Recommendation: The Attorney General should ensure that relevant DOJ offices update information about religious-based hate crimes on college campuses, practices to address them, and available DOJ resources to help colleges, campus law enforcement, and other stakeholders monitor and address these crimes. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Justice
Status: Open

Comments: DOJ has taken a number of steps to address this recommendation, including creating a campus-specific brochure that highlights the Community Relations Service's (CRS) hate crimes prevention and response resources for campus stakeholders. CRS is also in the process of developing a comprehensive guide with best practices for and tools to aid in the planning and implementation of Campus SPIRIT programs and a "spotlight" article for the Department's hate crimes website. DOJ noted that the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) is developing hate crimes-specific training curriculum to provide technical assistance to law enforcement agencies, including those on campus. These are important steps to implement this recommendation, but because these resources are currently under development, this recommendation remains open.

Recommendation: The Attorney General should ensure that relevant DOJ offices share more information about available DOJ resources with colleges, campus law enforcement, and other stakeholders to help them monitor and address religious-based hate crimes on college campuses. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Justice
Status: Open

Comments: DOJ outlined steps it will take to work with campus-based law enforcement organizations such as the International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators, the International Association of Chiefs of Police's University and College Police Section, and the National Association of Student Affairs Professionals. This includes participating in a conference in June 2020 and contacting the groups to increase awareness of its hate crimes website. GAO has requested documentation to demonstrate this outreach has occurred.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the VA should direct the Under Secretary for Health to collect complete staffing data for the Family Caregiver Program that includes Caregiver Support Program Office funded staff, VAMC funded staff, and staff that assist the program as a collateral duty at each VAMC. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VA concurred with this recommendation. The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) has reported that the Caregiver Support Program Office had identified a solution for identifying VHA Family Caregiver Program staff in the Human Resource (HR) Smart system. VHA reported that current full- and part-time employees funded by the Caregiver Support Program Office will be identified with a specific specialty code in HR Smart. However, as of April 2020, this capability was not yet available in HR Smart and staffing for the program continued to be manually updated and tracked. Further, the proposed use of HR Smart will still not result in complete information that the Caregiver Support Program Office can use to track all staff who support the program because according to VHA, staff that assist the program as a collateral duty and VAMC-funded staff who support the program will not be tracked through HR Smart. As of July 2020, this recommendation remains open pending further updates from VHA.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the VA should direct the Under Secretary for Health to establish a process to ensure that the Family Caregiver Program staffing data that are collected and reported to the Caregiver Support Program Office are accurate. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VHA concurred with this recommendation. In February 2020, the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) reported that the Caregiver Support Program Office had identified a solution for identifying full-time VHA Family Caregiver Program staff in the Human Resource (HR) Smart system through the use of a specific specialty code. VHA reported that once implemented, the use of the HR SMART specialty code would provide more accurate information regarding staffing. In April 2020, VHA stated that were would also be a static field called "position skill type" that would track positions with a skill type category of caregiver and that Veterans Integrated Service Network (VISN) leads for the Family Caregiver Program would use this field to cross check the new specialty code and identify and correct any reporting inconsistencies. As of July 2020, this recommendation remains open pending further updates from VHA.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should ensure that the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence requires that DOD components (including the military departments and the Defense Logistics Agency) monitor the use of PACS at their installations. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Army should ensure that the Office of Provost Marshal General monitors the use of PACS at Army installations. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Defense: Department of the Army
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Navy should ensure that the Commander, Navy Installations Command, monitors the use of PACS at Navy installations. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Defense: Department of the Navy
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Navy, in coordination with the Commandant of the Marine Corps, should ensure that the Commander, Marine Corps Installations Command, monitors the use of PACS at Marine Corps installations. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Defense: Department of the Navy
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should ensure that the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness develops appropriate performance measures and associated goals for the timely resolution of the Defense Biometric Identification System technical issues to facilitate improved PACS performance. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should direct the Director of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency to establish processes to ensure that information on the provision of Section 333 mandated human rights training is systematically and accurately entered into its tracking systems. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: In December 2019, DOD agreed with the recommendation and stated that the Defense Security Cooperation Agency needs to establish reporting procedures with geographic combatant commands and is working to determine the feasibility and requirements to modify existing systems to enable tracking of mandated human rights training. As of July 2020, DSCA was considering options for such changes.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy to develop a timeline for implementing its activities to monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of human rights training for foreign security forces. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: In December 2019, DOD concurred with the recommendation and said it would monitor and evaluate human rights training as part of monitoring and evaluating its broader security assistance efforts. As of July 2020, DOD was considering how it would implement these changes.

Recommendation: The Secretary of State, in consultation with the Secretary of Defense, should develop a plan with a clear timeline for monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of human rights training for foreign security forces provided under International Military Education and Training. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of State
Status: Open

Comments: In December 2019, State wrote that it did not agree to separately conduct monitoring and evaluation of human rights training provided under the International Military Education and Training (IMET) program. GAO's recommendation does not call for a separate evaluation. State could meet the intent of the recommendation through evaluating the effectiveness of human rights training as part of its broader efforts to monitor and evaluate IMET. As of June 2020, State indicated they had no plans to evaluate the effectiveness of human rights training related to IMET.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary of ETA should develop, document, and implement a comprehensive strategy that (1) accounts for Job Corps' projected workload requirements and (2) considers its acquisition workforce needs—including the number of staff, skills, and other supports necessary to plan, award, and monitor Job Corps center contracts—to enable it to effectively plan for and competitively award future Job Corps center contracts. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Labor: Employment and Training Administration
Status: Open

Comments: DOL stated that it will develop, document, and implement a comprehensive strategy that accounts for Job Corps' projected workload requirements and considers its acquisition workforce needs. DOL noted that it has released a new procurement plan which reflects its decision to re-procure 28 Job Corps centers prior to the final option year of their contract. DOL said that this action would result in each region having no more than five procurements each year, which it considers a manageable procurement workload for its current staffing level. We will consider closing the recommendation when such a comprehensive strategy is implemented.

Recommendation: Congress should consider legislation establishing permanent statutory authority for a disaster assistance program administered by HUD or another agency that responds to unmet needs in a timely manner and directing the applicable agency to issue implementing regulations.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: A bill introduced and passed by the House of Representative in the 116th Congress, HR 3702, would permanently authorize the Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) program.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development should develop additional guidance for HUD staff to use when assessing the adequacy of the capacity and unmet needs assessments that grantees develop. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2019, HUD said that CPD will provide training to HUD staff regarding the standards for assessing unmet needs and grantee capacity. HUD needs to provide written guidance or other documentation outlining the standards HUD staff must consider when assessing the adequacy of grantees' capacity and unmet needs assessments.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development should require staff to document the basis for their conclusions during reviews of grantees' financial controls, procurement processes, and grant management procedures and capacity and unmet needs assessments. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2019, HUD stated that HUD staff are now required to indicate the basis for their conclusions in the checklist used to review financial controls and all correspondence between grantees and HUD staff regarding revisions to the financial processes will be provided as part of the certification or grant approval package. We are following up with CPD on the extent to which similar requirements have been developed for reviews of procurement processes, grant management procedures, and capacity and unmet needs assessments. In addition, CPD needs to provide documentation showing that all correspondence between grantees and HUD staff regarding revisions to financial controls, procurement processes, and grant management procedures and capacity and unmet needs assessments are to be part of the grant's approval package.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development should develop and implement a comprehensive monitoring plan for the 2017 grants. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In November 2019, HUD stated CPD had modified the CDBG-DR risk analysis tool to include pre-award conditions that must be factored into the provision of the grant agreement as well as future monitoring reviews. HUD stills needs to develop a comprehensive monitoring plan for the 2017 grants based on the risk assessments conducted using this revised tool.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should conduct a comprehensive review of the physical inspection process. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should resume calculating the sampling error associated with the physical inspection score for each property, identify what changes may be needed for HUD to use sampling error results, and consider those results when determining whether more frequent inspections or enforcement actions are needed. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should develop comprehensive and organized documentation of REAC's sampling methodology and develop a process to ensure that documentation is maintained going forward. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should track on a routine basis whether REAC is conducting inspections of multifamily housing properties in accordance with federal guidelines for scheduling and coordinate with the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Multifamily Housing to minimize the number of properties that can cancel or reschedule their physical inspections. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should design and implement an evaluation plan to assess the effectiveness of the Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity pilot in ensuring timely and quality inspections for properties in hard-to-staff geographic areas. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for Multifamily Housing and the Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should expedite implementation of the recommendations from the Rapid Response and Resolution Team. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should follow through on REAC's plan to create a process to verify candidate qualifications for contract inspectors—for example, by calling references and requesting documentation from candidates that supports their completion of 250 residential or commercial inspections. The plan should also consider whether certain types of inspections—such as Federal Emergency Management Agency inspections and U.S. Army Office of Housing inspections—satisfy REAC's requirements. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should develop a process to evaluate the effectiveness of REAC's training program—for example, by reviewing the results of tests or soliciting participant feedback. (Recommendation 8)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should revise training for quality assurance inspectors to better reflect their job duties. Revised training should be documented, include expanded subject matter training, and address skills that may not be included in training for contract inspectors—for example, instructing contract inspector candidate trainings and coaching and providing feedback. (Recommendation 9)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should develop continuing education requirements for contract and quality assurance inspectors. (Recommendation 10)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should develop and implement a plan for meeting REAC's management targets for the timeliness and frequency of collaborative quality assurance reviews and quality control inspections. The plan should include consideration of resources of and demands on quality assurance inspectors, including the effect of natural disasters and other special assignments. (Recommendation 11)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should ensure that Quality Control's policies and procedures for overseeing quality assurance inspectors are implemented. (Recommendation 12)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Real Estate Assessment Center should review quality assurance inspector performance standards and revise them to better reflect the skills and supporting behaviors that quality assurance inspectors need to effectively contribute to REAC's mission. (Recommendation 13)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Deputy Assistant Secretary for Multifamily Housing should report to Congress on why the agency has not complied with the 2017 and 2018 Consolidated Appropriations Acts requirement to issue notices to properties when the REAC score is 60 or below, including seeking any statutory flexibilities or exceptions believed appropriate. (Recommendation 14)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Homeland Security should develop and implement a process to systematically review the reliability of the data used in its Border Security Metrics Report and comprehensively identify any limitations with the data and methodologies that underlie its metrics. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS concurred with the recommendation and in a May 2020 update stated that it plans to address this recommendation in its FY2019 Border Security Metrics Report scheduled to be issued in the summer of 2020. We will continue to monitor DHS's ongoing efforts to do so.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Homeland Security should ensure the communication of the limitations of the metrics identified through the systematic review in the department's annual Border Security Metrics Report. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: In its comment letter, DHS concurred with the recommendation and requested that we consider it closed as implemented because the department already detailed some of the limitations in its fiscal year 2017 report, and plans to continue to identify known limitations and the progress made to mitigate previously identified limitations in future reports. As discussed in the report, we agree that DHS identified and disclosed limitations for some metrics in its fiscal year 2017 Border Security Metrics Report; however, we identified at least one additional limitation for 21 of the 35 metrics on which DHS reported that DHS did not disclose or about which it could have been more transparent. To address the intent of this recommendation, once DHS has implemented a process to systematically review the reliability of the data used in its report and comprehensively identified related limitations, it should disclose those limitations in its annual Border Security Metrics Report. In a May 2020 update, DHS stated that it plans to address this recommendation in its FY2019 Border Security Metrics Report scheduled to be issued in the summer of 2020. We will continue to monitor DHS's ongoing efforts to do so.

Recommendation: The Under Secretary for the Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans should include the results of sensitivity analyses to key assumptions in its statistical models of unlawful entry estimates in its annual Border Security Metrics Report. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS concurred with the recommendation and in a May 2020 update stated that it plans to address this recommendation in its FY2019 Border Security Metrics Report scheduled to be issued in the summer of 2020. We will continue to monitor DHS's ongoing efforts to do so.

Recommendation: The Under Secretary for the Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans should include measures of statistical uncertainty for all metrics based on estimates derived from statistical models in its annual Border Security Metrics Report. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS concurred with the recommendation and in a May 2020 update stated that it plans to address this recommendation in its FY2019 Border Security Metrics Report scheduled to be issued in the summer of 2020. We will continue to monitor DHS's ongoing efforts to do so.

Recommendation: The Director of ICE should build on existing efforts to use data analytics by employing techniques, such as network analysis, to identify potential fraud indicators in schools petitioning for certification. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security: United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, ICE officials indicated that they were in the process of addressing GAO's recommendation and would submit an update including supporting documentation when available. When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Director of ICE should develop an implementation plan for the project aimed at strengthening background checks for DSOs; that plan should outline how the project will be executed, monitored, and controlled. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security: United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, ICE officials indicated that they were in the process of addressing GAO's recommendation and would submit an update including supporting documentation when available. When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Director of ICE should implement mandatory DSO training and verify that the training is completed. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security: United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, ICE officials indicated that they were in the process of addressing GAO's recommendation and would submit an update including supporting documentation when available. When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Director of ICE should complete the development and implementation of its plans for mandatory fraud-specific training for DSOs. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: Department of Homeland Security: United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, ICE officials indicated that they were in the process of addressing GAO's recommendation and would submit an update including supporting documentation when available. When we confirm what actions the agency has taken in response to this recommendation, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Labor should direct the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and the Employment and Training Administration (ETA) to develop ways to use existing or new data collection efforts to identify and systematically track the workforce effects of advanced technologies. For example, the Secretary could select any of the following possibilities, or could identify others.
• BLS could expand existing worker or firm surveys to ask respondents whether advanced technologies have resulted in worker displacements, work hour reductions, or substantial adjustments to work tasks.
• BLS could expand its employment projections work to regularly identify occupations projected to change over time due to advanced technologies.
• ETA could expand the O*NET data system to identify changes to skills, tasks, and tools associated with occupations, as the information is updated on its rotational basis, and consider how this could be used to track the spread of advanced technologies.
(Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Labor
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: DOL agreed with this recommendation. DOL stated that it will continue coordinating with the Census Bureau on research activities in this area, and plans to identify and recommend data collection options to fill gaps in existing information about how the workplace is affected by new technologies, automation, and AI. In February 2020, DOL's Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) issued a public report evaluating data gaps and providing recommendations for data collection options. In June 2020, DOL reported that BLS plans to host a seminar to discuss the report findings and potential pilot data collection options. DOL also plans to release its first annual employment projections data in September 2020 (previously released every 2 years). In addition, DOL reported that the Employment and Training Administration has undertaken three research efforts, which are still underway, to test ways to analyze O*NET data elements for their potential to track changes in occupations over time and to flag areas for further study on the workforce effects of automation. This recommendation will be implemented when DOL completes more of its activities.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Director of the Office of Project Management and the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Environmental Management to work together to establish requirements for classifying cleanup work as capital asset projects or operations activities. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE partially concurred with this recommendation. In August 2019, in a letter to GAO on how EM will address our recommendation, the Senior Advisor for Environmental Management to the Under Secretary for Science stated that DOE developed a draft Cleanup Project Management Policy to clarify the expectations for EM's management of discrete work, such as operations activities that could be considered projects. In February 2020, EM officials stated that they are addressing this recommendation in two steps. First, EM is working with DOE's Office of Project Management to draft a Cleanup Project Management Policy (expected to be completed in spring 2020) to address the Decommissioning and Deactivation (D&D) phase of cleanup. This policy will become an appendix in DOE's Order 413.3B. EM officials further stated that EM plans to develop an additional Cleanup Program Management Policy that would classify the remaining types of activities not covered by the Cleanup Project Management Policy, including what EM currently classifies as operations activities. EM plans to implement this policy by the end of fiscal year 2020.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Director of the Office of Project Management and the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Environmental Management to work together to asses EM's ongoing operations activities to determine if they should be reclassified as capital asset projects based on the newly established requirements. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE partially concurred with this recommendation. In August 2019, in a letter to GAO on how EM will address our recommendation, the Senior Advisor for Environmental Management to the Under Secretary for Science stated that DOE developed a draft Cleanup Project Management Policy to clarify the expectations for EM's management of discrete work, such as operations activities that could be considered projects. In February 2020, EM officials stated that they are addressing this recommendation in two steps. First, EM is working with DOE's Office of Project Management to draft a Cleanup Project Management Policy (expected to be completed in spring 2020) to address the Decommissioning and Deactivation (D&D) phase of cleanup. This policy will become an appendix in DOE's Order 413.3B. EM officials further stated that EM plans to develop an additional Cleanup Program Management Policy that would classify the remaining types of activities not covered by the Cleanup Project Management Policy, including what EM currently classifies as operations activities. EM plans to implement this policy by the end of fiscal year 2020.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Environmental Management to review and revise EM's 2017 cleanup policy to include program management leading practices related to scope, cost, schedule performance, and independent reviews. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: DOE concurred with this recommendation. In August 2019, in a letter to GAO on how EM will address our recommendation, the Senior Advisor for Environmental Management to the Under Secretary for Science stated that EM intends to replace its current EM Cleanup Policy with two separate project and program management policies that will incorporate leading practices related to scope, cost, and schedule, and independent reviews, as appropriate. In February 2020, EM officials stated that EM is working on a Cleanup Project Management Policy (expected to be completed in spring 2020) that will cover the Decommissioning and Deactivation (D&D) phase of cleanup. EM plans to develop an additional Cleanup Program Management Policy (expected to be completed by the end of fiscal year 2020), which will supersede EM's current cleanup policy and include leading program management practices-and possibly also project management practices-related to scope, cost, schedule performance, and independent reviews.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Environmental Management to review and revise EM's 2017 cleanup policy to include project management leading practices related to scope, cost, schedule performance, and independent reviews. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: DOE concurred with this recommendation. In August 2019, in a letter to GAO on how EM will address our recommendation, the Senior Advisor for Environmental Management to the Under Secretary for Science stated that EM intends to replace its current EM Cleanup Policy with two separate project and program management policies that will incorporate leading practices related to scope, cost, and schedule, and independent reviews, as appropriate. In February 2020, EM officials stated that EM is working on a Cleanup Project Management Policy (expected to be completed in spring 2020) that will cover the Decommissioning and Deactivation (D&D) phase of cleanup. EM plans to develop an additional Cleanup Program Management Policy (expected to be completed by the end of fiscal year 2020), which will supersede EM's current cleanup policy and include leading program management practices-and possibly also project management practices-related to scope, cost, schedule performance, and independent reviews.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Environmental Management to update its cleanup policy to require that earned value management (EVM) systems be maintained and used in a way that follows EVM best practices. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE concurred with this recommendation. In August 2019, in a letter to GAO on how EM will address our recommendation, the Senior Advisor for Environmental Management to the Under Secretary for Science stated that EM intends to replace its current EM Cleanup Policy with two separate project and program management policies that will incorporate earned value management best practices, as appropriate. In February 2020, EM officials stated that EM's forthcoming Cleanup Project Management Policy (expected to be completed in spring 2020) will require capital asset projects covered under the policy to use earned value management (EVM) systems that have been independently certified, which is an EVM best practice. However, EM officials told us that this policy will not require operations activities to follow EVM best practices. EM officials stated that EM is also considering including this requirement in its forthcoming Cleanup Program Management Policy (expected to be completed by the end of fiscal year 2020). In addition, EM officials told is that EM plans to require future end-state contracts to use EVM systems that have either been certified by the DOE Office of Project Management or been subject to a "compliance review" conducted by EM itself, depending on the dollar value of the contract.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Environmental Management to develop a policy to ensure that work is categorized as level of effort only in appropriate, specified circumstances, such as when work is not measurable or when measurement is impractical. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE concurred with this recommendation. In August 2019, in a letter to GAO on how EM will address our recommendation, the Senior Advisor for Environmental Management to the Under Secretary for Science stated that EM intends to include requirements related to the categorization of level of effort work in the project and program management policies EM is developing.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Energy should direct the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Environmental Management to integrate EVM data into EM's performance metrics for operations activities. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: DOE partially concurred with this recommendation. In August 2019, in a letter to GAO on how EM will address our recommendation, the Senior Advisor for Environmental Management to the Under Secretary for Science stated that DOE is in the process of developing a Cleanup Program Management Policy that will, among other things, incorporate changes relative to the integration of EVM data into performance metrics as appropriate. As of February 2020, EM officials told us that the new policy is expected to be completed by the end of fiscal year 2020. In February 2020, EM officials stated that EM plans to begin a new performance review process for operations activities that will include EVM-based performance metrics as part of annual reporting to the Assistant Secretary. The new process is expected to begin in October 2020, but EM officials have not determined whether this will be a requirement included in EM's forthcoming Cleanup Program Management Policy.

