Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment to identify the reasons behind the high rate of miscoding for orders awarded under multiple award contracts and use this information to identify and take action to improve the reliability of the competition data entered into FPDS-NG. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2018, and in response to our draft report, DOD stated that it would analyze the Federal Procurement Data System- Next Generation data in an effort to identify why the miscoding of orders under multiple award contracts occurs, and use this information to advise the contracting community of actions to improve the reliability of the competition data. In July 2019, DOD officials stated they did not have an update regarding planned actions to address the recommendation. As of September 2020, DOD officials did not respond to our multiple requests for updates to this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Associate Deputy Assistant Secretary for Acquisition to identify the reasons behind the high rate of miscoding for orders awarded under multiple award contracts and use this information to identify and take action to improve the reliability of the competition data entered into FPDS-NG. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2019, HHS stated it was performing analysis and research to understand the reasons for the miscoding of orders. Once this analysis and research is completed, HHS reported it plans to work to address the root causes of the previously identified miscodings, so as to prevent future errors. In July 2019, HHS officials stated they did not have an update regarding planned actions to address the recommendation. As of September 2020, HHS officials did not respond to our multiple requests for updates to this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Director of OMB should identify and publish a specific goal associated with its non-provisioned O&M spending measure.

Agency: Executive Office of the President: Office of Management and Budget
Status: Open

Comments: The agency agreed with the recommendation. However, in July 2020, OMB stated that the implementation of this recommendation would be counter to the Administration's focus of prioritizing modernization activities specifically for High Value Assets and, as a result, it does not intend on implementing this recommendation. We disagree and believe that identifying and publishing a specific goal aimed at reducing non-provisioned spending (i.e., spending associated with systems that are not cloud or shared service-based) aligns with the Administration's Cloud Smart strategy to accelerate agency adoption of cloud-based solutions. We will continue to monitor the implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Director of OMB should commit to a firm date by which its draft guidance on legacy systems will be issued, and subsequently direct agencies to identify legacy systems and/or investments needing to be modernized or replaced.

Agency: Executive Office of the President: Office of Management and Budget
Status: Open

Comments: The agency agreed with the recommendation. In July 2020, OMB stated that agencies were directed to manage the risk to High Value Assets associated with legacy systems in OMB's December 2018 guidance. While OMB's guidance does direct agencies to identify, report, assess, and remediate issues associated with High Value Assets, it does not require agencies to do so for all legacy systems. We will continue to monitor the implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: To monitor whether existing investments are meeting the needs of their agencies, the Secretaries of Commerce and the Treasury should direct the respective agency CIO to ensure that required analyses are performed on investments in the operations and maintenance phase.

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: The agency had no comment on the recommendation. In June 2017, Treasury provided an update on the IRS's efforts to ensure that operational analyses are performed on investments in the operations and maintenance phase. However, the recommendation is intended to address issues at the department level and not just at the IRS. In 2017, Treasury declined to provide an update at the department level. As of April 2020, Treasury has not responded to requests for updates. We will continue to monitor the implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: To address obsolete IT investments in need of modernization or replacement, the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, State, the Treasury, Transportation, and Veterans Affairs; the Attorney General; and the Commissioner of Social Security should direct their respective agency CIOs to identify and plan to modernize or replace legacy systems as needed and consistent with OMB's draft guidance, including time frames, activities to be performed, and functions to be replaced or enhanced.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: The agency agreed with the recommendation. In May 2019, the agency stated that it had conducted an assessment of its legacy system environment and identified 106 legacy IT assets across 18 components. In a March 2020 update, the agency stated that it is in the process of developing a policy to govern all legacy systems, to include modernization and decommissioning plans. The agency plans to publish this policy by March 2021. We will continue to monitor the implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: To address obsolete IT investments in need of modernization or replacement, the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, State, the Treasury, Transportation, and Veterans Affairs; the Attorney General; and the Commissioner of Social Security should direct their respective agency CIOs to identify and plan to modernize or replace legacy systems as needed and consistent with OMB's draft guidance, including time frames, activities to be performed, and functions to be replaced or enhanced.

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: The agency had no comment on the recommendation. In June 2017, Treasury provided an update on the IRS's efforts to modernize the IRS's legacy systems. However, the recommendation is intended to address issues at the department level and not just at the IRS. In 2017, Treasury declined to provide an update at the department level. As of April 2020, Treasury has not responded to requests for updates. We will continue to monitor the implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: To strengthen FCC's data collection efforts, the Chairman of FCC should develop a strategy to gather additional information on the IP transition to assess the transition's potential effects on public safety and consumers.

Agency: Federal Communications Commission
Status: Open

Comments: As of April 2020, FCC officials said they are exploring options to address this recommendation and hope to have it implemented in fiscal year 2020.

Recommendation: To help ensure the success of FDA's modernization efforts, the Commissioner of FDA should direct the CIO to, in completing the assessment of Mission Accomplishments and Regulatory Compliance Services (MARCS), develop an integrated master schedule (IMS) that (1) identifies which legacy systems will be replaced and when; (2) identifies all current and future tasks to be performed by contractors and FDA; and (3) defines and incorporates information reflecting resources and critical dependencies.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Food and Drug Administration
Status: Open

Comments: In 2018, we confirmed that FDA, in response to our recommendation, began efforts to identify which legacy systems will be replaced. FDA also developed an IMS for fiscal year (FY) 2017 and 2018 that identifies current and future tasks to be performed by contractors and FDA. However, FDA's IMS for FY 2017 and 2018 does not fully and clearly define resources. For example, although the FY 2017 IMS includes 265 names, roles, and teams, only 16 percent of activities have resource assignments. Further, FDA's fiscal year 2018 IMS does not fully define critical dependencies. For example, there are 14 activities and milestones with finish dates that are not properly tied to logic. Specifically, the finish dates of the 14 activities are not clearly tied to succeeding activities in the schedule. We contacted FDA in September and December 2019 and January 2020 for an update on the actions taken to implement the recommendation, but have not received a response. We will update the recommendation when additional information is obtained.