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As of May 20, 2024, there are 5115 open recommendations that still need to be addressed. 411 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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5021 - 5040 of 5115 Recommendations, including 411 Priority Recommendations

VA Administrative Investigations: Improvements Needed in Collecting and Sharing Information

GAO-12-483
Debra A. Draper
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Department of Veterans Affairs To systematically gauge the extent to which deficiencies identified by individual AIBs may be occurring throughout VHA; and to maximize opportunities for sharing information across VHA to improve its overall operations, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs should direct the Under Secretary for Health to establish a process for sharing information about systemic changes, including policies and procedures implemented in response to the results of AIB investigations, which may have broader applicability throughout VHA.
Open

VA concurred with this recommendation and noted that it would explore any new processes for collecting and analyzing aggregate data from AIB investigations. In September 2015, VA reported that it had established a working group to review this recommendation. In addition, VA also had created a database to collect and analyze aggregate data from AIB investigations into senior executive service (SES) employees to identify trends and address deficiencies. Based on an informal survey of its working group and its analysis of AIB data for SES employees, VA stated that VISNs currently provide adequate

Highway Infrastructure: Federal-State Partnership Produces Benefits and Poses Oversight Risks

GAO-12-474
Phillip R. Herr
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Congress As we have previously recommended, Congress should consider reexamining and refocusing surface transportation programs, including establishing well-defined goals with direct links to identified federal interests and roles. Based on this review, there may be areas where national interests are less evident and where Congress may wish to consider narrowing FHWA's responsibilities.
Open

In November 2021, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (Pub. L. No. 117-58) was enacted to reauthorize surface transportation programs, among other actions. In doing so, Congress generally increased the number of programs FHWA administers, which include four new formula grant programs and a number of new grant discretionary programs. As of March 2024, Congress has not taken any additional action in this area. GAO will continue to monitor congressional action in this area.

Tobacco Taxes: Large Disparities in Rates for Smoking Products Trigger Significant Market Shifts to Avoid Higher Taxes

GAO-12-475
David Gootnick
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Congress Disparities in tax rates on smoking tobacco products have negative revenue implications because they create incentives for manufacturers and consumers to substitute higher-taxed products with lower-taxed products. In light of that fact, as Congress continues its oversight of CHIPRA and Tobacco Control Act implementation, it may wish to consider modifying tobacco tax rates to eliminate significant tax differentials between similar products. Specifically, Congress may wish to consider equalizing tax rates on roll-your-own and pipe tobacco and, in consultation with Treasury, also consider options for reducing tax avoidance due to tax differentials between small and large cigars.
Open

As of March 2024, Congress has not passed legislation to eliminate tax differentials between roll-your-own and pipe tobacco or between small and large cigars. GAO's April 2012 report noted that prior federal and state legislation has aimed to discourage tobacco use and raise revenues by increasing taxes on tobacco products. Modifying tax rates to eliminate the tax differentials between similar tobacco products could address potential future revenue losses stemming from the substitution of higher-taxed products with lower-taxed products.

Crop Insurance: Savings Would Result from Program Changes and Greater Use of Data Mining

GAO-12-256
Lisa R. Shames
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Congress To reduce the cost of the crop insurance program, Congress may wish to consider limiting the subsidy for premiums that an individual farmer can receive each year or reducing the subsidy for all farmers participating in the program, or both limiting and reducing these subsidies.
Open

As of February 2024, Congress has not taken action to implement this matter.