Recommendation: The Director of BLM should identify the reasons internal control reviews were not completed (e.g., human capital and workforce), develop and implement a plan to address those reasons, and monitor state offices' progress toward completing required reviews. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of the Interior: Bureau of Land Management
Status: Open

Comments: In July 2019, BLM's Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management wrote a letter to GAO stating that the bureau agreed that there are additional opportunities to improve the Inspection and Enforcement program's internal control reviews and that policies should be updated and widely circulated. Specifically, BLM wrote that by early August 2020, the bureau will issue updated guidance and procedures for conducting internal control reviews and that this guidance would take the form of a manual, handbook or Instruction Memorandum. BLM also wrote that it is establishing teams to conduct internal control reviews, monitoring the status of any past-due reviews and actively engaging across its multiple state offices to ensure timely resolution. In late August 2020, BLM's Audit Liaison Officer informed GAO that due to competing workload priorities and key management vacancies, BLM now plans to implement this recommendation by the end of June 2021.

Recommendation: The Director of BLM should develop and document procedures for implementing internal control reviews under the July 2012 oversight policy. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of the Interior: Bureau of Land Management
Status: Open

Comments: In responding to our report, BLM stated that its July 2012 oversight policy, which expired in September 2013, should not have been allowed to lapse and given the importance of internal control reviews, the bureau will continue to use the July 2012 policy to conduct future reviews. In July 2019, BLM's Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management wrote a letter to GAO stating that the bureau agreed that there are additional opportunities to improve the Inspection and Enforcement program's internal control reviews and that policies should be updated and widely circulated. In addition, BLM wrote that by early August 2020, the bureau will issue updated guidance and procedures for conducting internal control reviews and that this guidance would take the form of a manual, handbook, or Instruction Memorandum. In late August 2020. BLM's Audit Liaison Officer informed GAO that due to competing workload priorities and key management vacancies, BLM now plans to implement this recommendation by the end of June 2021.

Recommendation: The Director of BLM should implement a risk-informed approach to scheduling and conducting internal control reviews that takes into account the risks to BLM's mission, such as those inherent in field offices' workload and workforce. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of the Interior: Bureau of Land Management
Status: Open

Comments: In July 2019, BLM's Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management wrote a letter to GAO stating that the bureau agreed that there are additional opportunities to improve the Inspection and Enforcement program's internal control reviews and that policies should be updated and widely circulated. Specifically, BLM wrote that by early August 2020, the bureau will issue updated guidance and procedures for conducting internal control reviews and that this guidance would take the form of a manual, handbook, or Instruction Memorandum. In addition, BLM noted that the guidance will help ensure that the bureau completes internal control reviews in a timely manner using a consistent risk-based approach. In late August 2020. BLM's Audit Liaison Officer informed GAO that due to competing workload priorities and key management vacancies, BLM now plans to implement this recommendation by the end of June 2021.

Recommendation: We recommend that the Director, DCMA, in collaboration with the Director, DCAA, develop a mechanism to monitor and assess whether contractor business systems reviews are being completed in a timely manner. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Defense: Defense Contract Management Agency
Status: Open

Comments: DCMA concurred with our recommendation and the department notified us in March 2019 that collaboration between DCMA and DCAA to develop a mechanism to increase oversight and improve management of contractor business system audits and determinations had begun. In September 2019, DCMA and DCAA provided lists of the business system reviews planned to be conducted during fiscal year 2020, showing that the data needed for oversight of all CBS reviews is available between the two agencies. Further, an April 2019 DCMA memorandum indicated that DCAA data on planned reviews for fiscal years 2019 and 2020 had been transferred to DCMA and that administrate contracting officers were to conduct risk assessments to identify additional reviews for DCAA to complete in the future. In August 2020, DCMA and DCAA specified the sources of the data provided earlier; DCAA data is collected through its strategic workload and resource initiative and inputted into the DCAA Management Information System while DCMA business system review data continues to be maintained by the functional offices responsible for those reviews. Both agencies stated that progress against planned reviews is tracked and status is reported to management at regular intervals. DCMA also noted a series of new tools designed to enhance surveillance of contractor business systems and implementation of corrective actions. These steps indicate progress towards increased insight into both the completion CBS review and the follow-up that occurs afterward. However It remains unclear to what extent data sharing between DCAA and DCMA to support CBS review planning has been formalized and will continue or the extent to which DCMA headquarters uses this data to assess implementation of its policies for the conduct of CBS reviews.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Air Force should (a) establish and implement a formal process to collect and monitor information on the extent to which all implemented IGSAs have resulted in financial and nonfinancial benefits and (b) document that process in Air Force IGSA policy or procedures. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Defense: Department of the Air Force
Status: Open

Comments: The Air Force concurred with this recommendation. When we confirm what actions the Air Force has taken in response to it, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Navy should (a) establish and implement a process to monitor whether Navy installations are evaluating opportunities for using IGSAs and to obtain explanations from installations on the outcome of their evaluations and (b) document that process in Navy IGSA policy or procedures. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of Defense: Department of the Navy
Status: Open

Comments: The Navy concurred with this recommendation, and in March 2019 the Department of the Navy directed Commander, Navy Installations Command to implement the recommendation. When we confirm any further actions the Navy has taken in response to it, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Commandant of the Marine Corps should (a) establish and implement a process to monitor whether Marine Corps installations are evaluating opportunities for using IGSAs and to obtain explanations from installations on the outcome of their evaluations and (b) document that process in Marine Corps IGSA policy or procedures. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: Department of Defense: United States Marine Corps
Status: Open

Comments: The Marine Corps did not concur with this recommendation. However, in written comments, DOD stated that the Department of the Navy would implement this recommendation and that it would be applicable to both the Navy and Marine Corps. In March 2019, the Department of the Navy directed Marine Corps Installation Command to implement the recommendation. When we confirm what actions the Marine Corps has taken in response to this direction, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Air Force should document in Air Force IGSA policy or procedures its process for monitoring whether Air Force installations are evaluating opportunities for using IGSAs. (Recommendation 8)

Agency: Department of Defense: Department of the Air Force
Status: Open

Comments: The Air Force concurred with this recommendation. When we confirm what actions the Air Force has taken in response to it, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: Once VA's new software for managing authorizations has been fully implemented, the Undersecretary for Health should monitor data on secondary authorization requests approval decision time frames to ensure VA medical facilities are in adherence with VA policy, assess the reasons for nonadherence with the policy, and take corrective actions as necessary. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VA agreed with our recommendation and stated that it has already taken steps to improve compliance with secondary authorization request approval timeframes.by identifying challenges, agreeing on improvement actions, and providing training. According to VA, its new Health Share Referral Manager system, which VA expects will be fully implemented across all medical facilities by December 2019, will automate secondary authorization request reporting and tracking. According to VA, it will utilize this new system to ensure compliance with secondary authorization request approval time frames.

Recommendation: The Undersecretary for Health should collect data and monitor compliance with the Choice Program contractual requirements pertaining to customer service for community providers, and take corrective actions as necessary. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VA agreed with our recommendation and stated that it currently does not have the ability to monitor and assess the performance of customer service operations under the Choice Program contracts. VA has included additional requirements for customer service in the Veterans Community Care Network request for proposals and plans to monitor compliance with these requirements under the Veterans Community Care Program. VA expects to implement this recommendation by December 2019.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Veterans Affairs should ensure that VA's Director of the Office of Acquisition and Logistics, in consultation with VA's Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization, takes measures to ensure that VA contracting staff adhere to the requirements for documenting the required Vendor Information Pages searches in contract files. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VA concurred with this recommendation and is taking steps to implement it. In August 2020, VA reported that it was beginning a process to update its contracting system to automate the inclusion of documentation of Vendor Information Pages searches in contract files. VA is also now tracking compliance rates. VA plans to provide GAO an update in fall 2020.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Veterans Affairs should ensure that the Director of the Office of Acquisition and Logistics conducts a fraud risk assessment for the Veterans First program. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VA concurred with this recommendation and is taking steps to implement it. In August 2020, VA provided GAO with a draft fraud risk assessment, and also reported that it is developing measures to mitigate identified risks. VA has not yet provided a date by which it plans to finalize its risk assessment and risk mitigation measures.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Veterans Affairs should ensure that the Director of the Office of Acquisition and Logistics directs the Risk Management and Compliance Service to share, through guidance, training, or other methods, subcontracting limitation risks and monitoring practices with contracting officers and their management. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VA concurred with this recommendation and is taking steps to implement it. In August 2020, VA provided draft lists of subcontracting limitations risks, as well as draft monitoring guidance and tools. After these items are finalized, VA plans to post them on a portal accessible to all VA contracting staff, but has yet to provide a date by which it expects to take this step.

Recommendation: The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should direct the Chief of Appeals, in coordination with the IRS Human Capital Office, to conduct a skills gap analysis specific to Appeals mission needs and develop a strategy for mitigating any identified gaps. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with this recommendation. As of April 2020, the Office of Appeals stated that it is working with the IRS Human Capital Office to design a questionnaire for all Appeals managers to identify the technical and organizational skills necessary to meet organizational short and long-term needs for the Appeals Officer position. This information will be used to conduct a skills gap analysis on the current Appeals workforce and to enhance the selection/hiring process to ensure future hires possess necessary skills. IRS plans to complete these actions by October 2020, and Appeals stated that time frame for this corrective action may be affected by budgetary and resource constraints. GAO will continue to monitor IRS's implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should evaluate the existing monitoring for collection due process appeal requests and address deficiencies in collection staff meeting the requirement for timely transfer to the Office of Appeals. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with this recommendation. In July 2019, IRS evaluated the existing monitoring for collection due process appeal requests to identify any impediments to collection staff timely transferring these requests to the Office of Appeals and provided the studies and related recommendations to GAO. The affected IRS collection units have developed action plans to address deficiencies in case transfer time. These plans include modifying inventory software to alert both staff and managers on the number of days collection due process requests have been under review. IRS also plans to update relevant IRM documentation in early 2020 to ensure that receipt dates of collection due process appeal requests are recorded for all cases and that there is appropriate notation of reasons why certain cases exceed established timeframes for transfer to the Office of Appeals. To fully implement this recommendation, IRS will need to provide GAO copies of the updated IRM as well as evidence of other corrective actions outlined in its evaluations of its monitoring procedures for collection due process appeal requests. GAO will continue to monitor the implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should establish timeframes and monitoring procedures for timely transfer of taxpayer appeals requests by examination compliance units to the Office of Appeals. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: IRS agreed with this recommendation. All four IRS business operating divisions have a corrective action plan and established and documented time frames for timely appeal transfer as of February 2020. While three business operating divisions have reporting procedures planned for monitoring timely appeal transfer, one division has not provided a plan for monitoring its timeliness in transferring cases to the Office of Appeals. To fully implement this recommendation, IRS needs to assess whether the planned monitoring actions will result in timely transfer of examination appeals. As of February 2020, data tracking the time from taxpayer request for appeal to when it is received by the Office of Appeals indicated that the actual transfer times are longer than the established time frames. Delays in transferring such requests can result in increased interest costs for taxpayers because interest continues to accumulate on the tax liability during the appeal process. Further, taxpayers unsure of their appeal status may call or write to IRS, tying up other IRS staff to respond to inquiries about appeals delayed in transfer. GAO will continue to monitor IRS's implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should direct the Chief of Appeals to regularly report and share with each compliance unit the data on the time elapsed between when a taxpayer requests an appeal to when it is received in the Office of Appeals. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with this recommendation. In February 2019, IRS stated that the Chief of Appeals will share with each compliance unit data on the time elapsed between when a taxpayer requests an appeal to when it is received in the Office of Appeals. Appeals will also conduct an assessment with IRS compliance units of the time elapsed between when a taxpayer requests an appeal to when it is received in the Office of Appeals and implement improvements based on that assessment. As of February 2020, Appeals demonstrated that it provided to compliance units initial example data that tracks the time from taxpayer request for appeal to when it is received by the Office of Appeals. As of April 2020, it continues to refine the format of these reports. Appeals said it plans to do an assessment of the data with compliance units and will provide an example of this analysis when it is complete. IRS plans to complete these actions by October 2020, and GAO will continue to monitor IRS's implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Commissioner of Internal Revenue should provide more transparency to taxpayers on historical average total appeal resolution times. This could include publishing average total resolution times by workstream on an Office of Appeals web page as well as including total expected times in the Appeals welcome letter. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with this recommendation. In February 2019, IRS stated that the Chief of Appeals will review appeal resolution times and participate in IRS-wide efforts to improve transparency of resolution timeframes. As of June 2019, the Office of Appeals explained that IRS was beginning to simplify its website, including the Appeals website, with a focus on making it more customer friendly. IRS plans to complete these actions by June 2020, and GAO will continue to monitor IRS's implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Treasury, consistent with its responsibilities under GPRAMA and Executive Orders for customer service, should ensure that the Commissioner of Internal Revenue takes action to make Appeals customer service standards and performance results more transparent to the public. This could include publishing customer service standards and related performance measure results on the Office of Appeals web page on IRS.gov. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: Treasury agreed with this recommendation and plans to monitor IRS implementation. In February 2019, IRS stated that it will publish customer service standards and related performance measure results on the Office of Appeals web page on IRS.gov. As of April 2020, the Office of Appeals stated it plans to use information from its redesigned customer satisfaction survey to address this recommendation and is determining how to include the performance information on its website. IRS plans to complete these actions by June 2020, and GAO will continue to monitor IRS's implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Treasury, consistent with its responsibilities under GPRAMA and Executive Orders for customer service, should ensure that the Commissioner of Internal Revenue takes action to develop a mechanism to solicit and consider public input and customer feedback on a regular basis on current and proposed IRS appeal policies and procedures. This could include leveraging existing IRS advisory bodies or establishing an Office of Appeals advisory body representing the taxpaying public, the tax practitioner community, and businesses to solicit customer perspectives. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: Treasury agreed with this recommendation and will monitor IRS implementation. In February 2019, IRS stated that it will leverage existing IRS advisory bodies to solicit customer perspectives. In January 2020, the Office of Appeals reported that it had begun to meet with the IRS Advisory Committee (IRSAC) to solicit customer perspectives, with its first interactions beginning in November 2019. The Office of Appeals stated that, in addition to this action, its leadership continues to meet with other external bodies to capture public input and customer feedback on an ad hoc basis. As of April 2020, the Office of Appeals stated it plans to participate in IRSAC's public meetings. Since the Office of Appeals has only begun leveraging IRSAC to solicit customer perspectives in November 2019 in a working session, GAO will continue to monitor the implementation of this recommendation to ensure sustained interaction with IRSAC through working sessions, as well as public meetings.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Interior should notify all participating entities to ensure they are aware of the Interim Federal Action Plan and their role in it. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of the Interior
Status: Open

Comments: The 2020 OMB Crosscut Budget states that the implementation of the Delta Plan has been conducted by the Delta Plan Interagency Implementation Committee, which was created in 2013, and includes participation and leadership from federal agencies at the regional and DC headquarters levels. It also states that the Council is primarily responsible for coordinating federal activities in the Delta. This language clarifies the role of federal agencies in relation to the Council and the Delta Plan, as we recommended. However, in December 2019, Bureau of Reclamation officials stated that they were not aware of any communication of federal agencies' role. We will continue to monitor this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Chair of CEQ should notify all participating entities to ensure they are aware of the Interim Federal Action Plan and their role in it. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Executive Office of the President: Council on Environmental Quality
Status: Open

Comments: The 2020 OMB Crosscut Budget states that the implementation of the Delta Plan has been conducted by the Delta Plan Interagency Implementation Committee, which was created in 2013, and includes participation and leadership from federal agencies at the regional and DC headquarters levels. It also states that the Council is primarily responsible for coordinating federal activities in the Delta. This language clarifies the role of federal agencies in relation to the Council and the Delta Plan, as we recommended. However as of January 2020, CEQ officials had not provided an update on this recommendation, although Bureau of Reclamation officials stated that they were not aware of any communication of federal agencies' role. We will continue to monitor this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Interior should coordinate with appropriate state entities to obtain and report the information available to meet the requirements under section 105 of the Calfed Bay-Delta Authorization Act (CALFED Act). (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of the Interior
Status: Open

Comments: In October 2019, Interior reported that the California Delta Stewardship Council (a state agency) had met twice and asked Reclamation to develop a template on financial detail for the Science Tracker, the Council's web-based tracking system. The Council compiles and reports on funding information and progress for federal and state agencies. The template will be used by a subgroup of agencies to collect their 2019 expenditures and this will be put into the Science Tracker in preparation for a February 15, 2020 reporting date. The subgroup is working on establishing common accounting and reporting protocols, supporting web-based tracking, and coordinating a review of science in the Delta.

Recommendation: The Director of OMB should coordinate with appropriate state entities to obtain and report the information available to meet the requirements under section 106 of the CALFED Act. (Recommendation 6)

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

Comments: As of January 2020, OMB staff did not provide an update. When we confirm what actions the agency has taken, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Director of OMB should direct staff to update OMB's written guidance for federal and state agencies on submitting data for the budget crosscut reports OMB is required to submit under section 106 of the CALFED Act. (Recommendation 7)

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

Comments: As of January 2020, OMB staff had not provided an update on this recommendation. When we confirm what actions the agency has taken, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: The Under Secretary for Health should work with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA's) Office of Construction and Facilities Management to ensure that VHA incorporates the 12 steps in the GAO Cost Estimating and Assessment Guide in VHA's updated construction projects' cost-estimating guidance. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs: Veterans Health Administration
Status: Open

Comments: The Office of Capital Asset Management Engineering and Support (OCAMES) is working with the Office of Construction and Facility Management (OCFM) to make necessary updates to CFM's Cost Estimating and Assessment Guide. GAO has reviewed VA's revisions and found that while they incorporated information on two of the 12 steps in GAO's Cost Estimating and Assessment Guide, the guidance currently meets or substantially meets only 4 of the 12 steps. GAO met with OCFM and OCAMES staff in April 2020 to further discuss our guidance and how to apply it. The VA staff will consider how to further apply our guidance.

Recommendation: The Under Secretary for Health should obtain information on cost increases, schedule delays, and reasons for contract modifications in its updated Capital Asset Database through requiring medical center staff to provide the information or another appropriate method. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs: Veterans Health Administration
Status: Open

Comments: OCAMES is finalizing updates and fixing issues related to improvements to the Capital Asset Database; these updates include additional information related to change orders. Due to unexpected challenges with data connections and issues; however, these improvements have not yet been completed. The change in completion date is caused by data connection issues and progress on the overall system was stalled. GAO will continue to monitor VA's progress in implementing this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Under Secretary for Health should develop a comprehensive plan that includes elements such as milestones and roles and responsibilities for updating VHA's Capital Asset Database. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs: Veterans Health Administration
Status: Open

Comments: OCAMES is still finalizing updates and fixing issues related to improvements to the Capital Asset Database. Until the updates have been finalized, roles and responsibilities cannot be created. Upon completion of updates, roles and responsibilities will be developed.

Recommendation: The acting Bank president and Board chairman should ensure that the Bank evaluates and implements methods to further promote and sustain an antifraud tone that permeates the Bank's organizational culture, as described in GAO's Fraud Risk Framework. This should include consideration of requiring training on fraud risks relevant to Bank programs, for new employees and all employees on an ongoing basis, with the training to include identifying roles and responsibilities in fraud risk management activities across the Bank. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Export-Import Bank of the United States
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2019, EXIM told us it continues work in this area and will provide us information on this work as it is completed. We will continue to monitor EXIM's progress in this area.

