Summary

In response to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the implications of the Coast Guard's plans to eliminate or reduce facilities in response to reductions in its requested fiscal year 1988 appropriations to determine the: (1) factors the Coast Guard used in selecting the New York and New Orleans vessel traffic service (VTS) facilities for closure; (2) safety value of the two VTS facilities; and (3) estimated personnel cost savings from closing the two VTS facilities and decommissioning two icebreaker vessels.

GAO found that: (1) the Coast Guard used selection factors primarily to reduce its operating expenses and gave little consideration to VTS effectiveness in enhancing safety; (2) the Coast Guard considered for closure only those VTS facilities with voluntary traffic participation that would not require legislative changes to close them, low user participation rates, and low potential for local resistance; and (3) an additional advantage in selecting the New Orleans site was avoiding over $16 million for required equipment upgrades. GAO also found that the Coast Guard: (1) did not maintain required cost-effectiveness and safety information; (2) did not consider accident prevention information, total VTS activity levels, or the complexity of traffic in VTS areas; and (3) could not clearly demonstrate VTS safety value, since it did not have complete and current management information regarding VTS program effectiveness. In addition, GAO found that: (1) the estimated annual savings from the New York and New Orleans VTS facility closures totalled $1,341,000 and $1,980,000, respectively; (2) $2.4 million of the total savings represented personnel cost savings, while the remainder was attributable to the elimination of operations and maintenance costs; (3) the Coast Guard estimated annual savings from decommissioning two icebreaker vessels at about $14.2 million, $9.3 million in personnel cost savings, and the remainder in fuel and maintenance costs, but could not provide documentation for the figures; and (4) the Coast Guard needed four icebreakers to meet future need and estimated the costs of two new vessels at about $250 million each, with annual operating costs of $7.4 million.