In June 2015 and April 2016, GAO reported on CMS's implementation of enrollment-screening procedures that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) uses to prevent and detect ineligible or potentially fraudulent providers and suppliers from enrolling into its Provider Enrollment, Chain and Ownership System (PECOS). GAO identified weaknesses in CMS's verification of provider practice loca

This testimony discusses our January 30, 2014 opinion concerning the effect of the District of Columbia's Local Budget Autonomy Amendment Act of 2012 (Budget Autonomy Act). In December 2012, the Council of the District of Columbia enacted the Budget Autonomy Act. The Mayor of the District of Columbia signed the measure in January 2013, and District voters approved it in April 2013. In the Distric

From fiscal years 2003 through 2014, judges have used a separate system to report their non-case-related (NCR) travel costs paid for by government and private sources. These NCR travel costs averaged $8.8 million per year. However, while the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts (AOUSC) tracks the costs of all official travel in its accounting systems of record, the NCR system does not collect

The federal judiciary has implemented cost containment initiatives for over 10 years, but the judiciary does not fully know how much it has saved because it has not developed a reliable method for estimating cost savings achieved. For example, GAO found that the judiciary's estimate of cost savings primarily attributed to cost containment initiatives since fiscal year 2005--nearly $1.5 billion, r

GAO's analysis of U.S. Trustee Program (USTP) data and interviews with bankruptcy stakeholders including Assistant U.S. Trustees (AUST), selected bankruptcy judges, and attorneys indicate that attorneys' fee applications for cases subject to the USTP's 2013 fee guidelines (cases involving assets and liabilities each of $50 million or more) have generally contained the information requested by the

The General Services Administration (GSA) developed eight selection criteria for utilizing its $4.5 billion in high-performing green (green) building funds--or more than 80 percent of its total $5.5-billion budget--under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act). GSA used almost $800 million of its $4.5-billion green building funds on 15 full or partial modernization proje

Of the 66 old federal courthouses that GAO reviewed, the General Services Administration (GSA) retained 40, disposed of 25, and is in the process of disposing of another. Of the retained old courthouses, the judiciary occupies 30 of them, 25 as the main tenant, most commonly with the district and bankruptcy courts. When determining whether to retain and reuse or to dispose of old courthouses, GSA

Based on GAO's 2003 report, it was found that the district court case weights approved in 1993 to be a reasonably accurate measure of the average time demands a specific number and mix of cases filed in a district court could be expected to place on the district judges in that court. The methodology used to develop the weights used a valid sampling procedure, developed weights based on actual cas

From 2000 to 2010, the number of patent infringement lawsuits in the federal courts fluctuated slightly, and from 2010 to 2011, the number of such lawsuits increased by about a third. Some stakeholders GAO interviewed said that the increase in 2011 was most likely influenced by the anticipation of changes in the 2011 Leahy-Smith America Invents Act (AIA), which made several significant changes to

Few federal judicial districts have consolidated their court clerks' offices; courts are sharing services among the clerks' offices, but the costs and benefits are unclear. Four of the 91 districts served by bankruptcy courts have consolidated the clerks' offices of the district and bankruptcy courts. Court officials in districts that are not considering consolidation told GAO that they are not c