<DOC>
[107th Congress House Hearings]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access]
[DOCID: f:73837.wais]
SEVEN YEARS OF GPRA: HAS THE RESULTS ACT PROVIDED RESULTS?
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT MANAGEMENT,
INFORMATION, AND TECHNOLOGY
of the
COMMITTEE ON
GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JULY 20, 2000
__________
Serial No. 106-245
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform
______
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COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM
DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman
BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland TOM LANTOS, California
CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut ROBERT E. WISE, Jr., West Virginia
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida MAJOR R. OWENS, New York
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York
STEPHEN HORN, California PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania
JOHN L. MICA, Florida PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii
THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
DAVID M. McINTOSH, Indiana ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,
MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana DC
JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania
STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
MARSHALL ``MARK'' SANFORD, South DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio
Carolina ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois
BOB BARR, Georgia DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
DAN MILLER, Florida JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts
ASA HUTCHINSON, Arkansas JIM TURNER, Texas
LEE TERRY, Nebraska THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine
JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois HAROLD E. FORD, Jr., Tennessee
GREG WALDEN, Oregon JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois
DOUG OSE, California ------
PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont
HELEN CHENOWETH-HAGE, Idaho (Independent)
DAVID VITTER, Louisiana
Kevin Binger, Staff Director
Daniel R. Moll, Deputy Staff Director
James C. Wilson, Chief Counsel
Robert A. Briggs, Clerk
Phil Schiliro, Minority Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on Government Management, Information, and Technology
STEPHEN HORN, California, Chairman
JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois JIM TURNER, Texas
THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania
GREG WALDEN, Oregon MAJOR R. OWENS, New York
DOUG OSE, California PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii
PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
Ex Officio
DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
J. Russell George, Staff Director and Chief Counsel
Robert Alloway, Professional Staff Member
Bryan Sisk, Clerk
Mark Stephenson, Minority Professional Staff Member
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on July 20, 2000.................................... 1
Statement of:
Armey, Hon. Richard K., a Representative in Congress from the
State of Texas, and Majority Leader, U.S. House of
Representatives; and Hon. Pete Sessions, a Representative
in Congress from the State of Texas and chairman, House
Results Caucus............................................. 7
Gotbaum, Joshua, Executive Associate Director and Controller
and Acting Deputy Director for Management, Office of
Management and Budget; Christopher Mihm, Associate
Director, Federal Management and Workforce Issues, U.S.
General Accounting Office; Maurice McTigue, distinguished
visiting scholar, Mercatus Institute, George Mason
University; and Ellen Taylor, policy analyst, OMB Watch.... 22
Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:
Armey, Hon. Richard K., a Representative in Congress from the
State of Texas, and Majority Leader, U.S. House of
Representatives, prepared statement of..................... 10
Gotbaum, Joshua, Executive Associate Director and Controller
and Acting Deputy Director for Management, Office of
Management and Budget, prepared statement of............... 25
Horn, Hon. Stephen, a Representative in Congress from the
State of California, prepared statement of................. 3
McTigue, Maurice, distinguished visiting scholar, Mercatus
Institute, George Mason University, prepared statement of.. 51
Mihm, Christopher, Associate Director, Federal Management and
Workforce Issues, U.S. General Accounting Office, prepared
statement of............................................... 34
Sessions, Hon. Pete, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Texas and chairman, House Results Caucus, prepared
statement of............................................... 17
Taylor, Ellen, policy analyst, OMB Watch, prepared statement
of......................................................... 104
Turner, Hon. Jim, a Representative in Congress from the State
of Texas, prepared statement of............................ 6
SEVEN YEARS OF GPRA: HAS THE RESULTS ACT PROVIDED RESULTS?
----------
THURSDAY, JULY 20, 2000
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Government Management, Information,
and Technology,
Committee on Government Reform,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in
room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Stephen Horn
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Horn, Turner, and Maloney.
Staff present: J. Russell George, staff director and chief
counsel; Earl Pierce, professional staff member; Bonnie Heald,
director of communications; Bryan Sisk, clerk; Elizabeth Seong,
staff assistant; Will Ackerly and Davidson Hulfish, interns;
Trey Henderson, minority counsel; and Jean Gosa, minority
clerk.
Mr. Horn. We are here today to examine the implementation
of the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993. This is
a very important process.
The act was designed to evaluate whether Federal agencies
and programs are accomplishing their missions. Once the law has
been successfully implemented, the American people will be able
to ask and receive an accurate answer to the question, what are
we getting for our money? The Results Act encourages efficiency
and accountability in government spending by requiring agencies
to justify how they spend their portion of the Government's
$1.8 trillion budget. The law requires agencies to set goals
and use performance measures for their management and
budgeting.
In a 1997 hearing before this subcommittee, Christopher
Mihm of the General Accounting Office testified that
implementation of the act varied among executive branch
agencies in quality, utility and responsiveness to the law. In
1999, the General Accounting Office found that only 14 of 35
agencies defined some type of relationship between the program
activities on their proposed budgets and the performance goals
cited in their plans. Yet, few of the 14 agencies explained how
they would use their funding to achieve these goals.
Clearly, agencies have made progress in linking program
planning with their budget requests. Yet, much work remains
before
Congress can use this performance information as a significant
tool in the budget allocation process. Nevertheless, once the
Results Act has been successfully implemented, it will help us
achieve a more efficient, effective and responsive government.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Stephen Horn follows:]
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Mr. Horn. We are honored to have as our lead witnesses, the
Majority Leader of the House, the gentleman from Texas, Mr.
Armey, and the chairman of the House Results Caucus headed by
the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Sessions.
We welcome all of our witnesses today and we look forward
to their testimony.
You know the routine here, my friend, and the full
statement goes into the record automatically when you are
introduced, resume and all. In a minute, I am going to yield to
another gentleman from Texas. This seems to be a Texas day
here. I hope the Texas Society is out here somewhere.
Mr. Sessions. Let us hope the rest of the year continues
that way, Mr. Chairman. [Laughter.]
Mr. Horn. I agree with you.
That is how it works and in the meantime, the gentleman
from Texas, Mr. Turner, our ranking member, will have his
opening statement.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Being from California, you certainly defer to Texas. We
appreciate it.
This March, for the first time under the Results Act,
agencies Governmentwide were required to report on their
results in achieving their goals. I think we all agree that
this bipartisan legislation we call the Results Act has been an
effective tool for enhancing government performance and
efficiency. Its intent is to fundamentally shift the focus of
our Federal Government and to be sure that we move from a
preoccupation with staffing and activity levels to a focus on
outcomes in Federal programs.
Outcomes are the results expressed in terms of real
differences in Federal programs and the impact those programs
make in peoples' lives such as increase in real wages earned by
graduates of an unemployment training program, or a reduction
in fatality and injury rates in workplaces or on our highways.
Congress and its committees can and have been involved in
the Results Act at all stages. Committees have a means to
develop and amend the strategic plans as well as the annual
performance plans. Agency officials have said that evidence of
real involvement and interest on the part of congressional
committees in using performance goals and information to help
in congressional decisionmaking would help to build and sustain
support for the Results Act within the agencies.
As a result, as Members of Congress, we have an obligation
to work with all of the executive branch's agencies to be sure
GPRA is the tool that improves the efficiency of the Federal
Government. I believe that a strong and sustained congressional
attention to GPRA is needed to ensure the success of the act
and I know that goal is shared by Chairman Horn. I commend the
chairman as well as my colleagues from Texas for their strong
support of this very critical effort on the part of this
Congress.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Jim Turner follows:]
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T3837.003
Mr. Horn. I thank the gentleman.
Now we have the ``el tremendo'' gentleman from Texas. We
are delighted to have the Majority Leader here. He has been a
backer of the results-oriented approach from day 1. We are
pleased to have him here. We will have a few questions for him
but I know he has a busy day.
The gentleman from Texas, the Majority Leader, Mr. Armey.
STATEMENTS OF HON. RICHARD K. ARMEY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS, AND MAJORITY LEADER, U.S.
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES; AND HON. PETE SESSIONS, A
REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS AND
CHAIRMAN, HOUSE RESULTS CAUCUS
Mr. Armey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me first appreciate the work that your committee has
done. I think as much as any committee in Congress, this
subcommittee and this committee has led our efforts under the
Results Act.