Recommendation: The acting Bank president and Board chairman should ensure that the Bank develops and implements an antifraud strategy with specific control activities, based upon the results of fraud risk assessments and a corresponding fraud risk profile, as provided in GAO's Fraud Risk Framework. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Export-Import Bank of the United States
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2019, EXIM told us it was in the final stages of its process for completing its antifraud strategy. We will continue to monitor EXIM's efforts in this area.

Recommendation: The acting Bank president and Board chairman should ensure that the Bank identifies, and then implements, the best options for sharing more fraud-related information--including details of fraud case referrals and outcomes--among Bank staff, to help build fraud awareness, as described in GAO's Fraud Risk Framework. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Export-Import Bank of the United States
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2019, EXIM stated that it is continuing to work with its Inspector General to implement this recommendation. We will continue to monitor EXIM's progress in this area.

Recommendation: The acting Bank president and Board chairman should lead efforts to collaborate with the Bank's OIG to identify a feasible, cost-effective means to systematically track outcomes of fraud referrals from the Bank to the OIG, including creating a means to link the OIG's proven cases of fraud to the specific Bank transactions from which the OIG actions arose. If any such means are found to be feasible and cost-effective, the acting Bank president and Board chairman should direct appropriate staff to implement them, with such information to be used for purposes consistent with GAO's Fraud Risk Framework, such as data analytics. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Export-Import Bank of the United States
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2019, EXIM stated that it is continuing to work with its Inspector General to implement this recommendation. We will continue to monitor EXIM's progress in this area.

Recommendation: The acting Bank president and Board chairman should ensure that the Bank monitors and evaluates outcomes of fraud risk management activities, using a risk-based approach and outcome-oriented metrics, and that it subsequently adapts antifraud activities or implements new ones, as determined to be appropriate and consistent with GAO's Fraud Risk Framework. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: Export-Import Bank of the United States
Status: Open

Comments: In November 2019, EXIM stated that it is continuing work to implement this recommendation. We will continue to monitor EXIM's progress in this area.

Recommendation: The Administrator of SBA should use its on-site and off-site reviews to routinely collect information on lenders' use of credit elsewhere criteria as part of its monitoring of lender practices related to the credit elsewhere requirement. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Small Business Administration
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: For the second and third recommendations, related to lender's use of the credit elsewhere criteria as part of its monitoring of lender practices, on June 11, 2019, SBA provided information on 7(a) lender reviews and summary reports. On September 27, 2019, we discussed these recommendations and SBA's responses with an SBA official. Specifically, we discussed the role of statistical sampling in addressing lender practices and SBA's selection of lenders for further review. On November 22, 2019, an SBA official stated that the agency plans to provide additional documentation in six months to further support actions taken. We will continue to monitor SBA's efforts to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Administrator of SBA should analyze information on lenders' use of credit elsewhere criteria obtained from its reviews to identify lenders that may be at greater risk of noncompliance and to inform its selection of lenders for further review for credit elsewhere compliance. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Small Business Administration
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: For the second and third recommendations, related to lender's use of the credit elsewhere criteria as part of its monitoring of lender practices, on June 11, 2019, SBA provided information on 7(a) lender reviews and summary reports. On September 27, 2019, we discussed these recommendations and SBA's responses with an SBA official. Specifically, we discussed the role of statistical sampling in addressing lender practices and SBA's selection of lenders for further review. On November 22, 2019, an SBA official stated that the agency plans to provide additional documentation in six months to further support actions taken. We will continue to monitor SBA's efforts to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Director of BLM should require cognizant officials in headquarters and state offices to conduct top-level reviews of field offices' monitoring of oil and gas lease suspensions, as well as of official lease files and databases to ensure they are current and complete. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of the Interior: Bureau of Land Management
Status: Open

Comments: BLM concurred with this recommendation. However, the Bureau has yet to provide information concerning the current status of this recommendation. We will update the recommendation's status when we receive such information.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should ensure that the Defense Laboratories Office routinely obtain and monitor defense laboratory hiring data to improve the oversight of the defense laboratories' use of hiring authorities. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation and cited steps the department was and would be taking to improve oversight and coordination of the defense laboratories' hiring efforts. In June 2018, DOD acknowledged receipt of our final report and stated that the department's overall position on the report had not changed. We will provide further updates once additional information is received.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should ensure that the Defense Laboratories Office develop performance measures to evaluate the effectiveness of the defense laboratories' use of hiring authorities as part of the labs' overall hiring to better inform future decision making about hiring efforts and policies. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation and cited steps the department was and would be taking to improve oversight and coordination of the defense laboratories' hiring efforts. In June 2018, DOD acknowledged receipt of our final report and stated that the department's overall position on the report had not changed. We will provide further updates once additional information is received.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should ensure that the Defense Laboratories Office, in collaboration with the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness and the Laboratory Quality Enhancement Panel's Personnel Subpanel, establish and document time frames for its coordination process to direct efforts across the relevant offices and help ensure the timely approval and implementation of hiring authorities. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation and cited steps the department was and would be taking to improve oversight and coordination of the defense laboratories' hiring efforts. In June 2018, DOD acknowledged receipt of our final report and stated that the department's overall position on the report had not changed. We will provide further updates once additional information is received.

Recommendation: The Administrator should direct the Chief Information Officer to address, in conjunction with the Chief Human Capital Officer, gaps in IT workforce planning by fully implementing the eight key IT workforce planning activities noted in this report. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Status: Open

Comments: NASA did not concur with this recommendation. As of October 2019, the agency reported that the Office of the Chief Information Officer was beginning its involvement with the agency's Mission Support Architecture Program which aims at re-aligning mission support functions from a decentralized model to an enterprise model. The office's participation in the re-alignment effort has an estimated completion date in fiscal year 2023.

Recommendation: The Administrator should direct the Chief Information Officer to address weaknesses in oversight practices and ensure routine oversight of all investments by taking action to document criteria for escalating investments among governance boards and establish procedures for tracking corrective actions for underperforming investments. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Status: Open

Comments: NASA concurred with this recommendation. In July 2018, NASA reported that the agency intended to address this recommendation by documenting its approach for governing IT investments. In February 2020, NASA reported that the agency remained committed to taking action to address this recommendation and reported that the Office of the Chief Information Officer had established a process to govern IT investment funds and had planned additional modifications for that framework. The agency now expects to complete actions to address this recommendation by November 2020.

Recommendation: The Administrator should ensure that the Chief Information Officer fully defines policies and procedures for developing the portfolio criteria, creating the portfolio, and evaluating the portfolio. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Status: Open

Comments: NASA concurred with this recommendation. In July 2018, NASA reported that it had begun updating policies and procedures for developing the portfolio criteria. In April 2019, NASA provided copies of its updated guidance. Among other things, the guidance described criteria for the portfolio and defined policies and procedures for creating the portfolio. As of April 2020, the agency had not yet provided evidence that it had developed policies and procedures for evaluating the portfolio. We plan to continue following up on the status of efforts to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Administrator should direct the Chief Information Officer to establish an agency-wide approach to managing cybersecurity risk that includes a cybersecurity strategy that, among other things, makes explicit the agency's risk tolerance, accepted risk assessment methodologies, a process for consistently evaluating risk across the organization, response strategies and approaches for monitoring risk over time, and priorities for risk management investments. (Recommendation 8)

Agency: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Status: Open

Comments: NASA concurred with this recommendation. In July 2018, NASA reported that it had hired a Chief Cybersecurity Risk Officer in April 2018 and that it had also approved a charter for an agency-wide Cybersecurity Integration Team. As of September 2020, NASA reported that it intends to deliver a cybersecurity risk management strategy that addresses the elements outlined in this recommendation by 2021.

Recommendation: The Administrator should direct the Chief Information Officer to establish an agency-wide approach to managing cybersecurity risk that includes policies and procedures with well-defined roles and responsibilities that are integrated and reflect NASA's current security practices and operating environment. (Recommendation 10)

Agency: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Status: Open

Comments: NASA concurred with this recommendation. As of September 2020, NASA reported that the Chief Information Officer had initiated a review of the agency's cyber policy management framework and that any related updates were expected to be completed by 2021.

Recommendation: The Director of BLM should systematically and comprehensively track the actual costs BLM incurs when reclaiming orphaned wells and the information, including the number of orphaned wells and inactive wells over time, necessary to determine the agency's potential liabilities. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of the Interior: Bureau of Land Management
Status: Open

Comments: BLM concurred with this recommendation and, in July 2019, the agency developed a new funding code to track the costs incurred when reclaiming orphaned wells and issued written guidance to state and field offices in order to implement the bureau-wide use of the code. Also in July 2019, BLM officials stated that the agency will expand existing reporting capabilities to provide the ability to track orphaned and inactive well records over time. As of September 2020, we are working to confirm what actions BLM has taken to track the number of orphaned and inactive wells over time, and we will provide updated information when we obtain it.

Recommendation: The Director of BLM should develop a resource management plan addressing resources needed for conducting well and bond adequacy reviews and reclaiming orphaned wells. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of the Interior: Bureau of Land Management
Status: Open

Comments: BLM officials stated that the agency conducts annual work planning processes which facilitates the decisions regarding the allocation of agency resources. In July 2019, BLM included additional language in its annual work plan that underscores the importance and relevance of well and bond adequacy reviews. The agency also developed a new fund code to track the actual reclamation costs incurred from reclaiming orphaned wells. The annual work plan also lists identifying and cataloging orphaned wells as a performance goal and the plan states that BLM is working with state regulatory agencies to plug wells within funding levels and state agreements. However, as of September 2020, absent identification of funds needed to reclaim orphaned wells and where those funds will come from, BLM does not have a plan to reclaim wells that are currently orphaned.

Recommendation: The Director of the Defense Security Service should determine how it will collaborate with stakeholders as it pilots a new approach to overseeing contractors with cleared facilities (DSS in Transition), including identifying roles and responsibilities and the related resources needed. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Defense: Defense Security Service
Status: Open

Comments: DOD agreed with this recommendation and as of February 2019, stated that it continues to pilot DSS in Transition at cleared facilities and use information gathered from stakeholders, including key government and industry stakeholder organizations to refine the process. On August 12, 2020, DOD stated that DSS was in the process of drafting a Corrective Action Plan. At that time, DOD officials explained that this plan would be completed in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2019. As of September 2020, this plan has not been completed.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Treasury, as the chair of CFIUS, and working with member agencies, should coordinate member agencies' efforts to better understand the staffing levels needed to address the current and projected CFIUS workload associated with core committee functions. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In commenting on the report in February 2018, Treasury concurred with the recommendation. In December 2018, Treasury noted that the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act of 2018 requires each CFIUS member agency to submit detailed spending plans annually for seven years to appropriate congressional committees, including estimated expenditures and staffing levels, and requires annual testimony for seven years from the CFIUS staff chairperson regarding anticipated resource needs. As of November 2019, GAO continues to monitor this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for the Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH) should complete workforce planning for the MTW demonstration to help ensure that PIH has sufficient staff with appropriate skills and competencies to manage an expanded demonstration, including reviewing reports and carrying out compliance reviews in a timely manner. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that PIH was continuing its workforce planning efforts, including assessing the knowledge, skills, and abilities needed to implement the MTW expansion.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should more fully document the process for annually assessing compliance with the five demonstration requirements. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that they had drafted written protocols for assessing compliance with the five demonstration requirements that would be finalized by May 2019.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should develop and implement a process to track how MTW demonstration funds are being used for other allowable activities, including local, nontraditional activities. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that they were still determining the most cost effective way to track MTW demonstration funds being used for local, nontraditional activities.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should identify and implement changes to PIC to capture household data for households served through local, nontraditional activities. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that HUD planned to add fields for capturing data on households served through local, nontraditional activities to the next generation of PIC for expansion MTW agencies, which would be implemented in the summer of 2020. Officials said HUD is currently in the process of determining how the next generation of PIC will be rolled out for existing MTW agencies.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should develop and implement a process to monitor MTW agencies' reserves. (Recommendation 5)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that they planned to monitor existing MTW agencies' Housing Choice Voucher reserves by revising their annual reporting requirements to require them to report their plans for and use of reserves.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should clarify HUD's rent-reform definition for the MTW demonstration as part of a framework for monitoring the effect of rent-reform, work-requirement, and time-limit policies on tenants. (Recommendation 6)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that PIH would clarify the definition of rent reform for existing MTW agencies in a document responding to frequently asked questions on the annual reporting requirements and for expansion agencies in the operations notice that it was finalizing for the expansion of the MTW program.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should set parameters for HUD's definition of self-sufficiency for the demonstration, either by providing one definition or a range of options from which agencies could choose, as part of a framework for monitoring the effect of rent-reform, work-requirement, and time-limit policies on tenants. (Recommendation 7)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that they planned to provide a range of suggested options for defining self-sufficiency in a document responding to frequently asked questions about the annual reporting requirements for MTW agencies.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should revise HUD's guidance to MTW agencies to make it clear which elements are required in impact analyses, annual reevaluations, and hardship policies and the information required for each element as part of a framework for monitoring the effect of rent-reform, work-requirement, and time-limit policies on tenants. (Recommendation 8)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that they planned to make it clear which elements are required in impact analyses, annual reevaluations, and hardship policies in the operations notice HUD was finalizing for the expansion of the MTW program. Further, HUD officials stated that the 2016 Appropriations Act that extended the standard agreement for the existing 39 MTW agencies limits HUD's ability to revise its guidance for these agencies to make it clear which elements are required in impact analyses, annual reevaluations, and hardship policies and the information required for each element. However, they stated that guidance related to the hardship policy and annual reevaluations has been updated to include more specific parameters for what an agency must submit to HUD. As we stated in our report, this guidance is set forth outside the standard agreement, which HUD already has revised without changes to the standard agreement. Therefore, we continue to believe that HUD could revise its guidance for the existing agencies to clarify which elements are required for these documents and the information each element should include.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should develop written guidance for existing MTW agencies that requires a hardship policy for public housing time limits and encourages an impact analysis, annual reevaluation, and hardship policy for work-requirement and time-limit policies for public housing and voucher programs as part of a framework for monitoring the effect of these policies on tenants. (Recommendation 9)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that they had updated their most recent annual reporting requirements for MTW agencies to require a hardship policy for public housing time limits and that they were working on finalizing guidance to existing MTW agencies encouraging an impact analysis, annual reevaluation, and hardship policy for work-requirement and time-limit policies for public housing and voucher programs.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should require an impact analysis, annual reevaluation, and hardship policy for work-requirement and time-limit policies new MTW agencies adopt for their public housing and voucher programs as part of a framework for monitoring the effect of these policies on tenants. (Recommendation 10)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that the operations notice they were finalizing for the expansion of the MTW program would require an impact analysis, annual reevaluation, and hardship policy for work-requirement and time-limit policies new MTW agencies adopt for their public housing and voucher programs.

Recommendation: The Assistant Secretary for PIH should develop and implement a plan for analyzing the information that agencies report on the effect of rent-reform, work-requirement, and time-limit policies on tenants as part of a framework for monitoring the effect of these policies on tenants. (Recommendation 11)

Agency: Department of Housing and Urban Development
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In February 2020, HUD officials stated that they planned to develop separate analysis plans for existing and expansion MTW agencies due to differences in the types of performance information HUD can require them to report under their MTW agreements.

Recommendation: The Administrator of CMS should provide guidance and clarify requirements regarding the monitoring and reporting of deficiencies that states using home and community-based services (HCBS) waivers are required to report on their annual reports. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: CMS concurred with this recommendation and indicated the agency would provide guidance and clarify requirements regarding the monitoring and reporting of deficiencies in states' annual reports. According to CMS's fiscal year 2021 Budget Justification the agency expects to issue sub-regulatory guidance pertaining to health and welfare of Medicaid beneficiaries in residential facilities by the close of 2020.To fully implement this recommendation, the sub-regulatory guidance should clarify requirements for states' monitoring and reporting of deficiencies in HCBS annual reports. GAO will continue to monitor CMS actions in response to this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Administrator of CMS should establish standard Medicaid reporting requirements for all states to annually report key information on critical incidents, considering, at a minimum, the type of critical incidents involving Medicaid beneficiaries, and the type of residential facilities, including assisted living facilities, where critical incidents occurred. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: HHS neither agreed nor disagreed with this recommendation. According to CMS' fiscal year 2021 Budget Justification, the agency expects to issue sub-regulatory guidance pertaining to health and welfare of Medicaid beneficiaries in residential facilities by the close of 2020. To fully implement this recommendation, the sub-regulatory guidance should establish standard Medicaid reporting requirements for all states to report critical incidents annually. GAO will continue to monitor CMS actions in response to this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Administrator of CMS should ensure that all states submit annual reports for HCBS waivers on time as required. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: CMS concurred with this recommendation and stated that it will review and update its communications with states to reaffirm reporting requirements and ensure that all HCBS annual reports are submitted on time. According to CMS' fiscal year 2021 Budget Justification, the agency expects to issue sub-regulatory guidance pertaining to the health and welfare of Medicaid beneficiaries in residential facilities by the close of 2020. To fully implement this recommendation, the sub-regulatory guidance should ensure that all states submit annual reports on time. GAO will continue to monitor CMS actions in response to this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Transportation should develop and implement a comprehensive plan to better manage departmental initiatives related to automated vehicles. This plan should include leading principles such as goals, priorities, steps to achieve results, milestones, and performance measures to track progress. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In July 2018, DOT released an initial plan related to this recommendation in response to congressional direction. This plan outlines DOT's overall approach for managing policy and research issues related to automated vehicles across DOT's modal administrations. In January 2020, DOT and the National Science and Technology Council released Ensuring American Leadership in Automated Vehicle Technologies (AV 4.0), building on prior policies that DOT has identified as actions regarding its implementation of GAO's recommendation. DOT has yet to identify, for example, performance measures to monitor and gauge results. Without a comprehensive plan, it continues to be unclear whether DOT is adequately tackling automated vehicle challenges.

Recommendation: To improve agencies' physical security programs' alignment with the ISC Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government for information and monitoring, the Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, with regard to the updated Security Policy and Procedures Handbook, should include data collection and analysis requirements for monitoring the performance of CBP's physical security program.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security: United States Customs and Border Protection
Status: Open

Comments: The U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued an updated Physical Security Policy and Procedures Handbook in January 2020, which includes a series of internal controls and physical security performance measures. We have reviewed the handbook and requested additional information from CBP to determine whether it meets ISC's Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities.

Recommendation: To improve agencies' physical security programs' alignment with the ISC Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government for information and monitoring, the Secretary of Transportation should direct the FAA Administrator to develop a plan that provides sufficient details on the activities needed and time frames within the date when FAA will implement an improved methodology.

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has developed, initially tested, and deployed a risk assessment methodology that aligns with the Interagency Security Committee Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities. In August and September of 2019, FAA trained some staff on the new methodology, which is being integrated into the facility security reporting system. After resolving any software compatibility issues, completing all necessary testing and training, and issuing the associated security policy, FAA expects to fully implement the methodology by December 31, 2020.

Recommendation: To improve agencies' physical security programs' alignment with the ISC Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government for information and monitoring, the Secretary of Transportation should direct the FAA Administrator to update FAA's policy to require the use of a methodology that fully aligns with the ISC's Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities for assessing all undesirable events, considering all three factors of risk, and documenting all deviations from the standard countermeasures.

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) drafted an updated facility security policy and distributed it for comment in October 2019. It received over 300 comments that are currently being addressed. Once completed, the policy is to incorporate a methodology that fully aligns with the Interagency Security Committee Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities for assessing all undesirable events, considering all three factors of risk, and documenting all deviations from the standard countermeasures. FAA plans to publish the new policy to coincide with the implementation of its risk-assessment methodology by December 31, 2020.

Recommendation: To improve agencies' physical security programs' alignment with the ISC Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government for information and monitoring, the Secretary of Transportation should direct the FAA Administrator to update FAA's policy to include ongoing monitoring of physical security information.