Medicare Secondary Payer: Additional Steps Are Needed to Improve Program Effectiveness for Non-Group Health Plans

GAO-12-333
Kathleen M. King
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services To improve the effectiveness of the MSP program and process for NGHPs, and to improve the agency's communication regarding the MSP process for situations involving NGHPs, the Acting Administrator of CMS should develop guidance regarding liability and no-fault set-aside arrangements.
Open

Since April 2012, the month the recommendation was made, CMS officials have reported at various times that the agency was planning to issue either regulatory or sub-regulatory guidance on this topic. In March 2019, officials said that the agency now planned to issue regulatory guidance. In August 2021, CMS officials said that they drafted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to address future medical obligations, through a set-aside arrangement for beneficiaries who receive liability insurance as well as workers' compensation settlements. Officials said that this was to be published in the spring

2012 Annual Report: Opportunities to Reduce Duplication, Overlap and Fragmentation, Achieve Savings, and Enhance Revenue

GAO-12-342SP
Janet St. Laurent, Zina Merritt
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7 Open Recommendations
1 Priority
Agency Recommendation Status
Federal Emergency Management Agency The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) should complete a national preparedness assessment of capability gaps at each level based on tiered, capability-specific performance objectives to enable prioritization of grant funding, and FEMA could identify the potential costs for establishing and maintaining those capabilities at each level and determine what capabilities federal agencies should provide.
Open – Partially Addressed

FEMA concurred with the recommendation and has taken steps to implement it. First in 2022, FEMA developed the National Stakeholder Preparedness Review (National SPR) is a first-of-its-kind federal self-assessment of capabilities. The National SPR goals are to gauge the Nation's readiness for catastrophic disasters, to identify national-level emergency management capability gaps and planning assumptions for all hazards and specific scenarios, and to inform preparedness efforts. Next, FEMA drafted the Concurrence of the Target Gap Overviews (previously called the capability assessment sheets)
Social Security Administration In response to prior recommendations, the Social Security Administration (SSA) has taken steps to explore the possibilities of sharing information with states and the workers' compensation insurance industry to identify persons who might be receiving workers' compensation benefits. While some information sharing has taken place, GAO continues to believe that additional opportunities exist to share information. While obtaining information from states is difficult, these efforts may help identify workers' compensation beneficiaries so that benefits can be appropriately and accurately offset.
Open – Partially Addressed

As GAO indicated in February 2012, additional opportunities exist for data sharing with states and the workers' compensation insurance industry to identify persons who might be receiving workers' compensation. While SSA has taken some steps to explore information sharing with states, the data SSA has on workers' compensation benefits are limited, and the agency is also now working to obtain federal workers' compensation data. In January 2013, SSA stated that its SSA Access to State Records Online (SASRO) agreements with states outline conditions under which it is permitted access to query
Office of Management and Budget
Priority Rec.
To improve performance through greater coordination among the many federal programs that support employment for people with disabilities, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) should consider establishing measurable, government-wide goals for employment of people with disabilities. Given the number of federal agencies and approaches involved in supporting employment for people with disabilities, government-wide goals could help spur greater coordination and more efficient and economical service delivery in overlapping program areas. To determine whether these goals are being met, agencies should establish related measures and indicators and collect additional data to inform these measures.
Open

OMB neither agreed nor disagreed with this recommendation, but reported in March 2024 that it does not plan to establish government-wide goals for the employment of people with disabilities. OMB cited the difficulty of setting goals for more than 40 programs with different designs and target populations. Instead, to enhance federal coordination, OMB staff previously noted that the Department of Labor's (DOL) Office of Disability Employment Policy led an interagency subcommittee on employment of people with disabilities. However, in April 2024, OMB officials said that the subcommittee had
Congress Congress may want to consider requiring the Department of Homeland Security to report on the results of the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) efforts to identify and prevent unnecessary duplication within and across its preparedness grant programs, and consider these results when making future funding decisions for these programs.
Open

No legislative action has been identified as of March 2024. FEMA's efforts to identify and prevent unnecessary duplication within and across four large preparedness grant programs are ongoing, and include planned upgrades to its grants management systems. According to FEMA officials, these system upgrades will allow FEMA to better collect and compare project-level data for all of its preparedness grant programs. Until FEMA completes these efforts, the congressional action above remains warranted.
Congress Until the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) completes its assessment, Congress may wish to consider limiting the use of federal preparedness grant programs to fund only projects to fill identified, validated, and documented capability gaps that may (or may not) include maintaining existing capabilities developed.
Open – Partially Addressed