The Results Act, as you know, was passed in 1993 and it was
designed to bring accountability and performance in government
agencies to the American people. Every one of us, as a Member
of Congress, will get testimony from back home in that area of
our work which we most often refer to as case work about the
extent to which the agencies are providing the services in the
lives of our constituents, the American people, who pay for
these agencies, and by whose authority the agencies exist. All
too often we find ourselves frustrated along with our
constituents in the agency not performing.
This has been, I think, a particularly heart warming
experience for me to be able to be involved in the Results Act.
The Results Act basically says to every agency, have a clear
understanding of what you are doing, be able to express that to
us, tell us what your mission is and give us some evidence of
your ability to achieve the results you desire.
We give the agency a great deal of latitude there. If we
have a quarrel with what they believe and express to be their
mission, we can take that up legislatively, but the fundamental
question is, do you in fact have an ability to demonstrate that
you are getting results, even as you define your mission? We
have encouraged this.
I have to tell you, to a large extent, what we did when we
passed the Results Act was ask the agencies to conform to a new
regime of accountability. I, for one, was more than willing to
be patient and encouraging. I have always argued that for any
of us in any occupation of our life, adaptation to change the
adoption and the performance under new regimes are always
something we must have some time and encouragement in doing,
and we have done that.
What you have seen happening simultaneously over the past
couple of years is congressional oversight that has been
designed to in fact encourage greater performance--your
scorecards being very important in that regard--and at the same
time, for us to give a very strong view of the results that are
there.
I think, quite frankly, this Congress has been encouraging
and it has been diligent in oversight. You have seen the
oversight extension go to other committees across Congress and
more committees have taken up the understanding of the
implementation of their role in oversight in this regard.
I have to tell you, Mr. Chairman, despite all the time and
effort that we have spent being encouraging in this manner, I
have come to a moment of some disappointment. Our latest
evaluations of performance are frankly disappointing to me.
Every agency in the Federal Government has had a chance to
travel that learning curve and frankly, should be doing better,
each and every one of them.
I think we need to appreciate the performance of the
General Accounting Office. They worked very hard on this, they
have taken it seriously and they have been very supportive
again, both to the committee and to the agencies, but we have
had independent reviews that have supported their own analysis
from George Mason University and other reviewers across the
country that it just isn't working well enough for the American
people.
I think what we need to do today perhaps is start to just
step it up another level. My friend, Pete Sessions, came to me
early on when we began talking about Results Act and said, I
would like to form a Results Caucus. He and his caucus have
been very active in that and we will hear from Pete in a
moment.
While I don't think we should ever be a singularly
discouraging voice out there, I think while we continue our
encouragement, we must at this point be a little demanding.
Finally, let me say two final points. One, I have taken
that initiative a little bit with something that perhaps you
have seen the ``waste-o-meter.'' We try to keep a better track
of this, try to publicize the results and try to arm our
budgeteers and appropriators with real information should it
become necessary as we try to implement an overall, rigorous
budget process, fighting against demands for new, more
spending, to document that spending is not necessarily
justifiable given the levels of waste we have uncovered from
the committees reporting today and the reports we have had, and
the fine work of GAO, some $16 billion uncovered already this
year, that we have talked about.
Finally, if I might chafe a little under the bit, at or
about the time we created the Results Act, the Vice President
of the United States, Al Gore, was billed as the
administration's leader in this effort in what he called the
whole effort to reinvent government. I know there was a great
deal of public relations there but the fact of the matter is
that the Results Act and any efforts to reinvent government,
enforce accountability in Government lay fallow until this
congressional majority took over in 1995.
Therefore, it irritates me a little bit when constituents
come into my office with severe disappointments, sometimes
heartbreaking disappointments about agencies that just aren't
performing as they should be for them. People come to my office
here, people sometimes with multibillion dollar private
agreements that are being held up by some agency that just
won't make a decision.
We don't necessarily sit in Congress and say to the agency,
you should make this or that decision but I think we have a
responsibility to say, make a decision--a disservice to the
people by virtue of agencies not performing.
To have the Vice President criticize this Congress that has
tried through all our oversight efforts in so many ways to
encourage this better service, refer to us as a do nothing for
the people Congress, I must say gets under my skin a little
bit. I have to say, where were you, Mr. Vice President, after
all the publicity waned over reinventing government; where were
you when it came time to dig in as committee after committee
has done here and implement the rigor, maintain the oversight
and continue the encouragement and at times, if necessary,
express some anger?
We have done that. Your committee has done that. As I said,
other committees have done that and the fact of the matter is,
we are getting improvement, but it is not coming fast enough.
You will hear further testimony today about that.
I guess my parting word would be, let us not only continue
but continue to expand our effort across the Congress to
implement this because the goal is worthy. The objectives of
the Results Act are laudable. We have said to the American
people, we are determined to not only make it clear in every
agency of this government, a shared understanding of what your
mission is, what your duty is to the American people, but to
give one another encouragement, prodding and at times, if
necessary, criticism in seeing to it that the American people
get the services they deserve from the agencies created by this
Congress on their behalf.
Let me again thank you for letting me be here this morning.
Let me again encourage you to continue your fine work and I
express my firm belief that as we continue in understanding and
implementing GPRA, we will make this government a government
that is a better service in the lives of its constituents and
that is what this government has an obligation to be.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Dick Armey follows:]
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Mr. Horn. We thank you. Those are very worthwhile bits of
wisdom. By the way, when we did take over this committee in
1995, we did offer an invitation to the Vice President on
several occasions and we told him it wasn't one where we were
going to crab a lot about it, we just thought he was trying to
do a good job and we will give you a forum. We wouldn't even
get that.
Let me ask you on this serious business. I have a feeling,
and I did say it once either in the retreat or in the
conference but nobody listens to humble subcommittee chairs but
they will listen to you.
I think under your leadership, if we can get the chairs of
the full authorization committees, the chairs of the
Subcommittees on Appropriations, and get their political
counterparts--Presidential nominees, be it Secretary, Deputy
Secretary, Assistant Secretary--in the same place around a
table and say, we have read through what some of your goals
are, show me where in the law this is based. I just think we
have to get a dialog of principals, not just a dialog of staff.
With all due respect to the wonderful staff around here, the
fact is, they are not elected and the executive branch at least
has the imprimatur of the President's nomination and the
confirmation of the Senate. I think that closure has not been
very good.
Mr. Armey. I appreciate that point. I couldn't agree with
you more. It has to be a full partnership. This is a big
government. Any big enterprise like this, it is easy for people
to lay down on the job and let it be overlooked or to have
confusions about what their jobs are and let that not be
clearly understood.
It does take a partnership effort I think between the
House, the Senate and the executive branch to make something
that is frankly this bold and large--imagine this. If you went
before any college class in America and said, my job is to make
sure the Federal Government, as large as it is, never misses a
beat in serving to the best of its ability, the needs of the
American people, you would astound people with just how
enormous that task is. No small group of people can do that. We
must all work on it together.
That is why I have tried to use the authorities of my
office to encourage that and I think your point is well taken.
We have to do a better job all the way around.
Mr. Horn. I thank you and I know you have other things to
do but if you want to stay and listen to Mr. Sessions, fine. We
would welcome you.
Does the gentleman from Texas have any questions for the
Majority Leader?
Mr. Turner. No.
Mr. Sessions. Majority Leader, are you going to stay or
stick around?
Mr. Armey. I might stay a little bit because I am so proud
of you. If I may, Mr. Chairman, my good colleague just got a
clean bill of health from Baylor University and they said he
was good looking too, so I am going to stay.
Mr. Sessions. It is true, I went in for a little bit of day
surgery and everything turned out all right.
I thank my good friend, the Majority Leader.
Mr. Sessions. Mr. Chairman, thank you so much for asking me
to be here today.
I would also like to give the same accolades to the
gentleman from Texas, Mr. Turner. He and I have numerous
conversations, as you and I do, Mr. Chairman, and I have found
that Mr. Turner is not only focused on government efficiency,
but that his answer to the problems is right in line with the
things you and I are attempting to accomplish. I would like to
applaud the gentleman for his leadership and work on that also.
I thank Mr. Turner for that.
As you know, the Results Caucus is interested in giving
this government every single dollar it needs but not a penny
more. Today, you are hearing testimony from Majority Leader
Armey from Texas talk about his observations as the father and
leader of the GPRA and other things that have come through this
Congress that would empower and give stature to government
agencies to be able to resolve their own problems.