Agency: Department of Transportation
Status: Open

Comments: The Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) update of its facility security policy and its associated databases should help to improve the monitoring and use of physical security information to better assist with risk assessment decision-making. In February 2020, FAA officials said that its facility security reporting system is to be improved with new metrics and executive level reporting. Such improvements are to result in increased program oversight, risk awareness, and mitigation planning. These improvements are to be completed by December 31, 2020 to coincide with full implementation of the components of the risk management framework, such as the risk assessment methodology, personnel training, and policy publication.

Recommendation: To improve agencies' physical security programs' alignment with the ISC Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government for information and monitoring, the Secretary of Agriculture should include data collection and analysis requirements for monitoring the performance of agencies' physical security programs, in the department's revised physical-security manual.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: The U.S. Department of Agriculture is drafting a revised physical-security regulation and manual that is to align with risk management processes, including a tracking and monitoring component. It expects to implement a revised process by the end of 2020.

Recommendation: To improve agencies' physical security programs' alignment with the ISC Risk Management Process for Federal Facilities and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government for information and monitoring, the Secretary of Agriculture should direct the Administrator of the Agricultural Research Service and the Chief of the Forest Service to implement and monitor a long-term assessment schedule with key milestones to ensure that higher-level facilities are reassessed at least once every 3 years.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recognizes the need to develop and implement a database to track and monitor physical security assessment schedules across all of its components. As a result, USDA plans to request funding in the President's Budget for fiscal year 2021 to design and build such a database. If sufficient funding is secured and development efforts go as planned, the agency anticipates having the database operational by the end of 2021.

Recommendation: The Administrator of CMS should require plan sponsors to report to CMS on investigations and other actions taken related to providers who prescribe high amounts of opioids. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: HHS did not concur with this recommendation. As of September 2019, HHS had not provided information on actions taken to implement it. We will update its status when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: The Administrator of RHS should develop and implement a plan for ongoing monitoring, including testing and evaluation, of the obligation tool using relevant data. (Recommendation 1)

Agency: Department of Agriculture: Rural Housing Service
Status: Open

Comments: In June 2019, RHS said that implementing the recommendation would require information technology funding.

Recommendation: The Administrator of RHS should develop controls to check the reasonableness of rental assistance agreement amounts calculated by the obligation tool. (Recommendation 2)

Agency: Department of Agriculture: Rural Housing Service
Status: Open

Comments: In June 2019, RHS said that implementing the recommendation would require information technology funding.

Recommendation: The Administrator of RHS should develop controls to ensure that RHS uses the inflation rates from the President's economic assumptions in developing budget estimates. (Recommendation 3)

Agency: Department of Agriculture: Rural Housing Service
Status: Open

Comments: In June 2019, RHS said it would incorporate the recommended controls into the fiscal year 2021 budget cycle.

Recommendation: The Administrator of RHS should provide guidance to Rural Development state offices that specifies that prior to obligating funds, staff are to review information related to a property's mortgage servicing status. (Recommendation 4)

Agency: Department of Agriculture: Rural Housing Service
Status: Open

Comments: In June 2019, RHS said it was working toward providing the recommended guidance to Rural Development state offices.

Recommendation: To improve oversight of school finances and provide better information to schools and the public about its monitoring efforts, the Chief Operating Officer of the Office of Federal Student Aid should update the composite score formula to better measure schools' financial conditions and capture financial risks.

Agency: Department of Education: Office of Federal Student Aid
Status: Open

Comments: In September 2019, Education published updated regulations related to the financial responsibility composite score that include steps to address some of the limitations identified in our report. For instance, these regulations incorporate changes to better align the composite score calculations with recently updated accounting standards related to leases. In additional, these regulatory changes are designed to curb the ability of schools to manipulate their composite scores by clarifying what is considered "long-term debt" and requiring schools to disclose in their financial statements the terms of the debt and certify that the funds were used for capitalized assets rather than to fund operations. However, these regulatory updates do not fully address the current limitations of the composite score formula. For example, they do not reflect several other changes in accounting standards identified in our report or incorporate new financial metrics that would provide a broader indication of schools' financial health, such as liquidity, historical trend analysis, or future projections. Education has stated that it intends to explore further updates to the composite score methodology in future regulatory actions, and we will continue to monitor these efforts.

Recommendation: To improve oversight of school finances and provide better information to schools and the public about its monitoring efforts, the Chief Operating Officer of the Office of Federal Student Aid should improve guidance to schools about how the financial composite score is calculated, for example, by updating current guidance to include explanations about common areas of confusion and misinterpretation for schools.

Agency: Department of Education: Office of Federal Student Aid
Status: Open

Comments: Education agreed with this recommendation and that additional general guidance to schools would be helpful. The department also stated that it will update the guidance in its Federal Student Aid Handbook and may provide answers and related guidance to some frequently asked questions on its website. As of October 2019, Education had not completed these actions.

Recommendation: To improve CMS's oversight of states' MLTSS programs, the Administrator of CMS should take steps to identify and obtain key information needed to oversee states' efforts to monitor beneficiary access to quality services, including, at a minimum, obtaining information specific to network adequacy, critical incidents, and appeals and grievances.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) agreed with this recommendation. In December 2017, HHS communicated its intent to review regulations and enhance its capacity to measure, monitor, and improve care and quality across a number of domains, including MLTSS. As of February 2020, HHS stated that it is developing guidance related to reporting on key information needed to oversee beneficiary access to care. GAO will continue to monitor the department's actions and any steps taken to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To provide reasonable assurance that USRAP applicant fraud prevention and detection controls are adequate and effectively implemented, the Secretaries of Homeland Security and State should conduct regular joint assessments of applicant fraud risk across USRAP.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: We reported that the Department of State and DHS's U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) have not jointly assessed applicant fraud risks across the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP), consistent with federal internal control standards and leading practices for fraud risk management. Specifically, we reported that although State and USCIS perform a number of fraud risk management activities and have responded to individual instances of applicant fraud in the program, these efforts do not position State and USCIS to assess fraud risks program-wide for USRAP or know if their controls are appropriately targeted to the areas of highest risk in the program. Therefore, we recommended that the Secretaries of Homeland Security and State conduct regular joint assessments of applicant fraud risk across USRAP. USCIS concurred with our recommendation. In response, State reported that it will work together with USCIS to conduct joint risk assessments by jointly developing a risk assessment framework. According to DHS and State documentation, the departments finalized a joint framework in January 2018. In February 2019, DHS and State provided us with the interim progress report on their efforts to conduct an assessment of applicant fraud risk across USRAP. In June 2019, USCIS reported that DHS and State have completed the planned analysis and the draft report is being prepared for leadership review and clearance. DHS estimated that the report will be completed by September 30, 2020. To fully address the recommendation, State and USCIS should jointly conduct regular fraud risk assessments across USRAP.

Recommendation: To provide reasonable assurance that USRAP applicant fraud prevention and detection controls are adequate and effectively implemented, the Secretaries of Homeland Security and State should conduct regular joint assessments of applicant fraud risk across USRAP.

Agency: Department of State
Status: Open

Comments: We reported that the Department of State and DHS's U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) have not jointly assessed applicant fraud risks across the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP), consistent with federal internal control standards and leading practices for fraud risk management. Specifically, we reported that although State and USCIS perform a number of fraud risk management activities and have responded to individual instances of applicant fraud in the program, these efforts do not position State and USCIS to assess fraud risks program-wide for USRAP or know if their controls are appropriately targeted to the areas of highest risk in the program. Therefore, we recommended that the Secretaries of Homeland Security and State conduct regular joint assessments of applicant fraud risk across USRAP. USCIS concurred with our recommendation. In response, State reported that it will work together with USCIS to conduct joint risk assessments by jointly developing a risk assessment framework. According to DHS and State documentation, the departments finalized a joint framework in January 2018. In February 2019, DHS and State provided us with the interim progress report on their efforts to conduct an assessment of applicant fraud risk across USRAP. In June 2019, USCIS reported that DHS and State have completed the planned analysis and the draft report is being prepared for leadership review and clearance. DHS estimated that the report will be completed by September 30, 2020. To fully address the recommendation, State and USCIS should jointly conduct regular fraud risk assessments across USRAP.

Recommendation: To help ensure that efforts to address smuggling through cross-border tunnels, ultralight aircraft, panga boats, and recreational vessels are effective and that managers and stakeholders have the information needed to make decisions, the Secretary of Homeland Security should direct the Commissioner of CBP to assess and document how the alternative technological solutions being considered will fully meet operational needs related to ultralight aircraft.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS concurred with this recommendation and stated that it plans to assess and document requirements related to ultralight aircraft threats and how technological solutions will address these requirements as part of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Air and Marine Operations (AMO) air domain awareness efforts. In March 2018, CBP completed an Air Domain Awareness Capability Analysis Report that identifies current capability gaps, including those related to ultralight aircraft. CBP stated that it plans to build upon the Capability Analysis Report to identify mission needs, a concept of operations, and operational requirements to address ultralight aircraft and other threats in the air domain. In February 2020, AMO reported that, in 2019, it conducted a technical assessment of one technology and plans to assess other systems in 2020 and 2021 to help determine if they fit into AMO's larger strategic vision for persistent wide area surveillance to address ultralight aircraft and other threats in the air domain. To fully address our recommendation, CBP should assess and document how alternative solutions will meet operational requirements related to ultralight aircraft.

Recommendation: To help ensure that efforts to address smuggling through cross-border tunnels, ultralight aircraft, panga boats, and recreational vessels are effective and that managers and stakeholders have the information needed to make decisions, the Secretary of Homeland Security should direct the Commissioner of CBP and the Director of ICE to jointly establish and monitor performance measures and targets related to cross-border tunnels.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS concurred with this recommendation and stated that U.S. Customs and Border Protection and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will review available information and develop performance measures and targets as deemed appropriate. As of March 2020, CBP and ICE have not reported taking any actions to develop performance measures and targets. To fully address our recommendation, CBP and ICE should establish and monitor performance measures and targets related to cross-border tunnels.

Recommendation: To help ensure that efforts to address smuggling through cross-border tunnels, ultralight aircraft, panga boats, and recreational vessels are effective and that managers and stakeholders have the information needed to make decisions, the Secretary of Homeland Security should direct the Commissioner of CBP to establish and monitor performance targets related to ultralight aircraft.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS concurred and stated that within U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Air and Marine Operations and the U.S. Border Patrol are developing a joint performance measure and targets for interdicting ultralight aircraft. However, in December 2019, CBP reported that it will no longer pursue establishing a performance measure because it found that the ultralight aircraft interdiction rate fluctuated year to year, and that the number of ultralight aircraft incidents had been trending downward. Subsequently, in September 2020, CBP officials stated that they had reinitiated efforts to develop a performance measure and target in response to our continued belief that they can be set and would help CBP monitor performance to ensure that technology investments and operational responses to address ultralight aircraft are effective. To fully address our recommendation, CBP should establish a measure and monitor performance related to ultralight aircraft.

Recommendation: To help ensure that efforts to address smuggling through cross-border tunnels, ultralight aircraft, panga boats, and recreational vessels are effective and that managers and stakeholders have the information needed to make decisions, the Secretary of Homeland Security should direct the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)-U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) tunnel committee to convene and establish standard operating procedures for addressing cross-border tunnels, including procedures for sharing information.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS did not concur with this recommendation. However, CBP and ICE agreed that strengthening operational procedures may be beneficial and stated that they will jointly review procedures and discuss revising and/or consolidating the procedures. In May 2018, CBP stated that it is looking for opportunities to standardize procedures for the detection, interdiction, mapping, and remediation of cross-border tunnels. To this end, CBP has plans to develop a standardized training on tunnel identification and tactics, techniques, and procedures for different types of tunnels. In addition, CBP is working to develop a consistent process that will facilitate coordination and collaboration with ICE. In March 2019, CBP reported that CBP and ICE have begun to routinely meet to collectively develop processes for using tunnel robotics, including processes to enhance communication between CBP and ICE. In September 2020, CBP and ICE reported that they do not plan to take any additional steps to address this recommendation. To fully address our recommendation, CBP and ICE should establish standardized procedures for addressing tunnels, including procedures for sharing information with one another.

Recommendation: To help ensure that efforts to address smuggling through cross-border tunnels, ultralight aircraft, panga boats, and recreational vessels are effective and that managers and stakeholders have the information needed to make decisions, the Secretary of Homeland Security should direct the Commandant of the Coast Guard, Commissioner of CBP, and the Director of ICE to establish and monitor Regional Coordinating Mechanisms performance measures and targets related to panga boat and recreational vessel smuggling.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: DHS did not concur with this recommendation. DHS stated that that it believes that by establishing common terminology to address our first recommendation, the RECOMs will have more reliable, usable analyses to inform their maritime interdiction efforts. However, DHS did not believe that performance measures and targets related to smuggling by panga boats would provide the most useful strategic assessment of operations to prevent all illicit trafficking, regardless of area of operations or mode of transportation. DHS also cited the recent creation of the DHS Office of Policy, Strategy, and Plans that is to work with U.S. Coast Guard, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and other components and offices to better evaluate the effectiveness of all operations that work to prevent the illegal entry of goods and people into the country, as appropriate. In February 2020, DHS reported that the department had not taken any further actions to implement this recommendation. We continue to believe that the recommendation is valid and will monitor any actions DHS takes that are responsive to it. For example, in response to a requirement in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017, DHS issued reports in May 2018, February 2019, and August 2020 that contain metrics and planned metrics to measure the effectiveness of border security in the maritime environment and other domains. Planned metrics that DHS does not yet have a methodology to measure across all components include situational awareness in the maritime environment, illicit drugs removal rate, and DHS maritime threat response rate. To fully address our recommendation, DHS should measure its performance related to smuggling across U.S. maritime borders.

Recommendation: To improve consistency in CMS oversight of federal spending under section 1115 demonstrations, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should require the Administrator of CMS to develop and document standard operating procedures for monitoring spending under demonstrations that (1) require setting reporting requirements for states that provide CMS the data elements needed for CMS to assess compliance with demonstration spending limits; (2) require consistent enforcement of states' compliance with financial reporting requirements; and (3) require consistent tracking of the amount of unspent funds under demonstration spending limits.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has taken steps to improve the consistency of oversight of federal spending under section 1115 demonstrations. In November 2018, HHS officials reported that they have developed draft guidance, including a standard reporting tool for states, to better ensure consistent reporting of the elements needed to assess compliance with demonstration spending limits and was in the process of testing the tool with two states. In addition, the agency is developing standard operating procedures for agency staff to require consistent tracking of unspent funds under the spending limit. As of November 2019, HHS has not provided any updates. GAO will continue to monitor HHS's actions and once procedures are in place, GAO will assess whether they address our recommendation.

Recommendation: To improve management and oversight of the SAVE program, the director of USCIS should develop and implement a mechanism to oversee agencies' completion of training on additional verification in accordance with SAVE MOA provisions and program policies.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security: United States Citizenship and Immigration Services
Status: Open

Comments: In March 2017, we found that USCIS does not track or monitor whether SAVE users have completed training and therefore does not have reasonable assurance that users have mastered SAVE policies and procedures prior to accessing the system. We recommended that USCIS develop and implement a mechanism to oversee agencies' completion of training on additional verification in accordance with SAVE provisions and program policies. The USCIS Verification Division reported that it planned to address providing additional training for SAVE users developed by December 31, 2017. The SAVE Program would then offer training events for agencies on the new material reflecting the agency user requirements for additional verification as well as system enhancements. In September 2017, the Verification Division implemented part one of this recommendation, a monthly webinar training session on user agency responsibilities and additional verification. This training can also be delivered to user agencies upon request. For part two of this recommendation, the SAVE program also developed training features to oversee agencies' completion of training. These training features are a system enhancement that will be incorporated into SAVE's overall modernization effort and was expected to be completed by September 30, 2019. In the interim, SAVE is implementing several other enhancements that will reduce the number of cases sent to additional verification, including the completion of modernized matching logic and initial verification screens and retiring less efficient access methods. In September 2019, SAVE officials told us that SAVE has reduced the number of cases sent to additional verification by retiring inefficient access methods and completing modernization of SAVE matching logic and initial verification screens. However, SAVE officials said they also determined that they must update the SAVE tutorial platform and content to account for these and other changes. Officials said that while SAVE is updated, the program continues to provide training, resources, and other support to user agencies to help ensure they are performing additional verification in accordance with SAVE MOA provisions and program policies. The new estimated completion date is February 28, 2021.

Recommendation: To improve the awareness of how risk-significant radioactive sources are transported within the United States and to better determine whether Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is meeting its goal of providing reasonable assurance for preventing the theft or diversion of these dangerous materials, the Chairman of NRC should take actions to collect information from licensees on the number of shipments and mode of transport for such sources--for example, by identifying the extent to which an existing NRC database (e.g., the National Source Tracking System) may be used to capture this information.

Agency: Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Status: Open

Comments: In its February 26, 2018 report to Congress on actions NRC has taken in response to GAO recommendations, NRC continued to disagree with the recommendation to expand its existing data collection requirements or to transition such information from its existing NRC databases to the NSTS. NRC stated that, as required by 10 CFR Part 37, "Physical Protection of Category 1 and Category 2 Quantities of Radioactive Material," the NRC currently collects the number of shipments and mode of transport for domestic transfers, and the import and export of Category 1 quantities of radioactive material. Additionally, under the provisions of 10 CFR Part 110, "Export and Import of Nuclear Material," the NRC stated that it collects the number of shipments and mode of transport for the import and export of shipments containing Category 2 or higher quantities of radioactive material. The NRC stated that it is the agency's position that the current information collected provides the NRC with an understanding of the potential modes of transport for Category 1 and 2 quantities of radioactive material and existing regulatory requirements provide robust protection for all such modes. The NRC stated that it does not consider the proposed additional information collection activity to be of sufficient safety or security benefit to justify the associated regulatory actions it would require. In August 2019, and again in August 2020, the NRC reaffirmed its disagreement with this recommendation and that it did not intend to take action to implement it. Despite its disagreement with this recommendation, we will continue to monitor whether NRC takes any actions that would result in addressing the concern GAO raised.

Recommendation: To assist IRA owners in addressing challenges associated with investing their retirement savings in unconventional assets, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue should provide guidance to IRA owners and custodians on how to determine and document fair market value (FMV) for certain categories of hard-to-value unconventional assets. For example, IRS could consider updating Form 5498 instructions to custodians on how to document FMV for hard-to-value assets (e.g., last-known FMV based on independent appraisal, acquisition price) and provide guidance directed at account owners that provides examples of how to ascertain FMV for different types of unconventional assets.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed that guidance should be provided to IRA owners and custodians. In 2018, IRS stated that it had discussed this issue with Counsel and Treasury, and it was agreed that fair market value would be a part of the IRA guidance project under the 2017 Priority Guidance Plan. IRS officials said that these new regulations would address FMV for certain categories of hard-to-value unconventional assets. IRS further noted that it would be premature to modify instructions and guidance to custodians on how to determine and document FMV for hard-to- value assets until the new regulations are issued. In their October 2019 update of planned guidance projects, Treasury's Office of Tax Policy and IRS still listed planned IRA regulations. GAO will not close this recommendation as implemented until the new valuation guidance is issued.

Recommendation: To achieve a better understanding of the effect of certain Personal care services (PCS) services on beneficiaries and a more consistent administration of policies and procedures across PCS programs, the Acting Administrator of CMS should collect and analyze states' required information on the impact of the Participant-Directed Option and Community First Choice programs on the health and welfare of beneficiaries as well as the state quality measures for the Participant-Directed Option and Community First Choice programs.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) concurred with GAO's recommendation. On December 30, 2016, the agency issued guidance on the Community First Choice program to assist states in submitting information to CMS on the health and welfare of beneficiaries. In March 2019, CMS officials stated that the agency is currently developing the process for states to report this information to CMS. Agency officials also stated they are exploring the value of collecting this information for the Participant-Directed Option program given the limited number of states currently operating under this authority. In February 2020, CMS officials stated that the agency continues to develop policy related to this recommendation.