FEMA concurred with the recommendation and has taken steps to implement it. First in 2022, FEMA developed the National Stakeholder Preparedness Review (National SPR) is a first-of-its-kind federal self-assessment of capabilities. The National SPR goals are to gauge the Nation's readiness for catastrophic disasters, to identify national-level emergency management capability gaps and planning assumptions for all hazards and specific scenarios, and to inform preparedness efforts. Next, FEMA drafted the Concurrence of the Target Gap Overviews (previously called the capability assessment sheets)
Congress To optimize the federal role in rural housing, the Congress may wish to consider requiring the Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to examine the benefits and costs of merging those programs that serve similar markets and provide similar products. As a first step, Congress could consider requiring USDA and HUD to explore merging their single-family insured lending programs and multifamily portfolio management programs, taking advantage of the best practices of each and ensuring that targeted populations are not adversely affected.
Open

As of March 2024, no legislation had been enacted or was enacted. A draft bill introduced in 2018 would have established HUD's Federal Housing Administration (FHA) as an agency separate from HUD and transferred it to USDA's Rural Housing Service (RHS) programs. H.R. 6746, 115th Cong. (2018). After the bill was referred to committee, no further action was taken.
Congress Congress may wish to require the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security to adjust the air passenger immigration inspection fee as needed so that collections are aligned with total inspection costs, if it is determined that total immigration fee collections do not cover total immigration inspection costs.
Open – Partially Addressed

As of March 2024, Congress had not enacted legislation to adjust the air passenger immigration fee, as GAO suggested in February 2012. However, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) identified the extent to which collections are aligned with total immigration inspection costs. ICE reported in its 2012 fee review that, based on its legal review of the Immigration and Nationality Act, it is authorized to use its air passenger and sea vessel passenger inspection collections to reimburse its immigration inspection activities. ICE's and CBP's combined

VA Health Care: Methodology for Estimating and Process for Tracking Savings Need Improvement

GAO-12-305
Randall B. Williamson
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2 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Department of Veterans Affairs The Secretary of Veterans Affairs should develop a detailed process for tracking VA's actual savings resulting from those operational improvements for which we identified concerns. This process should provide detailed written guidance for those responsible for tracking the savings, which outlines the methodology for calculating savings.
Open

In February 2012, we recommended that the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) develop a detailed process for tracking VA's actual savings resulting from those operational improvements for which we identified concerns. While VA partially concurred with this recommendation, in June 2016, VA reported that it has no future plans to fully implement this recommendation.
Department of Veterans Affairs In order to better inform future budget requests, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs should develop a sound methodology for estimating savings from new operational improvements. This methodology should include: (1) an explanation of how savings from each operational improvement will be achieved; (2) an explanation for the basis of any assumptions included in the savings estimates; and (3) an implementation plan that includes a realistic timeline for implementation, to help ensure that savings can be achieved within the targeted time frame.
Open

In February 2012, we recommended that the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) develop a sound methodology for estimating savings from new operational improvements in future budget submissions. While VA concurred with this recommendation, in June 2016, VA reported that it intends to implement this recommendation when new operational improvements are proposed in the budget. However, recent budget submissions have not included operational improvements.

Federal Statistical System: Agencies Can Make Greater Use of Existing Data, but Continued Progress Is Needed on Access and Quality Issues

GAO-12-54
Robert N. Goldenkoff, Ronald S. Fecso
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2 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Office of Management and Budget In order to maintain progress in maximizing the efficiency of existing data sources, and to improve the broader efficiency of the federal statistical system and improve communication among agencies and others, the Director of OMB, in consultation with the Chief Statistician, should work with the ICSP, when OMB next updates guidance on agency survey and statistical information collection and dissemination methods, to include additional details on actions agencies can take to meet requirements to identify duplication, to consult with persons outside of the agency, and address other requirements as appropriate.
Open

