commissioning the National Academy of Sciences or a blue ribbon panel to conduct a detailed analysis of alternative organizational food safety structures and report the results of such an analysis to Congress.
Open

The 2002 Farm Security and Rural Investment Act (2002 Farm Bill) established a national Food Safety Commission charged with making specific recommendations for drafting legislative language. Among other things, the Commission was to make recommendations on how to improve the food safety system, create a harmonized, central framework for managing federal food safety programs, and enhance the effectiveness of federal food safety resources. However, as of December 2021, as far as staff can ascertain, the Commission has not been formed, and no recommendations were ever produced. Thus, although

Financial Management: Improvements Needed in the Navy's Reporting of General Fund Inventory

GAO-01-37R
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Senior Civilian Official The Senior Civilian Official for the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Navy should revise the Navy's policies for compiling its financial statements so that they are in accordance with federal accounting standards and the DOD Financial Management Regulation. Specifically: (1) ammunition items needing repair and those categorized as excess, obsolete, and unserviceable should be revalued appropriately to comply with SFFAS No. 3 and the DOD Financial Management Regulation; and (2) shipboard inventories aboard smaller combatant ships should be reported as operating materials and supplies in accordance with federal accounting standards.
Open

Regarding the first part of this recommendation, the Statement of Federal Financial Accounting Standards 3: Accounting for Inventory and Related Property (SFFAS No. 3) requires items held for repair, including ordnance material, to be valued at either historical cost or latest acquisition cost less an allowance for estimated repair costs. Additionally, SFFAS No. 3 also requires that items deemed excess, obsolete, or unserviceable (EOU) be valued at expected net realizable value, which would allow the Navy to report the potential gain or loss once items deemed EOU are disposed. However, Navy's
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