Recommendation: To improve the management of DOD's credentialing program and better determine whether the program is achieving its desired results, the Secretary of Defense should direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to develop and implement program performance measures that include key attributes, such as a baseline and goals, that can be used to assess performance.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD did not concur with our recommendation to develop and implement performance measures for its credentialing program. In its response to the recommendation, DOD stated that servicemembers are not required to earn credentials and more than half of the credentials earned by servicemembers are voluntary. Therefore, establishing criteria that might create an incentive to force servicemembers into earning voluntary credentials would be counterproductive. DOD also stated that a basic reporting system is in place that captures credential attainment and associated costs that provides basic information to gauge the program's performance. As of April 2020, the department still does not plan to develop performance measures for the program.

Recommendation: To provide agencies access to SSA's more complete set of death data, Congress should consider amending the Social Security Act to explicitly allow SSA to share its full death file with Treasury for use through the DNP working system.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: In fiscal year 2020, the Senate passed S.4104, which included language to address the recommendation. In the context of the Do Not Pay (DNP) working system, the bill, if enacted, would authorize comparison of the Social Security Administration's (SSA) full death file with personally identifiable information reviewed through the working system and would allow redisclosure of such comparison of information to any federal or state agency authorized to use the working system. As of July 15, 2020, the House has not introduced a related bill for fiscal year 2020. Additionally, in February 2020, the administration released its President's 2021 Budget, which proposes legislation to allow the DNP Business Center full access to the SSA full death file. This proposal would include the Department of the Treasury and the SSA working together to determine the most efficient manner to make full death information available for use in preventing improper payment and fraud. We will continue to monitor congressional legislation to address this recommendation. .

Recommendation: To better monitor agency use of the DNP working system once a strategy has been developed, the Director of OMB should develop and implement monitoring mechanisms--such as goals, benchmarks, and performance measures--to evaluate agency use of the DNP working system.

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

Comments: OMB agreed with the concept of monitoring mechanisms and will continue to work with agencies to reduce improper payments and encourage agencies to establish goals to improve payment accuracy that will be monitored and evaluated by OMB. In fiscal year 2019, OMB provided us a status update on July 31, 2019, stating that Treasury does this monitoring and reports updates to OMB on a quarterly basis and that monitoring will occur in conjunction with the President's Management Agenda. In August 2020, Treasury provided us examples of reports that it provides to OMB to assist OMB with evaluating agency use of the DNP working system. We plan to meet with OMB to discuss how it uses these reports and will continue to monitor OMB's actions to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To reasonably assure that agency-reported information on use of the DNP working system is reliable, the Director of OMB should develop a process for comparing agency reporting on the use of the DNP working system to available sources, such as OMB guidance and DNP working system adjudication reports.

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

Comments: The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) agreed with the concept of ensuring that data are reliable and will consider the feasibility of a process to compare agency submissions to available sources to reasonably assure that agency-reported information on use of the Do Not Pay working system is reliable. OMB provided us a status update on July 1, 2019, stating that OMB will work with Treasury to determine feasibility of doing this review and establishing a process during fiscal year 2019. As of February 2020, OMB has not provided any new status updates for this recommendation. We will continue to monitor the agency's actions to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To reasonably assure that agency-reported information on use of the DNP working system is complete, the Director of OMB should revise its guidance to clarify whether agencies should report on their uses of all of the functionalities of the DNP working system in their agency financial reports.

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

Comments: The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) agreed with ensuring the completeness of data and will continue to work with agencies and the Chief Financial Officer community to ensure that agency-reported information on the use of the Do Not Pay (DNP) working system is complete. In fiscal year 2019, OMB provided us a status update on July 1, 2019, stating that this recommendation was addressed in OMB's Circular A-136. Additionally, we met with OMB officials on July 31, 2019. During the meeting, OMB officials informed us that the OMB Circular A-136, Section II.4.5 (bullet 3) (dated June 28, 2019) states that "Agencies should provide a brief narrative of the reduction in improper payments that is attributable to the DNP Initiative, as applicable. See OMB Circular A-123, Appendix C, Part V for a thorough overview of the roles and responsibilities of agencies to use centralized data sources such as the Treasury Working System and other government databases to prevent improper payments." We have reviewed OMB Circular A-136 and confirmed that the circular does contain the statements above. However, we do not believe that the OMB Circular A-136 meets the intent of our recommendation. GAO issued its recommendation, in part, because GAO found that OMB guidance does not indicate whether agencies should report on all uses of the DNP working system, including those outside payment integration that the DNP working system does not track. For this reason, GAO report concluded that without complete and reliable data and clear guidance on what information agencies should report, OMB cannot effectively monitor and evaluate the use of the DNP working system. Therefore, we do not believe that the OMB Circular A-136 sufficiently clarifies whether agencies should report on their uses of all of the functionalities of the DNP working system in their agency financial reports. As of February 2020, OMB has not provided any new status updates for this recommendation. We will continue to monitor OMB's actions to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To ensure that Field Collection program case selection processes support IRS's and the Collection program's mission, including applying tax laws with integrity and fairness to all, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue should develop, document, and communicate Field Collection program and case selection objectives, including the role of fairness, in clear and measurable terms sufficient for use in internal control.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with the recommendation and described actions being taken to address it. In June 2019, IRS officials told us they were beginning an initiative designed to help identify a program's objectives in relationship to the IRS Strategic Plan and that Field Collection was chosen as one of the pilot programs for this initiative. In September 2020, IRS officials provided us draft program and case selection objectives and said they expected to complete actions to implement the recommendation in Fall 2020.

Recommendation: To ensure that Field Collection program case selection processes support IRS's and the Collection program's mission, including applying tax laws with integrity and fairness to all, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue should develop, document, and implement performance measures clearly linked to the Field Collection program and case selection objectives.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with the recommendation and outlined planned actions to address it. In June 2019, IRS officials told us they were beginning an initiative designed to help identify a program's objectives in relationship to the IRS Strategic Plan and that Field Collection was selected as one of the pilot programs for this initiative. In September 2020, IRS officials provided us draft program and case selection objectives and said they expected to complete actions to implement the recommendation in Fall 2020.

Recommendation: To ensure that Field Collection program case selection processes support IRS's and the Collection program's mission, including applying tax laws with integrity and fairness to all, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue should incorporate program and case selection objectives into existing risk management systems or use other approaches to identify and analyze potential risks to achieving those objectives so that Field Collection can establish risk tolerances and appropriate control procedures to address risks.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with the recommendation and outlined planned actions to address it. In June 2019, IRS officials told us they were beginning an initiative designed to help identify a program's objectives in relationship to the IRS Strategic Plan and that Field Collection was selected as one of the pilot programs for this initiative. Since program and case selection objectives are necessary before appropriate risk management systems can be established, in September 2020, IRS officials said they expected to complete actions to implement program and case selection objectives in Fall 2020 but provided no anticipated completion date for actions to identify and analyze potential risks to those objectives and related risk management actions.

Recommendation: To ensure that Field Collection program case selection processes support IRS's and the Collection program's mission, including applying tax laws with integrity and fairness to all, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue should develop, document, and communicate control procedures guidance for group managers to exercise professional judgment in the Field Collection program case selection process to achieve fairness and other program and collection case selection objectives.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with the recommendation and described actions it will take to address it. In June 2019, IRS officials told us they are beginning an initiative designed to help identify a program's objectives in relationship to the IRS Strategic Plan. IRS selected Field Collection as one of the pilot programs for this initiative which would include actions to address this recommendation. In September 2020, IRS officials said they had revised the Internal Revenue Manual to guide group managers on elements to consider in selecting cases. We will update the status of IRS's actions to implement the recommendation after review of any documentation IRS provides.

Recommendation: To ensure that Field Collection program case selection processes support IRS's and the Collection program's mission, including applying tax laws with integrity and fairness to all, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue should develop, document, and implement procedures to periodically monitor and assess the design and operational effectiveness of both automated and manual control procedures for collection case selection to assure their continued effectiveness in achieving program objectives.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed with the recommendation and outlined planned actions to address it. In June 2019, IRS officials told us they are beginning an initiative designed to help identify a program's objectives in relationship to the IRS Strategic Plan. IRS selected Field Collection as one of the pilot programs for this initiative. According to IRS officials, this pilot effort is ongoing and includes consideration of how the agency will address this recommendation. In September 2020, we met with IRS officials to discuss the status of actions to implement this recommendation but no anticipated completion date was provided.

Recommendation: To enhance the budget process and to improve transparency, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, to the extent feasible, should ensure that the CJ includes data by appropriation account on the amount of funding requested to maintain current services for each future state theme.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: In its fiscal year 2017 congressional justification, IRS modified how its budget data were organized, including linking requested increases to future state themes, but did not clarify how current spending by themes relates to appropriation accounts. Information on current spending by theme and account is important to ensure transparency on the current funding levels to assist Congress in making informed budget decisions. As reported in October 2018 in GAO-19-108R, the themes under the Future State vision are now being pursued as part of IRS's strategic plan for fiscal years 2018 to 2022-issued in May 2018. IRS has been phasing out the use of the term Future State and did not include it in its fiscal year 2020 congressional justification. Including data on the themes in the strategic plan would provide additional transparency and improve the quality of the information available to Congress for budget deliberations.

Recommendation: As Treasury works with IRS to improve the quality and accuracy of budget data, the Secretary of the Treasury should ensure sufficient controls are in place to make certain that the information technology investment reports generated from the SharePoint Investment Knowledge Exchange are accurate. This includes, for example, taking steps to reduce the need for manual corrections to the data.

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: As of November 2017, Treasury Department officials took steps to address the need to manually correct budget data for the fiscal year 2017 budget request. However, as of October 2019, we have not received documentation that they have done so for future budget years. Improved information would help Treasury and IRS better account for information technology resources. We will continue to monitor Treasury's progress.

Recommendation: To strengthen the transparency of the complaints process, the Secretary of Homeland Security should direct CBP and ICE to develop and issue guidance on how and which complaint mechanisms should be communicated to individuals in custody at holding facilities.

Agency: Department of Homeland Security
Status: Open

Comments: In May 2016, we reported on the Department of Homeland Security's management and oversight of short-term holding facilities. We found, for example, that only 4 of 17 Border Patrol holding facilities posted information on how individuals can contact the DHS OIG to file general complaints, and the remaining facilities did not have information posted on any complaint mechanisms, such as the Joint Intake Center or CBP INFO Center. In December 2016, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) sent a broadcast to ICE field offices stating that posters should be visible at all of ICE ERO temporary holding facilities. This broadcast directed ICE ERO Field Office staff to immediately post copies of the Detention Reporting and Information Line poster, both in English and in Spanish, in temporary confinement areas or other areas so that it is visible to individuals in custody at ICE ERO temporary holding facilities. With regard to CBP, in October 2019, officials informed us there is no current CBP guidance requiring signage in CBP holding facilities to communicate complaint mechanisms other than the Prison Rape Elimination Act poster, which relates to reporting mechanisms for any potential incidents of sexual abuse and assault. In September 2020, CBP told us it planned to implement the necessary corrective actions to close this recommendation by March 31, 2021. In order to be able to close the recommendation as implemented, we will need to see updated guidance to the field about the posters that should be displayed in CBP facilities.

Recommendation: To improve agency information security programs, Acting Director of the Office of Personnel Management should provide and track specialized training for all individuals, including contractors, who have significant security responsibilities.

Agency: Office of Personnel Management
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: OPM partially agreed with this recommendation. In December 2018, OPM stated that it is working with its learning management system vendor to develop requirements, but had not yet targeted an expected completion date. To fully implement the recommendation, OPM needs to complete its efforts to ensure that it provides and tracks training for individuals with significant security responsibilities. As of March 2020, OPM has not provided evidence that it has completed these actions.

Recommendation: To improve agency information security programs, the Secretary of the Department of Veterans should conduct security control assessments for the two selected systems and ensure the procedures comprehensively test technical controls.

Agency: Department of Veterans Affairs
Status: Open

Comments: VA concurred with our recommendation. The agency has conducted security control assessments for the two systems, but these assessments did not show that technical controls were comprehensively tested. According to VA, the agency will complete the next security control assessment in October 2019 and complete the system assessment report in December 2019. As of March 2020, the agency has not provided evidence that it has implemented this recommendation. Subsequent to VA informing us that it has completed implementation, we plan to verify the agency's actions.

Recommendation: To improve security over federal systems, including those considered to be high impact, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget should issue plan and practices specified in the Cybersecurity Strategy and Implementation Plan.

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

Comments: OMB concurred with our recommendation. On December 9, 2016, OMB issued memorandum M-17-09, Management of Federal High Value Assets, which lists some existing policies and guidance and other actions that agencies need to take to protect IT assets. Further information is needed to validate implementation of the recommendation. As of March 2020, the agency has not provided evidence that it has implemented this recommendation. Subsequent to OMB informing us that it has completed implementation, we plan to verify the agency's actions.

Recommendation: To reduce the number of Medicare appeals and to strengthen oversight of the Medicare FFS appeals process, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct CMS, Office of Medicare Hearings and Appeals (OMHA), or Departmental Appeals Board (DAB) to modify the various Medicare appeals data systems to collect information on the reasons for appeal decisions at Level 3.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: According to HHS as of August 2016, OMHA and DAB were considering the cost and technical feasibility of collecting this information within their appeals data systems. As of August 2018, OMHA has begun to take action on this recommendation. Specifically, in the July 2017 interim release of the Electronic Case Adjudication and Processing Environment (ECAPE) system, OMHA added a "Reason for Disposition" data field. However, the "Reason for Disposition" data field is currently limited in the number of reasons that can be selected, and ECAPE has not yet been rolled out to all OMHA offices. In May 2019, HHS reported that OMHA had modified the "Reason for Disposition" data field to capture more categories, and that DAB had modified its case management system to capture the reasons for appeal decisions at Level 3 and was working to develop system interoperability with ECAPE. In August 2019, OMHA officials noted that ECAPE had been implemented in 6 of OMHA's 10 field offices and was on track to implement ECAPE in all 10 field offices and its satellite office by the end of 2019. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information regarding DAB's efforts to implement this recommendation.

Recommendation: To reduce the number of Medicare appeals and to strengthen oversight of the Medicare FFS appeals process, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct CMS, OMHA, or DAB to modify the various Medicare appeals data systems to capture the amount, or an estimate, of Medicare allowed charges at stake in appeals in Medicare Appeals System (MAS) and Medicare Operations Division Automated Case Tracking System (MODACTS).

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: According to HHS as of August 2016, this information was not captured in any CMS system, including MAS. HHS reported that if MAS is modified to capture the amount of Medicare allowed charges at stake, OMHA will consider modifying its Electronic Case Adjudication and Processing Environment (ECAPE) to include this information as well, and DAB can capture it in a new case management system currently being developed by the agency. As of August 2019, HHS officials stated that developing a methodology to estimate the amount that CMS would have paid providers is complex and would not be appropriate for use in determining whether the appeal meets the amount in controversy requirements for a Level 3 appeal. The basis for our recommendation was also so that HHS could better monitor important appeal trends. Additionally, without this information, HHS does not know the actual amount of Medicare reimbursement at issue in the appeals process. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information regarding HHS's efforts to implement it.

Recommendation: To reduce the number of Medicare appeals and to strengthen oversight of the Medicare FFS appeals process, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct CMS, OMHA, or DAB to modify the various Medicare appeals data systems to collect consistent data across systems, including appeal categories and appeal decisions across MAS and MODACTS.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: According to HHS as of August 2016, HHS reported taking several initial steps to standardize data across Medicare appeals systems. As of August 2018, HHS was continuing to take steps to implement GAO's recommendation to standardize data collection on appeals across its multiple data systems. Specifically, HHS stated that, in November 2016, CMS and OMHA modified the MAS system to standardize appeal categories between Levels 1 through 3, which will help to facilitate more accurate trending analyses across appeal levels. Further, as of April 2017, all Part A Medicare Administrative Contractors (MAC), who are responsible for Part A Level 1 appeals, were successfully processing appeals in MAS, according to HHS. In August 2019, OMHA officials noted that the ECAPE system, which will interact with MAS for reporting purposes, had been implemented in 6 of OMHA's 10 field offices and would be implemented in all 10 field offices and its satellite office by the end of 2019. However, Part B and DME MACs, which are responsible for Part B and DME Level 1 appeals, have not been fully transitioned to MAS. Therefore, appeals categories are still inconsistent for these claims. According to HHS, CMS has not received funding to transition the remaining Level 1 appeals contractors to MAS. Additionally, HHS reported that DAB continues to explore ways to develop interoperability between MODACTS and OMHA's ECAPE system. Therefore, we will continue to monitor progress on the implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: To strengthen compliance with the Leahy laws and implementation of State's human rights vetting process and to help ensure that U.S. funded assistance is not provided to Egyptian security forces that have committed gross violations of human rights, as State works to implement a revised version of the International Vetting and Security Tracking system (INVEST) system that is expected to help facilitate equipment vetting, the Secretary of State should develop time frames for establishing corresponding policies and procedures to implement a vetting process to help enable the U.S. government to provide a more reasonable level of assurance that equipment is not transferred to foreign security forces, including those in Egypt, when there is credible information that a unit has committed a gross violation of human rights.