Mr. Armey and I have, for quite some time, decided that
there is a time and a process that would allow this government
the opportunity to see that a process that would encourage
efficiency was important. We have also decided that we were not
going to become frustrated, that we were going to work with
agencies, work with GAO, work toward resolution of problems.
The fact of the matter is that I believe the gentleman from
Texas, Mr. Armey and I concur. It seems like the government has
had time to work through these problems and they have not made
as much progress as either one of us would have wanted.
The Results Act, as you know, was a challenge for agency
directors and those managers of the government to run their
agencies more efficiently. It was created as a challenge, as an
opportunity for them to focus on the near term needs of the
government by them establishing those goals and directions they
would like to go into.
The fact of the matter is that as technology and time has
played its course, many Federal programs are still dramatically
underperforming, inefficient and have become functionally
obsolete. This government and its managers have not even
recognized those changes and taken hold of that.
I believe that the Results Act, which was designed to
address those problems as well as to functionally require that
the Government managers would be attuned to those changes has
not worked. I have not seen agencies using the Results Act as a
helpful management tool. I will repeat, I have not seen the
agencies use the Results Act as a helpful management tool which
it was completely designed for.
The performance plans the agencies produce are often still
too broad, they are attempting to solve every agency problem
with a large stroke of a brush rather than specifically
focusing on a structured performance plan to focus or to move
toward reform by addressing those immediate problems that face
their agency.
I continue to have, as Majority Leader Armey and both you,
Mr. Chairman, and Mr. Turner, regular talks with agencies about
their performance, regular talks with agencies about how they
perform their job. I will tell you that the feedback I hear is
that the managers of the government see the Results Act as
cumbersome and yet just another hoop to jump through.
I am disappointed. I am disappointed because I do not
believe that the agencies have looked at what this is all
about. I don't believe they have worked hard enough to make it
work and I further do not believe that they view it as a value
added process.
We will continue to focus on the job of oversight. Mr.
Armey and I will continue not to be frustrated, but I will tell
you, Mr. Chairman, we will not yield back to believing that the
Government, regardless of how big it is, should not be
efficient. We believe a government or an organization, even the
smallest in this Government, should become efficient and should
do what its mandate is laid out to be.
Last, I would say this. While I have said we are not going
to be frustrated, you can anticipate and expect that the
Majority Leader and the Results Caucus led by me will continue
to speak out on the issues where we see problems. We do
appreciate what this committee is doing as well as the
gentleman from Indiana, Mr. Burton, and the whole committee,
and we want to continue working with you.
Today, you are going to hear from people who have specific
examples, ideas about how we can make it better, and I
encourage this committee to address that in the way they
choose. We will continue to be a value added partner.
I thank you for the opportunity to be here.
Last, I would say this, and ask unanimous consent to say
this, I have a professor to my right, Dr. Armey; I also have a
professor from my university, Dr. Weldon Crowley, who is here.
Dr. Crowley was my history professor. So many times we talk
about learning things in fifth grade, how government works and
playing them out here. In this case, it was at Southwestern
University as a young student where my professor, Dr. Weldon
Crowley, a man who is very distinguished in what he does, to
teach me the ways of government and here we are playing them
out today with the Majority Leader and this esteemed committee.
I thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Pete Sessions follows:]
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Mr. Horn. We thank you and we welcome you to the chamber
here. I know it must have been tremendous to get all that
knowledge in his head and maybe you should be a distinguished
trustee professor for life as a result of that. [Laughter.]
We thank the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Sessions. He has
done a terrific job with the Results Caucus. We will be putting
out our dear colleague bit which I hope will help you based on
the General Accounting Office, as to where the waste is in a
lot of agencies which we have done about every 6 months or so.
Thank you both for coming.
Unless Mr. Turner has some questions, you have heard mine
and I thank you very much.
We will have now panel two, the Honorable Joshua Gotbaum,
Christopher Mihm, Maurice McTigue and Ellen Taylor.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Horn. The clerk will note the four witnesses have
affirmed the oath.
We will begin with the Honorable Joshua Gotbaum, Executive
Associate Director and Controller, and Acting Deputy Director
for Management, Office of Management and Budget. I think you
have appeared three times or so this last month. We thank you.
STATEMENTS OF JOSHUA GOTBAUM, EXECUTIVE ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR AND
CONTROLLER AND ACTING DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR MANAGEMENT, OFFICE OF
MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET; CHRISTOPHER MIHM, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR,
FEDERAL MANAGEMENT AND WORKFORCE ISSUES, U.S. GENERAL
ACCOUNTING OFFICE; MAURICE MCTIGUE, DISTINGUISHED VISITING
SCHOLAR, MERCATUS INSTITUTE, GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY; AND ELLEN
TAYLOR, POLICY ANALYST, OMB WATCH
Mr. Gotbaum. Yes, Mr. Chairman, but since each of them is
something that is quite important to the business of
government, I am actually grateful.
Mr. Horn. You know the routine which is your paper is
already in the hearing record. We would like a summary of it
and you don't have to read it because we have read it.
Mr. Gotbaum. I appreciate that.
I would note that I am joined this morning by a number of
folks from OMB staff, including Jimmy Charney, Texas A&M, 1996,
who wanted me to make sure you knew that Mr. Turner's colleague
was an alumnus of his.
I don't want to spend a lot of time in this committee
talking about the importance of GPRA because I think it is
crystal clear that this committee recognizes it is important. I
think it is important to affirm that the administration does
too and that as this committee knows, each year we put out a
set of priority management objectives. For the last several
years, performance measurement has been PMO 2 because Y2K was
PMO 1. This year performance management, using performance
data, is PMO 1.
The story of our implementing this law, which was passed
with bipartisan support and which we strongly endorse, is I
think a story of real effort and some real success and a long
way to go. I think we should be honest about that.
I have listed in my testimony the fact that 100 Federal
agencies have turned out strategic plans and performance plans
and performance reports and this year, for the first time, they
all turned out performance reports and we think this is a very
important milestone.
What I would like to do is talk about the risks that we
face--how we go from here--and what the challenges are. I am
happy to talk in questioning about what individual agencies
have done.
We are still learning what the right measures are. This is
a difficult task, something the Government hadn't done before,
particularly systematically and certainly not with the force of
law. GPRA is not a one size fits all business. What we find is
that as agencies develop their measures, and try to implement
them, there is a trial and error process. That necessarily
involves error and it involves allowing people to learn from
their mistakes.
Let me list one of my personal favorites which is the
Occupational Safety and Health Administration. OSHA wanted to
implement the law, so they said, we are going to measure and
keep track of the number of inspections we do. Then they
realized that this was an intermediate measure, a measure of
their effort but not a result. They said, we are really in the
business of workplace safety, so maybe we should be tracking
and measuring and sending our troops based on where the
workplaces are safe or not safe. They reformed the way they did
business.
This had a couple of powerful effects. One, it enabled them
to be more effective in their job, and two, it enabled the
businesses they regulate to understand what the right goals
were. I mention this because I think it is very important as we
implement GPRA and as you provide oversight to both encourage
these guys to do it and allow them to make mistakes and
encourage them to correct and improve the results.
We need both outcome and output measures. There are some
who say that agencies should only be measured by how they are
doing in reducing poverty or improving the quality of housing,
or reducing unemployment rate. We agree that agencies should be
measured by that but it would be a mistake to throw out all
measures of output because it matters to the Government, it
matters to the citizens, and I believe it matters to the
Congress how efficiently agencies do things.
So while I think it is very important that we keep track of
measures of unemployment and how they change as a result of job
training programs, if we can figure that, it is equally
important that we tell the Social Security Administration that
they ought to watch how long it takes for them to answer the
telephone.
The real challenge of GPRA is moving beyond report writing.
It is in taking performance information and using it in program
management and budgeting. There are people who argue that we
should measure the success of our implementation of GPRA by the
clarity of reports or the validity of the data used. I must
strenuously disagree. They matter but those are output
measures. Those are not outcome measures.
The outcome that we are trying to get is to have
performance information used routinely by agencies to measure
how they manage their programs and by OMB and you in how you
review their programs and their budgets.
This is hard stuff because it means you have to pick the
right measures, you have to put them out there and get
agreement on them, you have to put them in your management
systems and then you have to use them, but we are beginning.
In budgeting, we have always used and looked for,
performance information. What GPRA has done is added the force
of law to that requirement and as a result, we are increasingly
using performance information in budget decisions. I have
listed some examples in my testimony.