In July 2022, OMB staff reported that the Interagency Council on Statistical Policy was developing plans to establish a website that would support agency Statistical Officials, a position required in the Evidence-Based Policymaking Act of 2018, and that the website would help to address this recommendation. As of May 2023, the website has not yet been established.
Office of Management and Budget In order to maintain progress in maximizing the efficiency of existing data sources, and to increase the reliability of the information presented on the Reginfo.gov website and in OMB's internal system, the Director of OMB, in consultation with the Chief Statistician, should work with the ICSP to implement quality-control procedures designed to identify and remedy any differences between cost and burden information provided on the website and in the related supporting statement documentation that underlies this information.
Open

OMB staff reported in July 2022 that because it publishes cost and burden information in Federal Register notices, PRA statements, and on RegInfo.gov, the public is able to identify discrepancies and bring them to OMB's attention. We continue to believe that the responsibility for identifying these discrepancies should belong to OMB and not the public.

Embassy Management: State Department and Other Agencies Should Further Explore Opportunities to Save Administrative Costs Overseas

GAO-12-317
Michael J. Courts
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Congress In order to contain costs and reduce duplication of administrative support services overseas, Congress may wish to consider requiring agencies to participate in ICASS services unless they provide a business case to show that they can obtain these services outside of ICASS without increasing overall costs to the U.S. government or that their mission cannot be achieved within ICASS.
Open

As of March 2024, no legislative action has been identified. Congress has not required agencies to participate in ICASS absent a business case that shows that they can obtain services outside ICASS without additional cost to the U.S. government, as GAO suggested in January 2012. In January 2014, the joint explanatory statement regarding the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2014, included a direction that the Secretary of State develop, in coordination with the ICASS Service Center and participating agencies, an efficient process by which an agency participating in the ICASS program provides a

Medicare: Use of Preventive Services Could Be Better Aligned with Clinical Recommendations

GAO-12-81
James Cosgrove
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Congress To further align Medicare beneficiary use of preventive services with Task Force recommendations, Congress may wish to consider requiring beneficiaries who receive services with a grade of 'D" to share the cost, notwithstanding that cost sharing may not be required for other beneficiaries receiving the same services.
Open

As of March 2024, Congress has not yet taken action to require beneficiaries who receive services with a Task Force grade of "D" to share the cost.

Medicare Advantage: CMS Should Improve the Accuracy of Risk Score Adjustments for Diagnostic Coding Practices

GAO-12-51
James Cosgrove
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1 Open Recommendations
1 Priority
Agency Recommendation Status
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
Priority Rec.
To help ensure appropriate payments to MA plans, the Administrator of CMS should take steps to improve the accuracy of the adjustment made for differences in diagnostic coding practices between MA and Medicare FFS. Such steps could include, for example, accounting for additional beneficiary characteristics, including the most current data available, identifying and accounting for all years of coding differences that could affect the payment year for which an adjustment is made, and incorporating the trend of the impact of coding differences on risk scores.
Open – Partially Addressed

CMS indicated in March 2021 that, given the complexity of measuring coding changes attributable to plan behavior and the difficulty of measuring countervailing factors, there is not a single correct factor within the viable range of adjustment factors. In addition, the agency noted that there is policy discretion with respect to the appropriate adjustment factor for the payment year. CMS applied the statutory minimum adjustment of 5.90 for calendar year 2023. As of February 2024, CMS had not provided any documentation of its analysis and the basis for its determination. Although the

2011 Tax Filing: Processing Gains, but Taxpayer Assistance Could Be Enhanced by More Self-Service Tools

GAO-12-176
James R. White
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1 Open Recommendations
Agency Recommendation Status
Internal Revenue Service The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should develop a new refund timeliness measure and goal to more appropriately reflect current capabilities.
Open

As of April 2024, IRS had not developed a new measure and goal for refund timeliness. During fiscal year 2023, individual taxpayers filed about 91 percent of returns electronically, and as a means to set taxpayer expectations, IRS publicly reported that about 90 percent of taxpayers owed a refund received it in less than 21 days. However, IRS does not set expectations for taxpayers that file on paper or have other situations that could result in longer processing times. In February 2023, IRS provided us with its analysis of refund timeliness that detailed the number of days IRS took to issue
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