Agency: Department of State
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: State agreed with this recommendation. State acknowledged challenges identifying recipients of equipment across the range of assistance activities, but noted that it would continue to update its systems and procedures to facilitate human rights vetting for recipients of equipment. In April 2017, State reported that it had provided finalized guidance on vetting Egyptian recipients of Foreign Military Financing-funded equipment to Embassy Cairo and that these procedures had been incorporated into a revised version of Embassy Cairo's guide for conducting human rights vetting. At the time, State noted that Embassy Cairo had begun to implement these procedures. However, State subsequently reported that implementation of these procedures lapsed in 2018 due to staff turnover at Embassy Cairo. As of January 2020, State said that it intends to have new standard operating procedures in place for equipment vetting in Egypt later in 2020. In addition, State has not adopted procedures, similar to those in development for Egypt, to be used more broadly in other countries that also receive equipment through the Foreign Military Financing account or through other U.S. assistance programs. As of June 2017, State had added new features to INVEST, its human rights vetting system, to help facilitate vetting of equipment recipients, and published new vetting guidance requiring screening of equipment transfers. However, State has not established global requirements for posts to use the new equipment vetting system features to screen equipment transfers. As of February 2020, State reported that it had developed draft standard operating procedures for conducting equipment vetting globally; however, these procedures are being reviewed internally within the Department and are expected to be finalized later in 2020. We will continue to monitor agency efforts to implement this recommendation.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Agriculture should revise existing department policies for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories to contain specific requirements for reporting laboratory incidents to senior department officials, including the types of incidents that should be reported, to whom, and when, or direct the Administrator of the Food Safety and Inspection Service to develop agency policies that contain these requirements.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: In October 2016, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) stated that its Joint Committee on Biorisk Management Policy (JCBMP) would oversee the revisions of existing policies to include department-wide incident reporting requirements and time frames. As of July 2020, USDA estimated that these revisions should be completed by October 2020. Officials stated that updates to component agency policies would be completed shortly after issuance of the departmental policy. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Agriculture should review and update outdated department policies for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and direct the Administrators of the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) and Agricultural Research Service to update their policies and, in the case of APHIS, establish a regular review schedule.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: In October 2016, USDA stated that the JCBMP would oversee the revisions of existing outdated departmental policies. In addition, officials stated that APHIS reviews and updates agency policies every 3-5 years, and that this schedule will be reflected in the updated departmental policy. In October 2019, the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) updated its agency policy for its institutional biological safety committee, the entity responsible for ensuring biosafety in its laboratories. As of July 2020, USDA estimated that revisions to the departmental, APHIS, and Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) policies should be completed by December 2020. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Agriculture should routinely analyze results of the department's laboratory inspections and incident reports to identify potential trends that may highlight recurring laboratory safety or security issues and share lessons learned with laboratory personnel.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: In October 2016, USDA stated that the JCBMP would oversee efforts to collect and analyze laboratory inspection results and incident reports and share these reports and critical analyses with USDA senior leadership on an annual basis. As of July 2020, USDA estimated that revisions to its departmental policy-which would reflect the JCBMP's role in analyzing inspection results and incident reports, identifying potential trends, and sharing lessons learned-should be completed by October 2020. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Agriculture should require routine reporting of the results of department, agency, and select agent laboratory inspections to senior department officials.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: In October 2016, USDA stated that the JCBMP would oversee the revisions of existing policies to include requirements for routine reporting of inspection results to senior USDA officials. In July 2020, USDA estimated that these revisions should be completed by October 2020. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Agriculture should require routine reporting of incidents at agency laboratories to senior department officials.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open

Comments: In October 2016, USDA stated that the JCBMP would oversee the revisions of existing policies to include requirements for routine reporting of laboratory incidents to senior USDA officials. In July 2020, USDA estimated that these revisions should be completed by October 2020. Officials stated that updates to component agency policies would be completed shortly after issuance of the departmental policy. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Defense should revise existing department policies for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories to contain specific requirements for inventory control for all of DOD's high-containment laboratories, not just for its select agent-registered laboratories, or direct the Secretaries of the Air Force, Army, and Navy to revise their existing, respective policies to contain these requirements.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation. In June 2018, DOD stated that it had completed evaluation of existing DOD and service level guidance related to inventory control. DOD also stated that it will continue to analyze the adequacy of existing policy and the need to expand that policy across the DOD Lab Enterprise as the draft Department of Defense Manual (DoDM) 6055.18 is finalized for publication. As of August 2019, DoD said the draft DoDM 6055.18 was still in review and the agency estimated it would complete work to respond to this recommendation in February 2020.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Defense should direct the Secretaries of the Air Force and Army to review and update their respective outdated policies for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation. DOD stated that it had updated the Air Force policy (AF Instruction 10-2611-0) as of January 19, 2017; this document updates the biological safety standards used in AF labs and implements the draft update to Department of Defense Manual 6055.18M: Safety Standards for Microbiological and Biomedical Laboratories. As of July 2019, DOD provided GAO with the updated Army policy AR 190-17; however DOD officials stated that as the draft Department of Defense Manual (DoDM) 6055.18 was still undergoing review, this recommendation should remain open. DOD estimated it would complete work to respond to this recommendation in February 2020.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Defense should require routine reporting of the results of Air Force, Army, and Navy inspections of non-select agent registered laboratories to senior department officials.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation. In August 2019, DOD reported that the Air Force is planning to close its BSAT program by the summer of 2019 and planning was underway to move the Air Force BSAT inventory to another DOD BSAT facility. Additionally, the Army was revising its AR 385-10, which contains biosafety criteria unique to the Army, and estimated the revision would be completed by December 2019. Finally, the draft Department of Defense Manual (DoDM) 6055.18 was still undergoing review, and DOD estimated it would complete work to respond to this recommendation in February 2020.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Defense should require routine reporting of laboratory incidents at Air Force, Army, and Navy non-select agent registered laboratories to senior department officials.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation. In August 2019, DOD reported that the Air Force is planning to close its BSAT program by the summer of 2019 and planning was underway to move the Air Force BSAT inventory to another DOD BSAT facility. Additionally, the Army was revising its AR 385-10, which contains biosafety criteria unique to the Army, to include a new mishap classification for biosafety mishaps to effect better reporting and analysis of these mishaps, and estimated the revision would be completed by December 2019. Finally, the draft Department of Defense Manual (DoDM) 6055.18 was still undergoing review, and DOD estimated it would complete work to respond to this recommendation in February 2020.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Defense should direct the Secretaries of the Army and Navy to require reporting of agency and select agent laboratory inspection results to senior agency officials.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with our recommendation. As of June 2018, DOD stated that the draft directive DODD 5101.XXE, which is expected to be published in October 2018, formally designates the Executive Agent Responsible Official for Biosafety and Biosecurity and will establish roles and responsibilities including a role for reporting inspection results. Further, DOD stated that all inspection results of a joint inspection team are provided to the Executive Agent Responsible Official, and that the joint inspection team was established in September 2016. As of September 2019, DOD officials had provided updated documentation regarding this recommendation, and GAO was reviewing these updates.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should develop department policies for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories that contain specific requirements for reporting laboratory incidents to senior department officials, including the types of incidents that should be reported, to whom, and when, or direct the Director of CDC and the Commissioner of FDA to incorporate these requirements into their respective policies.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In August 2016, HHS reported that both CDC and FDA were working to incorporate incident reporting requirements and time frames into formal agency policies and practices but did not provide an anticipated completion date. In summer 2017, CDC and FDA reported that they were continuing to incorporate incident reporting, which includes all laboratory incidents, accidents, injuries, infections, and near-misses, into formal agency policies. In August 2019, FDA reported that it continues to work with the Biosafety and Biosecurity Coordinating Council to establish a process for the routine reporting of these results but had not yet completed its actions. As of September 2019 we had not received an update from HHS on the status of CDC's implementation of this recommendation.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should develop department policies for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories that contain specific requirements for training and inspections for all high-containment component agency laboratories and not just for their select-agent-registered laboratories; or direct the Director of CDC to provide these requirements in agency policies.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In August 2016, HHS reported that CDC plans to revise its policies to include training and inspection requirements for inspections for all high-containment laboratories but did not provide an anticipated completion date. In June 2017, HHS reported that CDC was in the process of revising its formal policies to ensure they included requirements for training and inspections for all of the agency's high-containment laboratories but did not provide an anticipated completion date. In December 2017, HHS reported that CDC's policies were in the initial stages of the clearance process and anticipated they would be finalized in fall 2018. As of September 2019, HHS had not provided an update on the status of these policies.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should require routine reporting of the results of agency and select agent laboratory inspections to senior department officials.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In August 2016, HHS reported that CDC was working with FDA and NIH to establish a process for notifying HHS leadership of inspection results through the department's Biosafety and Biosecurity Coordinating Council. HHS did not provide us with an anticipated time frame for implementing this notification practice or when the agencies plan to begin notifying HHS of inspection results. In August 2019, FDA reported that it continues to work with the Biosafety and Biosecurity Coordinating Council to establish a process for the routine reporting of these results but had not yet completed its actions. As of September 2019, HHS had not provided an update on the status NIH's actions.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Director of NIH and the Commissioner of FDA to require routine reporting of the results of agency laboratory inspections--and in the case of FDA, require routine reporting of select agent inspection results--to senior agency officials.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In August 2016, HHS reported that NIH's ongoing practice is to report the results of external inspections to senior agency officials and, in May 2016, developed a standard operating procedure that outlines this reporting process. In March 2017, NIH officials provided assurance that its Division of Occupational Safety and Health provides NIH's intramural governing body with information about NIH's safety performance at least annually; officials further assured that this information includes the overall results of annual inspections (or audits, as NIH calls them) of all NIH laboratories and discussion of the top 10 most report safety infractions for the year. GAO considers NIH to have implemented the recommended action. GAO will close the overall recommendation once FDA has taken equivalent, appropriate action. As of August 2019, FDA reported that the agency began piloting a standardized agency-wide laboratory safety inspection checklist to ensure that all laboratories are inspected rigorously and consistently. As part of the pilot, all laboratories were to be inspected during the first 3 quarters of the calendar year. The agency said it planned to aggregate the results of the inspections, and trends and significant findings would be reported to FDA senior leadership in the fourth quarter of 2019. GAO will continue to monitor FDA's actions to implement this recommendation.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal departments and agencies have comprehensive and up-to-date policies and stronger oversight mechanisms in place for managing hazardous biological agents in high-containment laboratories and are fully addressing weaknesses identified after laboratory safety lapses, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should require routine reporting of incidents at CDC, FDA, and NIH laboratories to senior department officials.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In August 2016, HHS reported that its Biosafety and Biosecurity Council was working to establish incident reporting requirements for CDC, FDA, and NIH but did not provide an anticipated completion date. HHS noted that NIH formally adopted a standard operating procedure that lays out the agency's requirements for reporting incidents to senior officials. In August 2019, FDA reported that it continues to work with the Biosafety and Biosecurity Coordinating Council to establish a process for the routine reporting of these results but had not yet completed its actions. As of September 2019, HHS had not provided an update on the status of NIH or CDC actions.

Recommendation: The Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services should direct the Office of Refugee Resettlement to develop a process to ensure all information collected through its existing post-release efforts are reliable and systematically collected so that they can be compiled in summary form and provide useful information to other entities internally and externally.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In March of 2016, the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) created a new section in its unaccompanied children's policy guide that require ORR staff to make safety and well-being (SWB) follow-up calls to children and their sponsors after the child is release from ORR custody. In addition, in October of 2016, ORR added another section to its policy guide that included case reporting, records management, retention, and information sharing requirements for post-release service (PRS) providers. According to ORR officials, ORR collects and analyzes data from both its SWB calls and PRS providers. SWB call data include efforts made to contact both sponsor and child; participation rates; confirmation the child is currently residing with the sponsor; referrals made to the ORR National Call Center (NCC) for additional resources; any concerns regarding the child's safety and well-being; and whether any reports were made to the ORR Federal Field Specialist, child protective services, local law enforcement, and/or the ORR Sexual Abuse Hotline. PRS data include the reason for referral; level of services provided; services areas accessed by the child and/or sponsor; outcomes; any concerns regarding the child's safety and well-being; and when services were discontinued, according to ORR officials. According to ORR officials, because ORR is currently in the process of developing a new case management system, the majority of information from SWB calls and post-release efforts is collected manually, outside of ORR's current case management system. Information collected through ORR's SWB calls is aggregated quarterly and a fact sheet containing aggregate data is distributed internally to ORR leadership. ORR officials say the new case management system will include information on SWB calls and post-release efforts. ORR tentatively plans for the first phase of the system to be operational by November 2020 and to deploy a finished product with all planned enhancements in late 2021. GAO will close this recommendation once ORR completes this system and demonstrates that it can be used for the purpose of collecting reliable safety and well-being and post-release services data and disseminating it internally and externally, as appropriate.

Recommendation: To improve the data on tracked safety issues and postmarket studies that are needed for required reporting and for systematic oversight of postmarket drug safety, the Secretary of HHS should direct the Commissioner of FDA to work with stakeholders within FDA to identify additional improvements that could be made to FDA's current database or future information technology investments to capture information in a form that can be easily and systematically used by staff for oversight purposes.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: FDA has made changes intended to improve its process for overseeing tracked safety issues, but as of August 2020, FDA was still working on changes to its process for postmarket study data. For tracked safety issues, FDA held a one-day workshop to solicit input from staff on changes to its tracked safety issue process and collect user requirements for a new IT system to support tracking safety issues. In April 2020, FDA finalized new policies and procedures and implemented a new IT system for tracking safety issues. The new IT system allows anyone within FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research to enter new safety signals and has integrated product and adverse event dictionaries. FDA stated that integrating standardized data will support consistent regulatory decisions and improve the quality of analysis. For postmarket studies, FDA has indicated that it intends to formally assess the IT needs of users as part of the planned transfer of postmarket data to its new informatics platform. As of August 2020, FDA anticipated creating a project team to address specific concerns related to postmarket study data by the end of calendar year 2020 or the beginning of calendar year 2021. GAO is keeping this recommendation open until FDA has completed its planned improvements to its process for tracking postmarket study data.

Recommendation: To strengthen management of the Direct Loan Program and ensure good customer service for borrowers, the Secretary of Education should direct the Office of Federal Student Aid's Chief Operating Officer to review its methods of providing instructions and guidance to servicers, identifying areas to improve clarity and sufficiency, and ensure consistent delivery of instructions and guidance to ensure program integrity and improve service to borrowers. For example, the Department could consider implementing a detailed, common servicing manual for the Direct Loan program.

Agency: Department of Education
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: The Department of Education agreed with this recommendation and reviewed its process for providing guidance to servicers. It has issued a few clarifications to servicers to help with consistency and reported that it intends to incorporate this recommendation into its acquisition plan for a new loan servicing system. To fully implement this recommendation, the agency needs to demonstrate that the new Direct Loan servicing system will provide clear and consistent instructions and guidance to servicers to ensure program integrity and improve service to borrowers. As of February 2020, Education officials said implementation of this recommendation was still in progress, pending completion in October 2021. At that time, the agency expects the re-design of its student loan financial services environment, which will include additional guidance to servicers, to be fully operational.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Education should develop a risk-based, cost-effective strategy to verify that states are implementing a process for assessing whether any teacher preparation programs are low-performing.

Agency: Department of Education
Status: Open

Comments: In 2016, Education published an issue brief about identifying low-performing schools, which referenced GAO's report and the potential risks of limited state action to identify and address low performance. In December 2019, Education provided GAO with a revised data collection instrument for collecting information about states' criteria for identifying low-performing teacher preparation programs. Officials stated that the instrument has been approved by OMB and Education plans to start using it in October 2020. Officials said that the instrument is designed to provide more structured information about state criteria and allow Education to better monitor states' responses from year to year. We are encouraged by these efforts and will revisit the status of this recommendation when the new template is implemented in 2020.

Recommendation: To ensure that the Defense Civilian Personnel Advisory Service (DCPAS) and DOD components are determining LQA eligibility consistently with DOD's LQA Instruction, the DSSR, and OPM compensation claim decisions, the Secretary of Defense should direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to require the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Civilian Personnel Policy or DCPAS, as delegated, to monitor reviews of LQA eligibility determinations conducted by DOD components.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: DOD concurred with this action, and as of December 2019, had taken steps to improve oversight of LQA determinations by DOD components; however, it had not issued guidance that requires the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Civilian Personnel Policy or DCPAS to monitor reviews of LQA eligibility determinations by DOD components. At the direction of DCPAS, DOD components completed reviews and submitted reports of overseas allowances paid to a sampling of overseas employees for calendar years 2015, 2016, and 2017. According to DCPAS officials, in DOD's 2017 review of overseas allowances, one employee was identified as having erroneously received LQA. This number is lower than the three employees identified during the 2016 review and lower than the 11 employees identified in the 2015 review. Additionally, in September 2019, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Civilian Personnel Policy issued a memorandum requesting DOD components to complete a review of overseas allowances and differentials, including LQA, paid to overseas employees during calendar year 2018. In January 2018, the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness issued a memorandum that clarified LQA eligibility requirements as applied and interpreted in recent Office of Personnel Management compensation claim decisions and the Department of State Standardized Regulations. The memorandum also required components to screen relevant records and determine if there are any employees who are no longer eligible to receive LQA based on the compensation claim decisions and Department of State Standardized Regulations. Finally, according to DCPAS officials, in December 2019, DOD was revising DOD's LQA instruction to incorporate the new LQA guidance from the January 2018 memorandum. However, it is unclear whether the revised instruction once issued will require the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary or DCPAS to monitor the reviews conducted by DOD components to identify any potentially inconsistent eligibility determinations and ensure corrective action is taken, as was the intent of GAO's recommendation.

Recommendation: To improve SBA's administration and oversight of the HUBZone program and reduce the risk that firms that no longer meet program eligibility criteria receive HUBZone contracts, the Administrator of SBA should establish a mechanism to better ensure that firms are notified of changes to HUBZone designations that may affect their participation in the program, such as ensuring that all certified firms and newly certified firms are signed up for the broadcast e-mail system or including more specific information in certification letters about how location in a redesignated area can affect their participation in the program

Agency: Small Business Administration
Status: Open

Comments: In response to this recommendation, SBA improved its notifications to newly certified firms but not to other certified firms. For example, SBA's certification letter to firms with principal offices in a redesignated area specifically states that the firm is in a redesignated area, explains the implications of the designation, and notes when the redesignated status will expire. However, we found in March 2016 that SBA had not yet implemented changes to better ensure that all currently certified firms would be notified of changes that could affect their program eligibility. It is important that all certified firms potentially affected by such changes receive information about the changes or are made aware in a timely fashion of any effects on their program eligibility. As of February 2017, SBA had begun to improve its notifications to all firms. According to SBA officials, the agency has started sending program notices to all the firms in its portfolio. They told us that for its most recent notice in February 2017, the agency copied all the e-mail addresses in its HUBZone database and placed them in the e-mail distribution system. In March 2018, SBA officials informed us that they obtain monthly lists of certified firms generated by an Oracle system process and that analysts compare the new list to the prior list and add any new firms to the list. In July 2019, SBA officials told us that they informed HUBZone firms of their responsibility to stay up to date on HUBZone geographical designations and program eligibility, through updated language in its HUBZone certification letters and two notices issued to HUBZone firms. While it is helpful that SBA now includes language in its certification letters notifying firms located in a redesignated area of the implications of that designation, SBA's current process does not inform firms when their status may change.

Recommendation: To improve SBA's administration and oversight of the HUBZone program and reduce the risk that firms that no longer meet program eligibility criteria receive HUBZone contracts, the Administrator of SBA should conduct an assessment of the recertification process and implement additional controls, such as developing criteria and guidance on using a risk-based approach to requesting and verifying firm information, allowing firms to initiate the recertification process, and ensuring that sufficient staff will be dedicated to the effort so that a significant backlog in recertifications does not recur.

Agency: Small Business Administration
Status: Open

Comments: In response to this recommendation, SBA officials told us that they began automating the process to notify firms that were due for recertification. According to the officials, since September 2015, notification e-mails have been sent daily (compared with the former cycle of two times a year). Each firm due for recertification within the next 30 days would receive the notice. SBA sends a second e-mail to firms that have not responded within 45 days of the first notification. According to SBA officials, as of February 2017, this change has not yet eliminated the backlog. SBA officials informed GAO in May 2017 that they have developed risk-based guidance for conducting recertification reviews and requesting supporting documentation. According to SBA, any certified HUBZone small business concern that has received $1 million or more in HUBZone contract dollars since its initial certification (or its most recent recertification) must submit the following: (a) a list of all current employees, identifying the name of the employee, the employee's address, the number of hours worked per month, and the location where the employee performs his/her work; and (b) payroll documentation. While SBA officials stated that they had completed a risk assessment of their HUBZone recertification process, SBA had not provided GAO with documentation on when SBA performed the risk assessment, which risks were identified and considered, or what analysis established the $1 million threshold as of August 2018. In July 2019, SBA provided a rationale for its risk-based approach to recertification, but the analysis for establishing the $1 million threshold remained unclear. SBA officials told us that the agency plans to conduct a risk assessment in accordance with GAO guidance for all government contracting and business development programs, including the HUBZone program. GAO continues to believe that such a risk assessment of the recertification process would help inform a risk-based approach to reviewing and verifying information from firms that appear to pose the most risk to the program.

Recommendation: To ensure that OPM builds the predictive capacity to identify emerging skills gaps across the government--including the ability to collect and use reliable information on the competencies of the federal workforce for government-wide workforce analysis--the Director of OPM should (1) establish a schedule specifying when OPM will modify its Enterprise Human Resources Integration database to capture staffing data that it currently collects from agencies through its annual workforce data reporting process; and (2) work with agency CHCOs to bolster the ability of agencies to assess workforce competencies by sharing competency surveys, lessons learned, and other tools and resources.

Agency: Office of Personnel Management
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: Although OPM did not initially concur with this recommendation, OPM has taken actions towards addressing it by using the EHRI database, in combination with other sources, to generate workforce data to assist agencies in their efforts to identify skills gaps. In March 2019, OPM reported that it believed that collecting staffing gap targets through an alternative system, MAX Collect, would provide a more efficient and accurate means to collect workforce data than EHRI. In February 2020, OPM officials reported that it has used MAX Collect to address a portion of the recommendation by sharing lessons learned to close skills gaps. MAX Collect also stores and makes relevant tools and training available to users. However, OPM still needs to collect and store a consistent set of staffing and competency data. Without the collection and sharing of this data, OPM cannot perform valuable government-wide analysis to predict and address skills gaps in occupations affecting multiple agencies.