OMB strongly supports this. We are using it. We too are
learning how to incorporate performance information into the
budgeting process. We started by giving guidance on plans and
then when we got the plans saying how do you incorporate this
into budget decisions? We then said to the agencies, send us
performance information with your budget plans. We started
using it internally.
This year we moved a step ahead: We said to the agencies,
send us your performance plan as part of your budget
submission. What we were trying to do was ask the agencies to
integrate performance measures and budgeting so that we can do
a better job. As a result, we hope you will agree they will do
a better job.
We have a very long way to go. We have a long way to go in
improving the measures we use, a long way to go in integrating
them into management and budget, and we have a long way to go
in realigning budgets, programs and organizations as a result
of those reviews, but we are, I hope the committee recognizes,
beginning. This leads me to my last point, which is the role of
Congress.
We are enormously grateful for the attention that this
committee and this Congress places on the Government
Performance and Results Act. We think it is essential that you
review progress and hold everybody's feet to the fire.
I view this as an issue of combining patience and pressure.
One of the things for which we are grateful is that the
Congress has recognized this is a trial and error process. We
have to keep working at it. I was enormously gratified at the
statements by Congressman Sessions and Mr. Armey because they
recognize this takes time. But you have to hold our feet to the
fire.
That is really my last request, which is that you continue
to do so. Hearings like this one, every time you hold one, send
a message. Your suggestion, Mr. Chairman, of combining forces
with appropriations and authorizing committees would make the
message even clearer. We hope it is something the Congress will
take to heart.
In closing, all I will say is, however you choose to do it,
we are committed to working with you, to delivering on the
promise of performance, and as a result, to deliver the quality
of government the American people deserve.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Gotbaum follows:]
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Mr. Horn. Thank you. That is a very optimistic view and I
am glad to hear it.
Now we go back to a regular also here and that is
Christopher Mihm, Associate Director, Federal Management and
Workforce Issues, U.S. General Accounting Office, part of the
legislative branch.
Mr. Mihm. Yes, sir.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Turner. Once again, it is
an honor and a pleasure to appear before you to discuss the
Government Performance and Results Act.
The issuance last spring of the first performance reports
showing the degree to which agencies met their goals and the
strategies and plans they have to meet unmet goals, along with
their annual performance plans and strategic plans and the
Governmentwide performance plans, represents a new and
potentially more substantive phase of GPRA implementation. That
is, we have now completed the first full cycle of the act in
its planning and reporting requirements.
For GPRA to be fully useful to Congress and the executive
branch, however, agencies need to make continued progress in
addressing a set of five enduring challenges that we have
reported on fairly consistently: first, articulating the
results orientation; second, coordinating cross-cutting
programs; third, showing the performance consequences of budget
decisions which you highlighted in your opening statement;
fourth, showing how daily operations contribute to results--one
of the issues that Mr. Gotbaum raised--and fifth, building the
capacity to gather and use performance information.
First, in regards to adopting a results orientation, the
challenge confronting agencies is to develop a clear sense of
the results to be achieved as opposed to the products and
services the agency produces. The lack of a comprehensive set
of goals that focused on results was one of the central
weaknesses that we saw when we looked at the fiscal year 1999
annual performance plans.
Important progress was made over the next year and all of
the fiscal year 2000 plans we looked at, the plans the agencies
are operating under now, contained at least some goals and
measures that addressed program results. Still, detailed in my
written statement, there are plenty of opportunities for
continued progress in that area.
Second, coordinating cross-cutting programs: we have found
that unfocused and uncoordinated cross-cutting programs waste
scarce resources, confuse and frustrate taxpayers and program
beneficiaries--as the Majority Leader pointed out in the
casework examples he discussed--and limit overall program
effectiveness.
Although the fiscal year 2000 plans indicate that agencies
continue to make progress in coordinating these cross-cutting
programs, we are still finding they need to complete the far
more difficult and substantive task of establishing
complementary performance goals, mutually reinforcing
strategies and where appropriate, common performance measures.
Third, a key objective of GPRA is to help Congress develop
a clearer understanding of what is being achieved in relation
to what is being spent. We are finding that agencies are making
incremental progress in developing the useful linkages between
their annual budget request and performance plans but that much
additional work is needed in this area as well.
The actions of many agencies during fiscal years 1999 and
2000 performance planning cycles constituted important first
steps but, I would stress, just first steps in forging closer
links between the plans and budgets and could be seen in
essence as a baseline from which to assess future progress.
Fourth, understanding and articulating how agencies' day-
to-day operations contribute to results is a critical element
of GPRA implementation. Mr. Gotbaum mentioned the excellent
example of the experiences over at OSHA and I would underscore
that. The point there is that as OSHA and other agencies begin
to move beyond what they do on a day-to-day basis and consider
the results they are designed to achieve, that often opens
whole new avenues for them to explore in terms of strategies
and program initiatives they should be undertaking that would
lead them to more effectively achieve the results.
Fifth, we found although the fiscal year 2000 plans
contained valuable and informative information relating
strategies and programs to goals, there was plenty of work that
was still needed in that area. Let me mention two in
particular.
First, the virtual absence of discussions of human capital,
which as you know from the Comptroller General earlier this
week, is a major concern. The fiscal year 2000 plans suggested
that one of the critical components of high performing
organizations, the systematic integration of human capital and
performance planning, is not being adequately addressed
throughout the Federal Government.
More broadly, any serious effort to fundamentally improve
the performance of Federal agencies must address the management
challenges and program risks including those elements on our
high risk list. This obviously was the point that Mr. Sessions
was making. Unfortunately, the fiscal year 2000 plan showed
inconsistent attention to the need to resolve these issues.
The fifth and final key challenge we found deals with the
substantial and longstanding limitations in agency ability to
produce credible performance information. In fact, these
challenges and the lack of credible performance information is
one of the greatest continuing weaknesses with GPRA
implementation.
In summary, GPRA has the potential and is already beginning
to help Congress and the executive branch ensure that the
Federal Government provides results the American people care
about. We look forward to continuing to support the Congress in
this regard and in any way we can to meet your needs.
As you know from my prepared statement, one of the things
we suggest is under House Rule 10, the oversight plans that the
standing committees must send to this committee could be used
as a vehicle for further drilling GPRA into congressional
oversight plans. We look forward to helping you with that or in
any other way.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Mihm follows:]
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Mr. Horn. Thank you. We have two more witnesses and then we
will open it to questions. I think it will be a very good
dialog from all four of you.
Our next witness is Maurice McTigue, distinguished visiting
scholar, Mercatus Institute, George Mason University, and a
fellow once parliamentarian. We were delighted to visit
Australia and New Zealand in a trip last year to see if any of
your fine work was still holding forth. In places, it is, so I
would like to talk to you about that sometime.
Go ahead.
Mr. McTigue. Indeed, Mr. Chairman, and I would be delighted
to talk to you about it.
As you indicated, my experience is mainly as a politician
and as a member of Cabinet, and at a time when my country was
going through major changes, most of which were based upon the
principle that is the founding principle of GPRA.
I think for Congress one of the interesting factors
involved in that process is that while it started 16 years ago,
and there have been three changes of the party in power in
governance in New Zealand, there has been no relaxation in the
rigor with which the performance of government has been
pursued.
In the 3-years that I have been here in the United States
and have worked closely with the agencies of government and
also with Congress in terms of sharing some of our experiences,
I think the thing that impresses me most about GPRA is that it
does focus on changing the primacy of measures to a focus on
outcomes.
I have heard a number of people make comment this morning
about efficiency. When I talk about the primacy of measures, it
is that the primacy of the measure of effectiveness must
outweigh considerations of efficiency. That is not something
that legislatures have been good at doing in the past.
I think if we were to look at the high spot of government
performance over the past 3 years in the United States, it
would be the success of the Y2K project. In my view, the
success of that project was driven in no small part by people
like yourself who actually asked the right questions. The
question was the outcome question--will the computers work on
January 1, 2000? It didn't focus so much on tell me what you
have done, you kept focusing on ``will the computers work on
January 1, 2000.''
That is outcome-based scrutiny. We want to know the result.
Can you actually deliver for us what you have promised you
would deliver for us? If we looked at the principle that I
think is important to Congress in considering this whole area
of activity, that principle would really be this--``that all
future decisions by government would be taken in full knowledge
of the consequences of that decision.''
