Summary

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed: (1) how the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) planned to increase federal agencies' awareness of unclaimed properties held by the District of Columbia and other state and local entities; and (2) the nature and value of those properties.

GAO found that: (1) the District of Columbia's Unclaimed Property Division annually reported unclaimed properties by listing the owners' names and addresses in local newspapers to notify them of those unclaimed properties; (2) only 45 of the 8,740 unclaimed properties the District listed in 1989 belonged to federal agencies; (3) 41 of those properties had a total value of $30,669, less than 1 percent of the value of all 1989 unclaimed properties; (4) 3 federal agencies reclaimed $3,042 of the $30,699 after being notified, but agencies did not reclaim the remaining $27,657 in property; and (5) 82 percent of the unclaimed federal properties belonged to 6 federal agencies that generally did not know that those properties were being held.