Recommendation: If, in the next authorization for FAA, Congress chooses to mandate that FAA take actions to streamline and reform the agency, Congress may wish to consider requiring FAA to (1) track measures of and (2) report to Congress on the actual results of such efforts.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2019, Congress has passed several FAA authorization extensions and the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018 that did not include any actions related to this matter. We will continue to monitor legislation, and when we determine what steps the Congress has taken regarding this matter, we will provide updated information.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal regulators have better information about lump sum windows and to better ensure that participants have ready access to key information they need to make a decision when presented with a lump sum offer, the Department of Labor should require plan sponsors to notify DOL at the time they implement a lump sum window offer, including the number and category of participants being extended the offer (e.g., separated vested; retiree) as well as examples of the materials provided to them.

Agency: Department of Labor
Status: Open

Comments: The Department of Labor (DOL) agreed that this type of information may be helpful in determining the extent to which lump sum window offers are made, as well as the types of disclosures the participants receive. However, as of July 2017, DOL reported that it has not identified authority under ERISA for it to impose such a requirement on plan sponsors either before or shortly after the plan offers the lump sum window. The agency states that ERISA expressly provides specific reporting and disclosure requirements. These include various filings, such as annual financial reports, reports upon plan termination, and reports upon making certain transfers of pension plan assets to health benefit accounts. The agency believes ERISA does not require plans to notify them regarding the benefit distribution options they offer or changes in those options, and does not read the broad rulemaking authority in ERISA in Section 505 (general regulations) and Section 110 (pension reporting and disclosure) as authorizing EBSA to establish the notice filing requirement GAO recommended. The agency also commented that ERISA expressly requires that most pension plans file a Form 5500 annual report with the statute specifying the required contents of this annual report in some detail and requiring "such other financial and actuarial information as the Secretary may find necessary or appropriate." Although the agency noted it could, by regulation, require reporting on lump sum window offers on the Form 5500, there would be a substantial time lag because ERISA by statute establishes the reporting cycle for the Form 5500 -- the report is not due until 210 days (7 months) after the plan year closes (e.g., for calendar year plans, July 31st of the following year). The agency recognizes that this might not be responsive to the recommendation, which appears to envision a notification system that is relatively contemporaneous with the lump sum window being offered to participants and beneficiaries. In 2018, DOL noted that it allocated its regulatory resources to other priority projects and, as of June 2020, reported that this status remains unchanged.

Recommendation: To ensure that federal regulators have better information about lump sum windows and to better ensure that participants have ready access to key information they need to make a decision when presented with a lump sum offer, the Department of Labor should coordinate with the Internal Revenue Service and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) to clarify the guidance regarding the information sponsors should provide to participants when extending lump sum window offers and place the guidance on the agency's website. Guidance should include clear and understandable presentations of information, such as the relative value of the lump sum, the role and level of protections provided by PBGC, and the positive and negative ramifications of accepting the lump sum. Such guidance could also include promising practices for information materials from plan sponsors which are particularly effective in facilitating informed participant decision-making.

Agency: Department of Labor
Status: Open

Comments: The Department of Labor agreed with this recommendation, noting it is important to coordinate with the Treasury Department/IRS and PBGC to clarify the guidance regarding the information sponsors and other plan fiduciaries should provide to participants and beneficiaries when extending lump sum window offers. In 2016, the agency noted that the manner of publishing that guidance would be part of that coordination process. They may consider some formal public request for input (such as publishing a Request for Information in the Federal Register) and focus group or other field testing work. In addition, the agency noted that the 2015 ERISA Advisory Council announced that one of its projects this year concerns how to give participants effective notices and disclosures concerning lump sum window offers, including possible development of model participant notices. The 2015 Council developed recommendations and model notices on lump sum window offers in "pension risk transfer transactions," and suggested that DOL make the Model Notices available on its web site to plan sponsors and participant advocates and that plan sponsors use the Model Notices when engaging in risk transfer transactions. Similar to other model communications developed by the 2015 Council, the agency believes the model notice could be further enhanced if subjected to broader public input from, for example, plan sponsors, participant advocates, communications experts, and academics. Subject to the limits on its authority in this area and resource constraints. They are considering efforts to obtain public input on the Council's recommendations and model notice. They also intend to contact the Treasury Department/IRS and PBGC to discuss the Council's recommendations. In 2017, EBSA reported that it does not have a specific timeline for any next action but would alert GAO if a decision is made to add such a project to EBSA's agenda. In 2018, DOL noted that it allocated its regulatory resources to other priority projects and, as of June 2020, reported no additional changes.

Recommendation: To provide participants with useful information and to provide for lump sums that are based on up-to-date assumptions, Treasury should review its regulations governing the information contained in relative value statements to ensure these statements provide a meaningful comparison of all benefit options, especially in instances where the loss of certain additional plan benefits may not be disclosed.

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: Treasury generally agreed with this recommendation but did not provide specific comments on plans to address it. As of August 2019, Treasury has not addressed this recommendation.

Recommendation: To provide participants with useful information and to provide for lump sums that are based on up-to-date assumptions, Treasury should review the applicability and appropriateness of allowing sponsors to select a "lookback" interest rate for use in calculating lump sums associated with a lump sum window that can serve to advantage the interests of the sponsor.

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: Treasury generally agreed with this recommendation but did not provide specific comments on plans to address it. As of August 2019, Treasury has not addressed this recommendation.

Recommendation: To provide participants with useful information and to provide for lump sums that are based on up-to-date assumptions, Treasury should establish a process and a timeline for periodically updating the mortality tables used to determine minimum required lump sums-- including a means for monitoring when experts' views may indicate that mortality tables may have become outdated, and for taking expedited action if warranted.

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Status: Open

Comments: Treasury generally agreed with this recommendation but did not provide specific comments on plans to address it. As of August 2019, Treasury has not addressed this recommendation.

Recommendation: To ensure that DOE's long-term plans for storing waste in the existing SSTs and DSTs at Hanford consider the condition of the tanks and the WTP construction delay, the Secretary of Energy should assess the extent to which the factors that may have led to corrosion in AY-102 are present in any of the other 27 DSTs.

Agency: Department of Energy
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, DOE has not yet done this study though they are currently planning to do so.

Recommendation: To help ensure that FSOC is comprehensively identifying and considering companies, the Secretary of the Treasury in consultation with FSOC members, should establish procedures to evaluate companies in Stage 2 and Stage 3 under both statutory determination standards when an evaluation in either stage concludes that a company does not meet one of the standards, or document--on a company-specific or more general basis--why the second determination standard is not relevant for determination evaluations.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Financial Stability Oversight Council
Status: Open

Comments: In December 2019, FSOC adopted final interpretive guidance that revises its approach to evaluating and determining whether to designate nonbank financial companies. The final revised guidance prioritizes an activities-based approach to identifying and addressing potential risks to financial stability and states that FSOC will pursue company-specific determinations only if the activities-based approach is not sufficient. The guidance further states that if FSOC does consider a company-specific determination, its evaluation will focus primarily on the first determination standard. The guidance does not indicate the establishment of procedures to evaluate companies under both determination standards for the purpose of comprehensively identifying and considering companies or to document why the other standard is not relevant. We will continue to monitor FSOC's implementation of the guidance and any additional actions that may be responsive to our recommendation.

Recommendation: To help ensure that FSOC is comprehensively identifying and considering companies, the Secretary of the Treasury in consultation with FSOC members, should develop a process to collect information necessary for Stage 1 analysis, as appropriate, from certain nonbank financial companies for which public or regulatory information is otherwise unavailable. For example, FSOC could have companies for which such information is unavailable and that meet certain characteristics (such as quantitative thresholds similar to those used in Stage 1) report necessary information to the Office of Financial Research.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Financial Stability Oversight Council
Status: Open

Comments: In December 2019, FSOC adopted final interpretive guidance that revises its approach to evaluating and determining whether to designate nonbank financial companies. The final revised guidance introduces a new stage 1 of the designation process in which FSOC would notify a nonbank financial company under review and consider available public and regulatory information. While the guidance states that a company under review in stage 1 may submit information it deems relevant to the evaluation, FSOC would not require the company to submit information during stage 1. We will continue to monitor FSOC's implementation of the revised guidance and any additional actions that may be responsive to our recommendation.

Recommendation: To improve management and oversight of the WOSB program, and to help ensure the effective oversight of third-party certifiers, the Administrator of SBA should establish and implement comprehensive procedures to monitor and assess performance of certifiers in accord with the requirements of the third-party certifier agreement and program regulations.

Agency: Small Business Administration
Status: Open

Comments: In response to this recommendation, SBA has taken some actions. For example, SBA created a standard operating procedure stating that third-party certifiers are subject to a compliance review by SBA at any time, and SBA has completed a review of the four authorized third-party certifiers. We continue to monitor SBA actions to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To improve management and oversight of the WOSB program, and to provide reasonable assurance that only eligible businesses obtain WOSB set-aside contracts, the Administrator of SBA should enhance examination of businesses that register to participate in the WOSB program, including actions such as: (1) promptly completing the development of procedures to conduct annual eligibility examinations and implementing such procedures; (2) analyzing examination results and individual businesses found to be ineligible to better understand the cause of the high rate of ineligibility in annual reviews, and determine what actions are needed to address the causes; and (3) implementing ongoing reviews of a sample of all businesses that have represented their eligibility to participate in the program.

Agency: Small Business Administration
Status: Open

Comments: In response to this recommendation, SBA has created a standard operating procedure that includes some procedures for annual eligibility examinations. We continue to monitor SBA actions to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To better inform users of the annual monitoring report about the frequency and scope of pesticide tolerance violations, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct the Commissioner of FDA to disclose in the agency's annual pesticide monitoring program report which pesticides with EPA-established tolerances the agency did not test for in its pesticide monitoring program and the potential effect of not testing for those pesticides.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: In February 2020, FDA said that the recommendation should be closed as not implemented. FDA has previously said that it remained concerned that the disclosure of pesticides for which FDA does not test would enable users to more easily circumvent the pesticide monitoring program, which could jeopardize public health and, at a minimum, would undermine FDA's law enforcement efforts. In addition, FDA said that it discloses in its annual reports all pesticides tested for within the reports' annual scope as required by the Pesticide Monitoring Improvements Act of 1988. FDA's annual reports also clarify that not all pesticides for which EPA has established tolerances were analyzed. FDA said that the Pesticide Monitoring Improvements Act of 1988 does not specifically direct the agency to report information on untested pesticides with EPA-established tolerances. We continue to believe that disclosing the pesticides that are not included in FDA's testing program would be consistent with OMB best practices for reporting limitations relevant to analyzing and interpreting results from a data collection effort. In particular, we continue to believe that FDA should be more transparent about the potential effect of not testing for all pesticides for which EPA has established tolerances. We also note that the Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service implemented a similar recommendation to disclose information about its pesticide monitoring program. As a result, we are keeping this recommendation open.

Recommendation: To reduce the cost of the crop insurance program and achieve budgetary savings for deficit reduction or other purposes, Congress should consider reducing the level of federal premium subsidies for revenue crop insurance policies. In doing so, Congress should consider whether to make the full amount of this reduction in an initial year, or to phase in the full amount of this reduction over several years. In addition, Congress should consider directing the Secretary of Agriculture to monitor and report on the impact, if any, of the reduction on farmer participation in the crop insurance program.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, Congress has not taken action to implement this matter.

Recommendation: To assist states that rely on or are planning to contract with an MCO to administer Medicaid prescription benefits, and to help provide effective oversight of psychotropic medications prescribed to children in foster care, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should issue guidance to state Medicaid, child-welfare, and mental-health officials regarding prescription-drug monitoring and oversight for children in foster care receiving psychotropic medications through MCOs.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: In an October 2018 written response, Health and Human Services (HHS) noted that they released 2017-2018 Drug Utilization Review Summaries for Prescription Drug Fee-For-Service Programs as it relates to national statistics on state oversight of psychotropic medications, as well as new state requirements to report on their Medicaid managed care organizations. However, as of August 2019, HHS confirmed they have not issued any guidance to state Medicaid, child-welfare, and mental-health officials regarding prescription-drug monitoring and oversight for children in foster care receiving psychotropic medications through MCOs, as we recommended. We continue to believe that additional HHS guidance that helps states implement oversight strategies within the context of a managed-care environment is needed to help ensure appropriate monitoring of psychotropic medications prescribed to children in foster care.

Recommendation: To help ensure that qualified CDRs promote improved quality and efficiency of physician care for Medicare beneficiaries, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct CMS to establish a requirement for qualified CDRs to demonstrate improvement on key measures of quality and efficiency for their target populations.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: As of April 2019, HHS officials reported that they were implementing new requirements for qualified CDRs, but these requirements were not related to demonstrating improvement on the measures of quality and efficiency, as GAO recommended. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To help ensure that qualified CDRs promote improved quality and efficiency of physician care for Medicare beneficiaries, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should direct CMS to establish a process for monitoring compliance with requirements for qualified CDRs that draws on relevant expert judgment. This process should assess CDR performance on each requirement in a way that takes into account the varying circumstances of CDRs and their available opportunities to promote quality and efficiency improvement for their target populations.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: As of April 2019, HHS officials have not informed us of any actions taken to implement this recommendation. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To help ensure that qualified CDRs promote improved quality and efficiency of physician care for Medicare beneficiaries, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should determine and implement actions to reduce barriers to the development of qualified CDRs, such as (1) developing guidance that clarifies Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act requirements to promote participation in qualified CDRs; (2) working with private sector entities to make relevant multipayer cost data available to qualified CDRs; (3) testing one or more models of shared savings between Medicare and qualified CDRs that achieve reduced Medicare expenditures with improved quality of care, and (4) providing technical assistance to qualified CDRs.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: As of April 2019, HHS officials have not informed us of any actions taken to implement this recommendation beyond providing limited technical assistance to qualified CDRs through monthly support calls and an annual kick-off meeting. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To help ensure that qualified CDRs promote improved quality and efficiency of physician care for Medicare beneficiaries, the Secretary of Health and Human Services should determine key data elements needed by qualified CDRs--such as those relevant for a required core set of measures--and direct Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology and CMS to include these data elements, if feasible, in the requirements for certification of EHRs under the EHR incentive programs.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services
Status: Open

Comments: As of April 2019, HHS officials have not informed us of any actions taken to implement this recommendation. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To improve DOD's corrosion-prevention and control program, and to enhance DOD in its oversight of the status and potential benefits of its equipment-related corrosion projects, the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics should require the Director, Corrosion Policy and Oversight Office, to revise the DOD Corrosion Prevention and Mitigation Strategic Plan or other guidance to require that the military departments include in all follow-on reports the details of measures of achievement other than ROI, such as the features, results, and potential benefits of the project.

Agency: Department of Defense: Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics
Status: Open

Comments: DOD did not concur with this recommendation. As of March 2016, DOD had not implemented this recommendation and stated that the DoD Corrosion Prevention and Mitigation Strategic Plan currently provide sufficient guidance in this regard. As of March 2019, DOD has decided to take action to implement this recommendation. According to DOD Corrosion Office officials, they plan to list measures of achievement for the military departments to follow on the departments' corrosion project in a new DOD manual on corrosion. The Office's goal is to create this new manual by the end of calendar year 2020. We will monitor the extent to which DOD implements this recommendation.

Recommendation: To further improve agency controls that help prevent payments to participants whose incomes exceed eligibility limits, the Secretary of Agriculture should direct the Administrator of FSA to implement a process to verify that accountants' and attorneys' statements accurately reflect participants' incomes as reported on income tax returns and supporting documentation or other equivalent documents.

Agency: Department of Agriculture
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: The U.S. Department of Agriculture agreed with this recommendation at the time of our report but, as of April 2020, has not acted to implement it because of the sensitive nature of questioning accountants' and attorneys' professional judgment. However, we believe doing so would reduce the potential for improper payments supported by taxpayers and would be an appropriate action for the agency to take.

Recommendation: To increase beneficiaries' awareness of providers' financial interest in a particular treatment, Congress should consider directing the Secretary of Health and Human Services to require providers who self-refer IMRT services to disclose to their patients that they have a financial interest in the service.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: In August 2013, to increase beneficiaries' awareness of providers' financial interest in a particular treatment, we suggested that Congress should consider directing the Secretary of Health and Human Services to require providers who self-refer IMRT services to disclose to their patients that they have a financial interest in the service. As of June 2020, Congress has not implemented this suggestion.

Recommendation: The Administrator of CMS should insert a self-referral flag on its Medicare Part B claims form, require providers to indicate whether the IMRT service for which a provider bills Medicare is self-referred, and monitor the effects that self-referral has on costs and beneficiary treatment selection.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: In August 2013, we recommended that the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) insert a self-referral flag on its Medicare Part B claims form, require providers to indicate whether the intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) service for which a provider bills Medicare is self-referred, and monitor the effects that self-referral has on costs and beneficiary treatment selection. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) did not concur with this recommendation, noting that CMS does not believe that this recommendation will address overutilization that occurs as a result of self-referral, would be complex to administer, and may have unintended consequences. We continue to believe that such a flag on Part B claims would likely be the easiest and most cost-effective way for CMS to identify self-referred IMRT services and monitor the effects of self-referral. As of June 2020, CMS has not provided any additional information about actions it has taken to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To help ensure that ADI suppliers provide consistent, safe, and high-quality imaging to Medicare beneficiaries, the Administrator of CMS should determine the content of and publish minimum national standards for the accreditation of ADI suppliers, which could include specific qualifications for supplier personnel and requiring accrediting organization review of clinical images.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: In June 2019, HHS officials informed us that they plan to implement this recommendation in March 2020. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To help ensure that ADI suppliers provide consistent, safe, and high-quality imaging to Medicare beneficiaries, the Administrator of CMS should develop an oversight framework for evaluating accrediting organization performance, which could include collecting and analyzing information on accreditation results and conducting validation audits.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: In June 2019, HHS officials informed us that they plan to implement this recommendation in March 2020. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To help ensure that ADI suppliers provide consistent, safe, and high-quality imaging to Medicare beneficiaries, the Administrator of CMS should develop more specific requirements for accrediting organization mid-cycle audit procedures and clarify guidance on immediate-jeopardy deficiencies to ensure consistent identification and timely correction of serious care problems for the duration of accreditation.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: In June 2019, HHS officials informed us that they plan to implement this recommendation in March 2020. We will update the status of this recommendation when we receive additional information.

Recommendation: To reduce the incentive for facilities to restrict their service provision to avoid reaching the LVPA treatment threshold, the Administrator of CMS should consider revisions such as changing the LVPA to a tiered adjustment.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: As of February 2020, CMS had not implemented this recommendation. CMS stated in February 2020 that the agency had extensive discussions with the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission regarding the Commission's suggestions for modifying the LVPA. CMS also stated that the agency was analyzing the design of the LVPA as part of its evaluation of the ESRD Prospective Payment System. This recommendation remains open because CMS has not provided documentation of steps such as those described above that the agency has taken to consider revisions to the LVPA. We will update the status of this recommendation upon receipt of additional information from CMS.

Recommendation: To improve NASA management and oversight of its spaceflight projects, and to improve the reliability of project EVM data, the NASA Administrator should direct the appropriate offices to modify the NASA Procedural Requirements (NPR) 7120.5 to require projects to implement a formal surveillance program that: (1) Ensures anomalies in contractor-delivered and in-house monthly earned value management reports are identified and explained, and report periodically to the center and mission directorate's leadership on relevant trends in the number of unexplained anomalies. (2) Ensures consistent use of work breakdown structures (WBS) for both the EVM report and the schedule. (3) Ensures that lower level EVM data reconcile to project level EVM data using the same WBS structure. (4) Improves underlying schedules so that they are properly sequenced using predecessor and successor dependencies and are free of constraints to the extent practicable so that the EVM baseline is reliable.