In the past, I believe many decisions have been taken in
full knowledge of what will be done but without full knowledge
of the consequences of that decision. What GPRA does is shifts
the focus of accountability to what were the public benefits
from the expenditure of that money rather than what were the
activities that were funded from the expenditure of that money?
If we look at GPRA as a tool, then it breaks into four
significant parts. The first part of the process is planning.
Give to the public a fair expectation of what it is that you
are going to achieve. The second part of it is implementation,
putting in place and implementing those outputs that are meant
to achieve that outcome.
We have been through the first two stages of that with GPRA
and I like to remind people that GPRA, while passed in 1993,
only took effect for fiscal year 1999, so there is very little
evidence at this stage of the success or otherwise of GPRA.
As an ex-politician and working in a university at the
moment, in my mind the most important part of GPRA is what
occurs now. In March of this year, we saw the first round of
disclosure of performance. What was in the reports of the
agencies should disclose what was achieved and now we are at
the fourth stage, what does Congress do in the process of
oversight and scrutiny of those reports?
To me that is the most important part. One of the things
you need to do, in my view, is look at the quality of the
reporting. Have you had placed in front of you sufficient
knowledge and a high enough quality of information for you to
be able to make decisions in the knowledge of the full
consequences of those decisions? We at the Mercatus Center did
a study on the quality of reporting and in many instances, the
reports do not provide you with that capability. Some of them
were good. Most of them lacked in a number of areas in terms of
being able to identify for you what were the public benefits
from these activities.
In looking at those reports, I think you also need to look
at not only are they open and transparent but is there full
disclosure? For example, we found some organizations that
describe their activity in terms of ``we fully met the goal''
when what they actually did was achieve 90 percent of the goal.
Ninety percent might be a good measure in some cases but in
some other areas, you might determine that was quite
inadequate.
In other cases, they described adequate performance as
anything above 67 percent of goal. Those are very arbitrary and
I think what you need to know is what was the percentage of
each goal that was achieved rather than a broad-based measure
like that. So that is full disclosure in my view and it is very
important to the success of Congress's security of Government.
What then might Congress do through committees like
yourself? I believe what Congress has to do is to learn to
conduct scrutiny based on outcomes rather than conduct,
scrutiny based on process. What you need to be able to do is to
look at a particular outcome: you are examining an agency, you
pick a particular activity, look at that outcome. If you were
to follow that outcome through, you would be able to say how
much of the public good for this particular issue comes from
this agency and how much from others.
By following that outcome and looking at the effectiveness
of each program, you can then make comparisons and finally get
to a position of saying if we have optimal utilization of
resources, here is the potential public benefit. The cost to
the American public for suboptimal utilization of resources is
the difference between optimal allocation and the status quo.
We, the public could have had
this quantity of benefit and we are shortchanged by the amount
that was placed in ineffective programs.
That is the end of my testimony and thank you for the
opportunity.
[The prepared statement of Mr. McTigue follows:]
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Mr. Horn. Thank you.
We have a vote on the floor now, so we are going to have to
recess for 20 minutes. I think it is just one vote but why
don't you all have a cup of coffee. Just go down to the
basement and you can get plenty of coffee.
We will be recess until at least 11:05 a.m.
[Recess.]
Mr. Horn. The committee will come to order.
We will now continue with the last presenter, Ellen Taylor,
policy analyst, OMB Watch. You might just tell us in a couple
of sentences what OMB Watch is. This is your chance to plug it.
Included that because I was afraid no one would know.
Ms. Taylor. Thank you for this opportunity to testify. For
those who don't know, OMB Watch is a nonprofit, research and
advocacy organization that seeks to promote greater government
accountability and citizen participation.
For the past 3 years, we have actively sought to increase
the participation of nonprofits as one kind of stakeholder
under GPRA in the implementation of the act. I believe this
work, including our lack of success in persuading nonprofits of
the importance of GPRA, and our reflection on that, gives us a
unique perspective from the others presented here. I hope it
will be useful in these deliberations.
This has already been said a number of times but it is very
important that Congress and the executive agencies work
together in a constructive way to accomplish GPRA. Second,
Congress should mandate stakeholder involvement in the
performance planning process, encouraging the active
solicitation of comments on performance measures and ensuring
that agencies have adequate resources to obtain outside
comments.
It is already part of the law that stakeholders must be
involved during the strategic planning stage, but we would
argue that the performance planning stage is the real meat and
potatoes of GPRA and it needs outside involvement, and it needs
involvement of State and local grantees who are involved in
Federal programs.
Third, Federal agencies must make greater use of the
Internet to make data and performance measurement transparent
and accessible to the public. I would suggest this kind of
public exposure can actually help improve the quality of the
data and mitigate some of the problems in data and in
benchmarking.
There is no doubt that GPRA is an important tool and yet we
remain skeptical about whether it can achieve the purposes for
which it was made into law. These three changes may help GPRA
to strengthen government accountability and enhance public
trust. I would like to look more closely at our
recommendations.
First, GPRA's success depends on government's commitment to
it. Otherwise, it will simply become another kind of exercise
in a long series. Government agencies we have seen are taking
GPRA very seriously and they are taking it not as just another
paperwork exercise, but as a real potential to do things
differently, and to do things better.
This can only happen with a concerted and constructive
involvement of Congress, not as an antagonist but as a partner.
In this regard, we encourage congressional committees to
exercise their oversight authority but we would caution if that
oversight is done in the context of partisanship or as a way to
wage ideological battles, it will be detrimental. We should
always remember that GPRA is about improving government and
performance, not about downsizing or not about privatizing, or
not about bean counting.
While we recognize one of the distinguishing features of
GPRA is its linkage to the budget, we also think it is
important to realize that it is not a panacea for difficult
budget decisions. Performance measurement may be a helpful tool
in determining resource allocations but quantifiable measures
of performance will never be enough.
Finally, we think Congress has a golden opportunity here
not only to emphasize the problems in government but to
highlight those government programs that do work, that are
effective and accomplish goals for citizens. Recent studies
have shown that citizens rate government almost on a par with
private services. Yet, mistrust of government as a whole is
still a problem. We think one way of overcoming that is to
start focusing on the successes of GPRA and not just on the
failures.
Our second recommendation is stakeholder involvement in
performance planning. While we know the public can't become
privy to Federal budget decisions, the performance plans are
too important to disallow public engagement on the selection of
benchmarks and performance measures. Performance information
can be pulled out of the budget submissions and made available
to stakeholders without impinging on the privileged nature of
the budget.
Finally, agencies need to use the Internet to make their
GPRA plans and reports available but also to provide the public
with the underlying data and the information used in their
plans to measure performance. We believe that public exposure
and input can positively affect the quality of that data.
For example, even though the EPA never identifies specific
amounts of reduction in emission of toxic chemicals, the public
accessibility of their toxics release inventory helped to
create an amazing 45 percent reduction in toxic emissions it
was easy to find, easy to access.
To conclude, frankly, we don't know whether the Results Act
has achieved results during the past 7 years. We have doubts
but we remain hopeful. GPRA was not meant to be perfect in the
first go around and this really has been the first go around.
We think it may succeed in its purposes if there is meaningful
stakeholder involvement in the performance plans, including
that of Federal grantees, if underlying data as well as plans
and reports are publicly accessible and open and transparent,
and if Congress will work in a constructive partnership with
agencies to achieve GPRA's potential.
Thank you for allowing me to speak.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Taylor follows:]
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Mr. Horn. We appreciate your presentation and we are now
going to go to questions. It will be 5 minutes for each and we
will alternate between myself and Mr. Turner.
Let me start with you, Ms. Taylor. I would be interested,
based on your analysis, in what are the three top Federal
departments and agencies that have successfully implemented the
Results Act, if you were asked that question, which you just
have been, what would you say?
Ms. Taylor. I think I would hedge. I think maybe that is
the wrong way to go about it, trying to identify the agencies
that have done the best.
Mr. Horn. We need some role models in this work.
Ms. Taylor. Right. I think we should pick out parts of each
agency's plans that meet the mark and use those as examples so
other agencies with similar programs or for whom that
information could be transferred.
Mr. Horn. Give me an agency where they have something that
has really made a difference in terms of using the Results Act.
Ms. Taylor. I haven't read the results reports carefully so
I am really at a loss to try to specifically give an agency. I
think my example of the EPA and the toxics release inventory is
an example of an agency who made information available and
accessible and through that, allows the public to start urging
accountability which aids the agency ultimately in their
performance. I am sorry to be vague.
Mr. Horn. Do you have any evidence that they have used
measurements that would apply to other types of environmental
problems?
Ms. Taylor. I think that approach would be transferrable to
other agencies, to other kinds of problems government is trying
to solve. I think we all agree that sometimes the data is
lacking and the agencies are struggling to come up with the
right benchmarking and starting measures to show they have
measured performance, so I think the openness of the data so
the public can see it and can know what they are starting from
and where they are trying to go is really important.
Mr. Horn. Mr. McTigue, what is your answer to that
question?
Mr. McTigue. This is an opportunity to make myself very
unpopular with a lot of people. The three I would pick I would
pick for different reasons. I would pick the Department of
Transportation because in my view they are using
comprehensively the principles of the Results Act to influence
their decisionmaking.
One of the things that impressed me most about the
Department of Transportation is that in their internal budget
negotiation round, what they do is identify 10 priority areas
and other areas of activity and if necessary they have to
concede resources to those 10 priorities. Those priorities are
set very much on the basis of the outcomes we need to achieve.
So I think there is a good example of making comprehensive use
of the principles of GPRA.
If I looked at who has been most successful in changing
their outcomes, I would say Veterans Health because Veterans
Health starting about 5 years ago, moved the emphasis of that
entire organization to the imperative of improving the wellness
of veterans, and they direct their resources to that particular
end goal.
They have some wonderful information that looks at the
efficacy of different health procedures inside veterans
hospitals and other facilities and how the efficacy of those
procedures has significantly improved over time to the point
now where they are equal to or better than those procedures in
public and private hospitals. That is a dramatic outcome
improvement.
If I was to look for the organization where Congress and
the American public are getting the greatest benefit in terms
of their tax dollars, I would say it is FEMA because today FEMA
is doing about 20 percent more for about 25 percent less money
in its administrative budget while managing more disasters.
In addition to that, it has also moved to a new and very
important focus on mitigation. How can they continually reduce
the consequences of a disaster on individuals and communities
so that at the same time they are dealing with their base
cause, which is helping people get their lives together, after
a disaster they are also looking at how they can minimize the
impact.
Those would be my three choices but for three very
different reasons.
Mr. Horn. What is your suggestion, Mr. Mihm?
Mr. Mihm. One of the advantages of being third is that it
gives me to time to think. The disadvantage is when someone
steals some of the best ideas, so I am going to agree in large
measure with what has been said.
I think the Department of Transportation as a department is
clearly one of the leaders. That is, when you look across their
various modal administrations, you see a lot of leadership from
the Coast Guard, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
is certainly one of the leaders in this; FAA, despite a lot of
other high risk problems, is beginning to come along as well.
Social Security Administration, I would put as one of the
leaders. I think that is a function of two things, one, their
experience in doing accountability reports under the Government
Management Reform Act led them early to be thinking about how
they pull together and talk about what they are doing and
accomplishing. I also think it is a function in SSA that a lot
of their outcomes are more outputs, making sure the right check
gets to the right bank account on the right day. Nevertheless,
they have done a fairly sophisticated job in thinking about
their goals and presenting them in that regard.
I would also agree with Veterans Health Administration. The
chronic disease prevention index that they have has become
quite sophisticated looking across a variety of diseases such
as: diabetes, obesity, heart disease. It is a quite
sophisticated index that they are able to evaluate the
performance of VHA generally as well as each of their
integrated service centers, and to talk about how they are
doing.
We are doing a review at the request of Mr. Burton that is
looking at how the performance goals are being drilled into the
contracts of senior managers at VHA and elsewhere. So I would
put them among the leaders as well.
Mr. Horn. Mr. Gotbaum, I want you to answer the question
last because you have the overall view from the executive
branch. Then I will give 10 minutes to Mr. Turner for his
questioning because we are obviously going over 5.
Mr. Gotbaum. I am sure you have run into this dilemma; what
do you say when everything has been said but not everyone has
said it. I don't disagree with these particular analyses, so
what I would like to do is elaborate on a couple of points.
One, Veterans Affairs. The work that was done in Veterans
Health has been very impressive. I would note the Department of
Veterans Affairs is now taking the next step we talked about,
which is that they are trying to both realign their budget
accounts so they follow program lines and to modernize their
financial systems to take them into account.
I mentioned moving from output measures and asking how good
the reports are, to outcome measures, how much is incorporated
into management. The Department of Veterans Affairs is really
trying to go this next step, for which I personally commend
them.
Social Security and NASA are interesting cases because
these agencies really were concerned with accountability and
were a little slow to develop the skill on the performance side
but have clearly gotten it, and gotten it very well. The nice
thing is, because they were so concerned with accountability in
the first place, each has produced reports that cover both
financial accountability and performance. That achieves the
goal that you mentioned which we agree is quite important:
people want to know what they get and what they pay for with
their money.
The last one I want to mention is Education. I want to
mention it because of two things. One, the task is hard. A
large part of the Department of Education budget is programs in
which they send checks to States and local governments who
implement their programs. So one of the real tasks and real
difficulties for Education is: what is it I measure? What is it
I am accountable for? Am I accountable for merely how quickly I
send the check or how carefully I review the State agency's
plan, or should I be accountable for literacy levels in local
jurisdictions?
In my view, one of the impressive and honest things in the
Department of Education's accountability report is how clear
they are that they are keeping track of both but they haven't
yet figured out what is the best tie between their activities
and final results. I commend them, partly because they have
improved dramatically over the last year, and partly because
they are honest about the linkage question which is, for those
of us in the Federal Government, really very important.
Mr. Horn. Thank you very much.
Ten minutes of questioning to the gentleman from Texas, Mr.
Turner.
Mr. Turner. One of the areas I want to spend a little time
with each is discussing the role of the Congress and the
committees in successful implementation of the Results Act. I
want to do that because I think when we look honestly at the
origin of this legislation, it did begin as a bipartisan
effort.
As I recall, Mr. Conyers and Mr. Clinger were the co-
sponsors in the House and Senator Roth was the sponsor in the
Senate. I frankly believe the success of GPRA not only will lie
with the ability of the agency managers to put GPRA and the
performance measures in place and to properly evaluate them,
but it is going to depend on the ability of Congress to carry
out its role in GPRA.
I think we need to jealously guard the bipartisan nature of
this legislation. Frankly, I really think it is not only
important to jealously guard it to ensure its success, I think
it is probably poor politics to do otherwise because if you
make an effort to make efficiency and effectiveness of
government a partisan issue, it is like trying to make
motherhood a partisan issue. I don't think the public is going
to buy into it. I think they understand both sides of aisle
believe in efficiency and effectiveness in government.
I think if we can ensure the Congress approaches this
legislation in that manner, I think we have the hope of its
ultimate success. If we fail to do that, I think we sow the
seeds of its destruction.
In keeping with those thoughts, I want to first ask a
question perhaps of any of you who would like to respond. I
think I might want to start with Mr. Mihm.
One of the key things we all know ultimately GPRA is all
about, as I think Mr. McTigue expressed in his testimony, is
that Congress should be able not just to see government
agencies manage activities and then hope for results, but as
you said in your testimony, GPRA makes it possible for Congress
to choose to do only those programs that will produce results.
With that concept, we will change the way the Congress
conducts oversight and review of our agencies. So what I would
like to do even though I acknowledge GPRA is in its infancy and
this is only the first year, even though passed in 1993, of
full implementation, I would like you all to give me an
example, if you have one, of where the Congress has made a
decision, based on your observations of the work of the
committees, to either fund or not fund a program based upon the
Results Act and the information flowing from a given agency
produced by the Results Act.
Mr. Mihm. I think we would be hard pressed to point out
here is where a budget was increased or decreased because the
appropriators saw and said we are doing this because of GPRA.
However, one of the things we need to guard against is
setting the bar so high that if someone doesn't say they are
doing something because of GPRA, we call the law a failure. In
other words, when you take a look at the appropriations
committee reports--we have examined committee reports that have
come out of the appropriators--there is plenty of language in
there that talks about how performance information was being
used in their decisions, that talks about the goals and the
actual performance of a program.
GPRA is not often mentioned. However, it is very clear
where that information that is being used is coming from. It is
coming from GPRA plans and products. The point I am making is
that while I would be hard pressed to say here is something
that happened only because of GPRA, we are seeing the
conversation change, more attention to performance information.