Agency: National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: NASA partially agreed with this recommendation, stating that the reliability and utility of the EVM data needed to be improved but that it did not plan to implement a formal surveillance plan due to resource constraints. Since initially commenting on the report, however, in December 2018, NASA included an initiative in its Corrective Action Plan-a plan put in place in response to recent programmatic performance and NASA's designation on GAO's High-Risk List-to enhance EVM implementation. In June 2019, NASA issued EVM guidance that covered several items, including enhancing in-house and contracted earned value management surveillance and requiring EVM reporting at Baseline Performance Review. NASA officials reported that its near-term plans are well-defined to address the reliability of project EVM data, but they have expressed concerns about funding challenges and cultural resistance. To fully implement this recommendation, NASA will need to take action and provide documentary support for several of its identified planned next steps to enhance EVM surveillance. Without implementing proper surveillance, NASA may be utilizing unreliable EVM data in its analyses to inform its cost and schedule decision making.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to coordinate with the services on conducting research, as appropriate, to determine optimal bonus amounts.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: In a July 2012 report, the USD (P&R) stated that it continued to believe that a study to determine optimal bonus amounts would be beneficial. As of September 2015, DOD was working with the RAND Corporation to develop a model to analyze the impact of adjusting bonuses and special pays for certain personnel communities. According to officials at USD (P&R) the goal of this effort was to provide the services with a tool that can be used to set bonuses and special pays more efficiently. The officials added that models have been developed for officers in the aviation community, and are currently being developed for officers in the healthcare and special operations communities. OSD officials reported in February 2017 that the study by RAND covering all bonuses and special pays had still not been issued. RAND did issue a study, but it covered only mental health care officers. As of November 2019, DOD has not taken any further action on this recommendation.

Recommendation: The Secretary of Defense should direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, as the consolidation of the special and incentive pay programs is completed over the next 7 years and the instructions directing the services on how to administer the new programs are revised, to monitor the implementation of this consolidation to determine whether it is in fact resulting in greater flexibility and more precise targeting of resources and what impact the consolidation is having on DOD's budget.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: In a July 2012 report, the USD (P&R) stated that it was continuing to consolidate special and incentive pay authorities. However, because this consolidation was not yet complete, it has not yet determined whether this consolidation has resulted in greater flexibility, as GAO recommended. In June 2013, OSD reported that OSD was about halfway through with its effort to consolidate special pay authorities, and in September 2015 USD (P&R) officials stated that this effort is continuing. The officials added that, while the Department is tracking the impact of the consolidation on the cost of special and incentive pays, it had not assessed whether the consolidation had resulted in greater flexibility. OSD officials reported that in November 2019 it had still not completed a study of whether the consolidation had resulted in greater flexibility.

Recommendation: The Commissioner of the IRS should direct the appropriate IRS officials to revise the post orders for the service center campuses (SCC) and lockbox bank security guards to include specific procedures for timely reporting exterior lighting outages to SCC or lockbox bank facilities management. These procedures should specify (1) whom to contact to report lighting outages and (2) how to document and track lighting outages until resolved.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS's actions to address this recommendation are ongoing. IRS officials stated that during fiscal year 2020, Facilities Management and Security Services (FMSS) will update the Internal Revenue Manual to reflect the necessary guidance for service center guards and FMSS physical security specialists to know (1) whom the guards are to contact to report lighting outages and (2) how lighting outages are to be documented and tracked until resolved.

Recommendation: To help ensure that Medicare beneficiaries have access to high-quality dialysis care, the Administrator of CMS should assess the extent to which the bundled payment for dialysis care will be sufficient to cover an efficient dialysis organization's costs to provide such care when the bundled payment expands to cover oral-only ESRD drugs. The Administrator should conduct this assessment before implementing this expanded bundled payment.

Agency: Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Status: Open

Comments: CMS, as required by the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014 (PAMA), delayed until 2024 when the bundled payment for dialysis care is expanded to cover oral-only ESRD drugs. Because PAMA requires CMS to use the most recent year of data available to implement this payment change, CMS has been unable to implement our recommendation. We will update the status of this recommendation upon receipt of additional information from CMS.

Recommendation: To ensure sufficient follow-up to DOD's corrosion study, the Secretary of Defense should direct the USD (AT&L) to document program-specific recommendations flowing from the corrosion study with regard to the other weapon systems identified--specifically, the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, CH-53K helicopter, Joint High Speed Vessel, Broad Area Maritime Surveillance Unmanned Aircraft System, and the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle--and establish a process for monitoring and assessing the effectiveness of the CPC programs for these systems.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: As of September 2015, DOD had not documented program-specific recommendations from the corrosion study for the other weapon systems identified in its report. However, DOD updated its Corrosion Prevention and Control Planning Guidebook in 2014 and, according to officials, is working to update DOD Instruction 5000.67, Prevention and Mitigation of Corrosion on DOD Military Equipment and Infrastructure. These actions may improve the corrosion prevention and control planning for the weapon systems identified in DOD's study. DOD partially concurred with this recommendation at the time of our report but as of March 2019, has since decided to take action to implement it. According to Corrosion Office officials, they interacted with two of five weapon-systems programs on corrosion-related matters. One of these weapon-system programs, per Corrosion Office officials, was eventually canceled. In addition to updating the Corrosion Prevention and Control Planning Guidebook for Military Systems and Equipment in 2014, officials stated that they are planning to further update DOD Instruction 5000.67 (Prevention and Mitigation of Corrosion on DOD Military Equipment and Infrastructure). Also, according to Corrosion Office officials, procedures for evaluating acquisition programs will be included in the new DOD manual on corrosion. The Corrosion Office's goal of completing this instruction update and creating the new manual is by the end of calendar year 2020. We will monitor the extent to which DOD implements this recommendation.

Recommendation: To ensure sufficient follow-up to DOD's corrosion study, the Secretary of Defense should direct the USD (AT&L) to document Air Force-and Navy-specific recommendations flowing from the corrosion study and establish a process for monitoring and assessing the effectiveness of these services' corrective actions.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: As of September 2015, DOD had not documented Air Force- and Navy-specific recommendations flowing from the corrosion study. However, DOD updated its Corrosion Prevention and Control Planning Guidebook in 2014 and, according to officials, is working to update DOD Instruction 5000.67, Prevention and Mitigation of Corrosion on DOD Military Equipment and Infrastructure. Further, the Air Force and the Navy have both taken actions to address the DOD-wide recommendations from the corrosion study. These actions may improve corrosion prevention and control planning for Air Force and Navy programs. As of March 2019, Corrosion Office officials stated that they are planning to further update DOD Instruction 5000.67 (Prevention and Mitigation of Corrosion on DOD Military Equipment and Infrastructure) or other appropriate guidance related to the process or procedures for monitoring and assessing the effectiveness of Corrosion Prevention Control planning for weapon systems, particularly related to how the military services will accomplish this within their increased weapon system oversight role. In addition, per Corrosion Office officials, this information will be addressed in the new DOD manual on corrosion. The Corrosion Office's goal to complete this instruction update and create the new manual by the end of calendar year 2020. We will monitor the extent to which DOD implements this recommendation.

Recommendation: To help improve the effectiveness of the Bureau's outreach and enumeration efforts, especially for HTC populations, should they be used again in the 2020 Census, and improve the Bureau's marketing/outreach efforts, the Secretary of Commerce should require the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs as well as the Director of the U.S. Census Bureau to develop mechanisms to increase coordination and communication between the partnership and local census office staff. Possible actions include offering more opportunities for joint training, establishing protocols for coordination, and more effectively leveraging the partnership contact database to better align partnership outreach activities with local needs.

Agency: Department of Commerce
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: The Department generally agreed with this recommendation. In 2011, the Bureau reported on the agency's assessment of the partnership program. In September 2014, the Bureau's Path to the 2020 Census, identified the Partnership Program as one of the best methods for communicating the importance of response and states its intent to map out details about the Partnership Program in early 2016. As of March 2018, Bureau officials said they were developing coordination mechanisms between partnership and Area Census Office staff for the 2020 Census. For example, the Bureau updated a form it had used during the 2010 Census to track partnership outreach activities to help facilitate information sharing within the Bureau and said it plans to make additional updates. In March 2019, the Bureau informed us that it is assigning at least one partnership specialist to each census office manager to help address this recommendation. As we reported in May 2020, the Bureau had not put in place expectations for how Partnership staff should support area census office staff. We also reported that pluralities of area census office managers we surveyed in March 2020 were dissatsified with the level of clarity of roles and responsibilities of Partnership staff, as well as the level of communication and coordination between Partnership and office staff. To fully implement this recommendation, the Bureau will need to take such steps as documenting for partnership specialists and their area census office manager how they are expected to work together and other significant mechanisms that would increase effectiveness of coordination and communication between partnership and local field office staff.

Recommendation: To help improve the effectiveness of the Bureau's outreach and enumeration efforts, especially for HTC populations, should they be used again in the 2020 Census, and to improve some of the Bureau's key efforts to enumerate HTC populations, the Secretary of Commerce should require the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs as well as the Director of the U.S. Census Bureau to determine the factors that led to the staffing issues observed during SBE and take corrective actions to ensure more efficient SBE staffing levels in 2020.

Agency: Department of Commerce
Status: Open

Comments: The Department generally agreed with this recommendation. In September 2012, the Bureau issued its assessment of the Service Based Enumeration Program. The assessment reported on the number of individuals counted and the complexities of this special enumeration activity. The assessment did not address the Bureau's approach to staffing this special enumeration activity. In its 2020 Census Operational Plan, issued in October 2017, the Bureau provided a high level overview of reengineered field operations plans but did not provide details on special enumeration efforts. In April 2018, the Bureau provided us with its planned staffing ratios for its Service-Based Enumeration activity for the 2020 Census in comparison to those used in the 2010 Census, as well as results of its 2016 Census Test of SBE activity. As of August 2020 we have ongoing work that will be examining implementation of peak field operations and providing updates to this recommendation. In order to fully implement this recommendation, the Bureau needs to demonstrate that its planning for how it will determine staffing levels for SBE takes into account the factors that led to inefficient staffing allocation previously.

Recommendation: To help improve the effectiveness of the Bureau's outreach and enumeration efforts, especially for HTC populations, should they be used again in the 2020 Census, and to improve some of the Bureau's key efforts to enumerate HTC populations, the Secretary of Commerce should require the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs as well as the Director of the U.S. Census Bureau to evaluate the extent to which each special enumeration activity improved the count of traditionally hard-to-enumerate groups and use the results to help inform decision making on spending for these programs in 2020.

Agency: Department of Commerce
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: The Department generally agreed with this recommendation. In 2012, the Bureau reported on assessments of many 2010 special enumeration activities such as the Service-Based Enumeration and the Be Counted/Questionnaire Assistance Center Programs. These assessments revealed the number of persons counted and spending for the special enumeration activities. Separately, the Bureau issued results of the 2010 Census Coverage Measurement Program that described the level of coverage of various hard-to-enumerate populations generally without attributing coverage to specific enumeration activities. Since 2015, the Bureau has issued annual updates of its 2020 Census Operational Plans, which have not provided details of plans for various special enumeration activities. In April 2017 Bureau officials provided us with evaluation results of its 2010 communication efforts and other documents related to ongoing efforts to reduce errors in the census. As of August 2020, we are in communication with Bureau officials about steps they are taking to implement this recommendation. To fully implement this recommendation, the Bureau needs to demonstrate how it is relying on data about how various special enumeration activities of historically hard-to-enumerate groups contributed to census coverage in 2010 to inform its design for the 2020 Census.

Recommendation: To better ensure FDA's oversight of the safety of GRAS substances, the Commissioner of FDA should develop a strategy to minimize the potential for conflicts of interest in companies' GRAS determinations, including taking steps such as issuing guidance for companies on conflict of interest and requiring information in GRAS notices regarding expert panelists' independence.

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

Comments: On November 16, 2017, FDA published a notification of availability for the draft guidance "Best Practices for Convening a GRAS Panel: Guidance for Industry," with a request for comments on the draft guidance by May 15, 2018. FDA indicated that the draft guidance represents FDA's current thinking on strategies to minimize the potential for conflicts of interest in companies' GRAS determinations, including assessing potential GRAS panel members for conflicts of interest. As of July 2020, FDA had not yet finalized the guidance, so we are leaving the recommendation open.

Recommendation: Should the program be extended beyond 2009, to ensure that the maximum amount of capital ends up in low-income community businesses, Congress may wish to consider offering grants to CDEs that would provide the funds to low-income community businesses. If it does so, Congress may wish to require Treasury to gather appropriate data to assess whether and to what extent the grant program increases the amount of federal subsidy provided to low-income community businesses compared to the NMTC; whether the grant program otherwise affects the success of efforts to assist low-income communities; and how costs for administering the program incurred by the CDFI Fund, CDEs, and investors would change. One option may be for Congress to set aside a portion of funds to be used as grants and a portion to be used as tax credit allocation authority under the current structure of the program in a future allocation round to facilitate comparison of the two program structures.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: No legislative action has been identified as of March 2020. Section 141 of division Q of the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2020, extended NMTC through 2020 (Public Law 116-94). However, this act did not offer grants in lieu of credits, as GAO suggested in January 2010. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimates the cost of this extension to be approximately $1.5 billion. Offering grants in lieu of NMTCs could result in a greater portion of the federal subsidy reaching low-income community businesses.

Recommendation: Because EPA alone cannot address the complexities of the nation's challenges in addressing environmental health risks for children, Congress may wish to consider re-establishing a government-wide task force on children's environmental health risks, similar to the one previously established by Executive Order 13045 and co-chaired by the Administrator of EPA and the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Congress may wish to consider charging it with identifying the principal environmental health threats to children and developing national strategies for addressing them. Congress may also wish to consider establishing in law the Executive Order's requirement for periodic reports about federal research findings and research needs regarding children's environmental health.

Agency: Congress
Status: Open

Comments: As of March 2020, we have not identified actions by the Congress to establish in law requirements such as those in Executive Order 13045.

Recommendation: To help DOD obtain reasonable assurance that all active and Reserve component servicemembers to whom the PDHRA requirement applies are provided the opportunity to have their health concerns identified, the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs and the military services should take steps to ensure that PDHRA questionnaires are included in DOD's central repository for each of these servicemembers.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: In its comments to this report, the Department of Defense (DOD) concurred with this recommendation. On October 2009, DOD's Force Health Protection and Response Office sent a memo to each of the military service Surgeons General emphasizing the need for the post-deployment health reassessment (PDHRA) to be offered to all service members who are eligible to complete the assessment. In 2010, DOD's noted that the services would work with the Armed Forces Health Surveillance Center (AFHSC) repository to ensure PDHRAs are submitted correctly, without transmission errors. DOD's 2011 case records showed that the Air Force and Army had developed data verification processes to ensure that AFHSC received PDHRAs. Further, the Defense Medical Data Center (DMDC) had planed to create a file consisting of the date of deployment for deployed personnel, and that the file would be available to the services in order to match DMDC with data from each of the service-specific systems, in accordance to requirements. In September 2011, although DMDC and the services had agreed to match rosters of deployed service members, there were still inconsistencies in deployment dates. In March 2012, DOD was still verifying data inconsistencies which, until resolved, leads to inaccurate reporting based on errors in the deployment dates. As of September 2019, DOD has not provided information or documentation to address this recommendation.

Recommendation: To improve the Bureau's use of its master schedule to manage the 2020 decennial census, the Secretary of Commerce should require the Director of the U.S. Census Bureau to include estimates of the resources, such as labor, materials, and overhead costs, in the 2020 integrated schedule for each activity as the schedule is built, and prepare to carry out other steps as necessary to conduct systematic schedule risk analyses on the 2020 schedule.

Agency: Department of Commerce
Status: Open
Priority recommendation

Comments: Commerce neither agreed nor disagreed with this recommendation. Regarding GAO's 2013 assessment of the Bureau's schedule (GAO-14-59), Bureau officials stated that they hoped to begin identifying the resources needed for each activity in their schedules by early 2014. Bureau officials announced they had completed the 2020 Census schedule in July 2016, and have since periodically described their intent to link resources to activities within their schedules. However, as of May 2018, when the Bureau had not taken these steps. Senior Bureau officials stated that it would require additional staffing in order to plan for and implement this recommendation. In July 2018 (GAO-18-589) we reported again on the status of the Bureau's scheduling, stating that when the Bureau has resource loaded its schedule, it will be able to use the schedule more effectively as a management tool. The Bureau took steps toward assigning resources to its master activity schedule for the 2020 Census, but effectively ran out of time to do so. Assigning resources to large complex schedules is easier to do early in schedule development process, as we recommended the Bureau do in 2009 for its 2020 Census schedule. This recommendation will remain open pending the Bureau taking steps in developing its 2030 schedule with appropriate resources linked to it.

Recommendation: To help implement a fair, effective, and credible performance management system for its civilian employees--whether NSPS or another--the Secretary of Defense should review and evaluate the effectiveness of the department's training.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 which repealed the National Security Personnel System required that DOD (1) take all actions necessary for the orderly termination of NSPS and (2) transition of all employees and positions from NSPS to legacy personnel systems or, if applicable, to the personnel systems that would have applied if NSPS had never been established. The law also mandated that the transition be completed by no later than January 1, 2012 and required DOD to establish a new performance management system, among other things. DOD began to implement a new performance management system in 2016. GAO staff met with DOD officials in October 2019 to discuss the status of the new system and any efforts to address these recommendations. DOD officials agreed to provide documentation related to these efforts, but, as of November 2019, have not yet done so. Further updates will be made once that documentation is received and reviewed.

Recommendation: To help implement a fair, effective, and credible performance management system for its civilian employees--whether NSPS or another--the Secretary of Defense should ensure that guidance is in place for conducting a postdecisional analysis that specifies what process the components should follow to investigate and eliminate potential barriers to fair and equitable ratings.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 which repealed the National Security Personnel System required that DOD (1) take all actions necessary for the orderly termination of NSPS and (2) transition of all employees and positions from NSPS to legacy personnel systems or, if applicable, to the personnel systems that would have applied if NSPS had never been established. The law also mandated that the transition be completed by no later than January 1, 2012 and required DOD to establish a new performance management system, among other things. DOD began to implement a new performance management system in 2016. GAO staff met with DOD officials in October 2019 to discuss the status of the new system and any efforts to address these recommendations. DOD officials agreed to provide documentation related to these efforts, but, as of November 2019, have not yet done so. Further updates will be made once that documentation is received and reviewed.

Recommendation: To help implement a fair, effective, and credible performance management system for its civilian employees--whether NSPS or another--the Secretary of Defense should include, as part of the department's monitoring of the implementation of its system, efforts to monitor and evaluate how the safeguards specifically are implemented by lower-level organizations across the department.

Agency: Department of Defense
Status: Open

Comments: The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 which repealed the National Security Personnel System required that DOD (1) take all actions necessary for the orderly termination of NSPS and (2) transition of all employees and positions from NSPS to legacy personnel systems or, if applicable, to the personnel systems that would have applied if NSPS had never been established. The law also mandated that the transition be completed by no later than January 1, 2012 and required DOD to establish a new performance management system, among other things. DOD began to implement a new performance management system in 2016. GAO staff met with DOD officials in October 2019 to discuss the status of the new system and any efforts to address these recommendations. DOD officials agreed to provide documentation related to these efforts, but, as of November 2019, have not yet done so. Further updates will be made once that documentation is received and reviewed.

Recommendation: In order to better assess whether changes are needed in the way IRS administers activities not engaged in for profit provisions, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue should take steps to estimate the extent of activities not engaged in for profit noncompliance from its ongoing research programs.

Agency: Department of the Treasury: Internal Revenue Service
Status: Open

Comments: IRS agreed to research sole proprietor noncompliance, as GAO recommended in September 2009. It is focusing on those who improperly claim business losses (i.e., not profits). IRS's Office of Research, Analysis and Statistics is using the reporting compliance study of Form 1040 filers to gather the data on such noncompliant business losses. This research covered sampled tax returns filed for tax years 2009, 2010, and 2011 and used audits of the sampled tax returns that are filed for each tax year. In November 2016, IRS research officials provided the initial rough estimates of the percentage of disallowed losses and associated dollar amounts for all 3 tax years but as of December 2019, they had not yet indicated how these estimates helped IRS to understand the nature of the tax noncompliance. The officials cautioned that their ability to develop the estimates depends on the number of observations that can be applied from each tax year. This research, when completed, could help IRS to identify noncompliant sole proprietor issues and take action to reduce losses.