GPRA is contributing to that environment and so in that sense,
we are seeing appropriations decisions are beginning to be
influenced or at least colored by a greater attention to
performance and performance information.
Mr. Turner. Mr. Gotbaum, have you seen examples where GPRA
results have affected the funding decisions of the Congress?
Mr. Gotbaum. I believe so. I meant what I said in my
testimony. I believe that we have always--we at OMB and the
Congress in its deliberations--looked for information about
programs. What is it doing? What is it actually accomplishing?
GPRA provided the force of law and the process and the language
that enhanced that.
I agree and accept Chris' point which is I am not sure I
can hand you a case in which I can tell you the chairman of an
appropriations subcommittee said, based on the Social Security
Administration's performance report, I change their level. I
don't think that is the right test.
I think there are lots of cases in which the fact the
discussion is based on performance and not on dollars has
changed the discussion. Let me mention one. This is one which
was controversial.
The President proposed a couple of years ago what we call
the Class Size Initiative. He said, I would like to provide
funding so that school districts in grades 1 through 3 didn't
have to have class sizes larger than 18. This got translated
into 100,000 teachers.
I don't mean to raise this so that we can talk about the
merits of that particular proposal, but I think it is important
that we recognize that was a proposal that was framed not as
let us expand the budget of the Department of Education by $1
billion. That wasn't what he said and that wasn't what the
debate was.
He said, let us focus on class size. The interesting thing
was the congressional debate then became should we tie Federal
dollars to class size or should we work on a more generic block
grant. So that is a case in which I think the debate was
affected very powerfully by the fact that it was framed in
terms of performance measures.
There are to be sure intermediate measures. Class size is
not literacy but it is a heck of a long way from the let us
just increase the budget of the Department of Education by 10
percent.
I think we all recognize and everyone is conscious of the
fact that performance information alone isn't going to take
away the need to make choices. The President and Congress are
going to have to say, I think we should do more in education
versus defense, environment or whatever, but I really do feel
and I have watched it in the budget process in case after case
after case, the more debate goes toward measures other than
dollars, the more focused the debate is and in my view, the
better the ultimate decisionmaking.
I am enormously grateful for your point about the
bipartisan support for GPRA. We feel that very strongly. My
colleague from OMB, Walter Groszyk, although he generally
doesn't admit it, helped draft GPRA. We think it is very
important that the Congress work on it, work on it
aggressively, work on it expansively and work on it in a
bipartisan fashion.
Mr. Turner. Mr. McTigue, do you have any examples you could
cite where you have seen Congress or a committee actually make
a decision on funding based on results?
Mr. McTigue. The first comment I would make is with all due
respect, I think your question is a little bit premature
because you are only now seeing the first of the annual reports
based on that. Quite frankly, the quality of the reporting at
the moment does not provide you with information where you
could clearly say we should cancel this activity.
To approximate an answer to your question, I think the
principles that probably led to the writing of GPRA in 1993
have certainly been applied by Congress to a number of
organizations. If you take the five, in my view, highest
performing organizations in government, each and every one of
them has been subjected to intense scrutiny by this Congress in
the last 10 years.
FEMA was slated by Congress to be wiped out in the early
1990's unless it was able to improve its performance. Today, it
is one of the best performing government organizations and
meeting the criteria of GPRA. You can say exactly the same
thing for the Department of Transportation, for NASA, post the
shuttle crash, that intense congressional interest dramatically
changed the way in which that organization focused and
delivered. You can say exactly the same sort of thing for
Veterans Health. I think in those areas Congress has played a
very significant role in improving a total organization and its
culture.
What could Congress do now? I think there are two things
that I believe are very important right now for Congress. You
should insist on greater transparency in the reporting that you
get from agencies and greater disclosure. That would be very
helpful to your role. The second thing is controversial and it
is internal and that is Congress should conduct some reform
itself. That reform would be that the processes of oversight,
authorization and reauthorization should be used as a means of
informing the process of appropriation, not commanding it but
the knowledge built up in hearings like this should be used to
inform whether or not an appropriation is appropriate for this
particular program or activity.
Mr. Turner. Ms. Taylor.
Ms. Taylor. I would agree with Mr. McTigue about the fact
that we can't use GPRA right now in making budget decisions. It
really is too early and I think the important thing Congress
should be concentrating on right now is the issue of
performance, not to make agencies terrified that they are going
to lose their budget because their performance rates are low
because we don't want this to lead to performance goals that
are so low that an agency can easily meet them and say, look, I
met my performance goals.
Rather, they should be striving for higher goals. I think
we would all agree. I am just afraid if we directly tie it to
the budget at this point, the only performance reports will be
good performance reports and yet they won't be meaningful in
terms of the act.
Mr. Turner. I didn't expect any of you really to give me
any real concrete examples and frankly only asked the question
to make the point that as we look at the agencies and their
efforts to implement GPRA, Congress has an equal responsibility
to begin to use GPRA. Though the Congress, being the
deliberative body and elected by the people, may not always
choose to fund programs based on results, it does need to
become a part of the culture of the Congress. I frankly think
the Congress is a long way from that kind of approach.
I think Mr. McTigue, you put it very well when you
suggested that in order to win the confidence of the public and
improve the quality of government performance, the scrutiny
provided by the Congress must be robust, focused on results,
committed to rewarding superior activity and equally committed
to punishing poor performance.
I am not sure that is really a part of the process, not to
say that process would result in the ultimate decision because
other considerations may override and maybe appropriately so in
certain circumstances. Somehow, as we try to train the managers
in the agencies, we in Congress are going to have to be trained
as well.
I thank each of you for your comments.
Mr. Horn. Thank you. You and the chairman of the full
committee seem to be on the same track. Your questions and his
if he were here, wanted to ask the point you had made on what
is Congress doing on this.
Let me go back to the reverse of what I was going from Ms.
Taylor back to Mr. Gotbaum. Starting with Mr. Gotbaum, please
name the Federal departments and agencies that have been
unsuccessful in their implementation of the Results Act. Can
you give me three or four?
Mr. Gotbaum. As we have discussed before, usually Mr. Ose
asks this question but he always asks it, and I know it is a
concern.
Mr. Horn. So you came prepared?
Mr. Gotbaum. I came prepared with the same response,
unfortunately, I gave each of the two times he asked. I think
in order for OMB to be effective in its role as supervisor,
encourager, combination cheerleader and sanctioner of agency
performance, we need to use a combination of public praise and
private criticism. So I have to resist the temptation to
mention by name any of the agencies that disappoint. There
certainly are several agencies whose performance reports look
like they haven't taken the time to think through what they are
trying to do and whose performance reports look an awful lot
like they are describing their programs instead of describing
their results and performance.
There are certainly agencies whose performance reports look
exactly like their organizational chart and their measures
don't appear to have been linked to programs, which obviously
is a problem. There are agencies whose performance reports
don't include what intermediate output measures, efficiency
measures, we think matter. There are plenty of grantmaking
agencies that don't include information and don't even collect
information on what is the turnaround time from the time a
grant is applied for to the time a decision is made, and what
is the turnaround time from the time a decision is made to
actually delivering the check.
I mention those as shortcomings in a range of agencies
reports. I would, with the committee's forbearance, like to
avoid naming the names but instead naming the sins because I
think the sins are pretty clear.
Mr. Horn. Did you read Mr. McTigue's study on who was ahead
and who was behind?
Mr. Gotbaum. I did.
Mr. Horn. Would you say he gave a fair appraisal there?
Mr. Gotbaum. I think he gave a fair appraisal of part of
the things that we would like to look for. As I mentioned,
clarity matters, linkage matters, and those are some of the
things that Mr. McTigue's review focused on.
We think there are other things. I view those in this
process as outcome measures. What he was doing and was forced
to do was evaluate the performance reports. What we are trying
to do, we hope, is implement what we think is the outcome of
GPRA, which is the extent to which these agencies are
developing performance measures and using them in management
and budget. For example, I give very high marks to the
Department of Veterans Affairs, not just for the fact that they
have clear measures in health but, that they are actually
trying to realign programs and information systems. For me that
is a very substantial task.
That is not something which would necessarily be evident
from reading their report. So I would say Mr. McTigue's report
is an incomplete measure of what agencies are doing. The fact
is that moving beyond reports to implementing this is a harder
job and it is a job at which we are still at the initial steps.
So his analysis covers most of the things you can see right
now.
I wouldn't want it to be seen as the complete measure
because the best reports in the world, the clearest reports in
the world with the finest measures in the world, if they are
not actually used, are just paper. So we hope we in our
analysis, and you in your oversight, will not stop at judging
the quality of reports, that you will continually ask agencies,
``This is great, you got a good report, but what are you doing
with this information? Are you managing to it? Are you changing
your management systems? Are you changing your information
systems? Are you really doing what GPRA was supposed to do?''
Mr. Horn. We went through this with Y2K. Nothing was being
done by OMB, period. Nothing was being done by the
administration in April 1996. We had to just get them in here
and say, what are you doing, started the grading aspect and all
that, and that finally shook them up a little. Two Cabinet
office friends of mine said keep at it. It is the only way I
can get this bureaucracy working. It worked.
I am not a Mr. Fuzzy type. I am anything but that. All I
can say is the question has been asked, it should be answered,
you are under oath and we want the information. I want to know
what are the ones that have not done as good a job as they
should have. That ought to help you, unless they cry too much
and say, I won't do it. That is nonsense. Tell us which ones
aren't producing.
Mr. Gotbaum. I think that this is a case that is in some
respects different from Y2K for a bunch of reasons. Frankly, it
is a harder, more complicated job. As I mentioned in my
testimony, I think this is a case in which we at OMB have
turned on the heat progressively, I would hope progressively
more effectively. We started by saying send us reports, then
saying send us information but these are, as Mr. Turner
mentioned, as Mr. Armey mentioned and Mr. Sessions mentioned,
sufficiently early days in that process so that I don't think
we can say and I wouldn't pretend that we are there. We are not
at the promised land. I kind of think of this in biblical terms
as maybe we have crossed the Red Sea but we have a long time in
the desert yet.
I really do think that we can be most effective not by
dropping the dime on people but by talking about what are the
standards we think they should meet, hoping you will agree or
disagree.
Mr. Horn. People have had 8 years and you don't say they
shouldn't be noted if they haven't produced much after 8 years?
Mr. Gotbaum. The issue is not whether agencies are
producing plans and reports. They are. This is not a case in
which any significant agency has just dropped the ball entirely
and said, I am not going to implement GPRA. That is not what is
going on here.
Every significant agency--we have 100 strategic plans, 100
performance plans, almost 100 performance reports. The issue is
a little more subtle than that which is, when you read these
things, are they picking measures that are relevant, then
getting to the point that Chris mentioned and Ellen mentioned,
are they picking measures, are they picking goals that are
either too high or too low. We get a lot of that.
I guess if I wanted to be a cheerleader, I could say the
good news is we have 100 agencies complying with the law, they
are turning out reports but I think and I hope your oversight,
like our oversight, goes beyond that and says, are they picking
the right measures. We have a huge range. We have agencies like
DOT that did pretty well the first time and are doing OK and we
have agencies like Education that didn't do so well the first
time and SSA that didn't do so well the first time and are
getting better, and we have agencies where I think it is clear
they have a ways to go in terms of their measures.
If the question is, are they complying with the law, they
are complying with the law, but I know our goal and I believe
your goal as well is that they do more than comply with the
law, that they use the stuff and incorporate it, that they are
working on it.
Mr. Horn. Have you got a unit under your control in OMB
that is working on types of measurement across the various
parts of the executive branch?
Mr. Gotbaum. We have some efforts and I don't want to
mislead the committee. We have some efforts that are cross-
cutting efforts. For example, on the procurement side, the
Office of Federal Procurement Policy, which is in OMB,
developed a set of Governmentwide measures for efficacy on the
procurement side which they are now putting out which will
enable people to benchmark procurement.
On the grant side, partly as a result of pressure under a
different law, Public Law 106-107, an act out of this
committee, that said review grants. We have set up a process
where we are trying to get agencies to come together and talk
about where grant programs are on either a common constituency
or for a common purpose, how we can simplify and consolidate
and measures will be part of that effort.
I can say yes, we are making some efforts in that area.
Mr. Horn. So there is a unit that you can count on in terms
of developing measurements for various programs?
Mr. Gotbaum. Yes.
Mr. Horn. Mr. Mihm, since the witness from the
administration refuses to answer the question, will you answer
the question and we will follow your advice and have them all
in here. Please tell us what you think are the ones that aren't
really conforming and have been unsuccessful in implementation.
Mr. Mihm. If I was going to pick out of the 24 CFO Act
agencies a handful of agencies having the biggest trouble with
this, I would include the Office of Personnel Management, the
Department of State and the Small Business Administration.
One of the things that brings the three of them together is
that they are agencies that have real challenges to try to
determine that critical point of how what they do makes a
difference. All of them are really struggling with that.
In the case of OPM and SBA, it is an even larger issue as
to their relevance and it is something that is beginning to be
raised and questioned. Those are the agencies that are really
having a real struggle.
I would agree with one thing Mr. Gotbaum raised and that is
there is no agency that has got this entirely licked and no
agency that hasn't made improvement over the last couple of
years. Everyone is moving and moving in the right direction but
clearly there are some agencies that are lagging the rest. I
think those three are among them.
Mr. Horn. What do you think is the reason on the three you
picked?
Mr. Mihm. I think in part it deals with the difficult in
connecting what they do on a day to day basis to a larger
result; in some cases it was because of that difficulty I think
senior leadership at the agency was slow to embrace GPRA and
understand the seriousness of the Congress. The first couple of
annual performance plans from the Department of State, I hope
senior management wasn't too involved in putting those
together. The most recent one does reflect the use of
qualitative goals which is allowed by the Act with OMB's
authorization. As a result, you now have a far more
sophisticated discussion of what State is trying to achieve and
how it will hold itself accountable.
In the case of SBA, we have seen a couple of years in a row
where their mission statement is right in the sense that it is
based on statute and the goals are now outcome oriented goals.
The performance measures for those goals are things like
contacts to small businesses, numbers of loans made. This is
little connection between those performance measures and the
results they are trying to achieve.
In the case of the Office of Personnel Management, there is
an agency whose relevance and real fundamental mission is now
under question. It is not as though the annual performance plan
is going to resolve that but the annual performance plan I
don't think gives a real indication of the struggle or how they
are trying to work their way out of that.
Mr. Horn. Mr. McTigue, do you agree with Mr. Mihm's OPM,
State, SBA? Is that what your study would confirm?
Mr. McTigue. I couldn't actually confirm that. I suspect
that what he is saying is correct because we haven't actually
conducted a study of who are those organizations that missed
their goals by the most. Even that may not be very informative
because in the first instance, some organizations set really
strict goals and 95 percent of that goal might be very good
performance where others set fairly easy goals and 100 percent
performance may not be very adequate.
I think we have been able to note what I would call the
conglomerate organizations, like Agriculture, Justice and
Labor, those that have a huge number of stovepipes have found
it more difficult to implement GPRA because there is not a
common mission. Some of that is due to mission creep over a
long period of time inside the government, so they are doing
some odd things that don't really belong in their portfolio.
The other is that it is quite difficult to get a single
purpose or an imperative for that organization and they are
still battling with what is the imperative that drives us as
the Department of Agriculture or the Department of Commerce. I
think you will find that is one of the missing factors with
those organizations. They are trying but they are finding it
more difficult. It's easy to write a mission statement, it is
easy to have an imperative if you are NASA, FEMA or
Transportation or something like that. It is much more
difficult if you are the Department of Agriculture with 78
different stovepipes that you have to account for.
Mr. Horn. Mr. Gotbaum, would you agree with what Mr. Mihm
has selected there in terms of the three agencies.
Mr. Gotbaum. Actually, no, I wouldn't. The State Department
has conceded publicly that they were late to the party and that
they are now paying more attention, that they have a ways to go
and I agree with that.
On SBA and OPM, I guess everything in life is relative but
I can't remember personally the OPM report but in the SBA
report, they were clearly making efforts to link their programs
to results and to benchmark them, so let us just say there are
other agencies which as I say I would prefer not to name, that
have not, as far as I am concerned, made that attempt, made
that basic linkage, whereas SBA I know has and I think OPM too,
at least attempted to make the linkage.
So I allow the State example and I would suggest there are
some other places that GAO might want to look.
Mr. Mihm. We will take your suggestions off-line.
Mr. Horn. The gentleman from Texas?
Mr. Turner. Nothing else, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Horn. Thank you very much.
We appreciate your coming. We do expect the answer to that
question.
With that, we are in adjournment.
[Whereupon, at 12 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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