Key Financial Management Positions Lack Nominees

 

The Washington Post and Partnership for Public Service, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization, are tracking more than 500 key executive branch nominations through the confirmation process. These positions include Cabinet secretaries, deputy and assistant secretaries, chief financial officers, general counsel, heads of agencies, ambassadors and other critical leadership positions. These are a portion of the roughly 1,200 positions that require Senate confirmation.

The Senate can only act on nominations that have been formally submitted by the Trump administration.

There are several agencies lacking nominees for key financial management positions as listed below.

 

Agencies without a nominee for Chief Financial Officer:

• Department of State
• Department of Agriculture
• Department of Commerce
• Department of Education
• Department of Energy
• Department of Homeland Security
• Department of Housing and Urban Development
• Department of Labor
• Department of Transportation
• Department of Veterans Affairs
• Department of the Treasury
• Environmental Protection Agency
• National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Agencies without a nominee for Inspector General:

• Department of Defense
• Department of Energy
• Department of the Interior
• Central Intelligence Agency
• Small Business Administration
• Export-Import Bank
• Office of Personnel Management
• Social Security Administration

  

 

What IT Budget Authority Really Means for CIOs

Federal CIOs got an early Christmas gift from Congress in 2014: explicit authority to plan and approve their department’s information technology budgets.

Under the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA), which Congress passed as an amendment to the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act, CIOs are responsible for reviewing and approving department IT contracts. Department CIOs will also play a more direct role in the hiring of any bureau-level CIOs. The new law requires that department CIOs approve those appointments.

“I think this is going to be an interesting time in federal IT because, for the first time, we will see federal CIOs take ownership of the IT landscape in their agencies,” says General Services Administration (GSA) CIO and FedTech must-read IT blogger Sonny Hashmi.

FITARA applies to CIOs at civilian departments.

GSA was an early adopter of the consolidated IT approach, and Hashmi has experienced the benefits and challenges of having the agency’s IT under his authority.

He cautions against the bureaucracy that can bog down organizations with consolidated IT. They can become oversight driven, slow to respond and less innovative if they don’t strike the right balance, Hashmi says.

At GSA, Hashmi and his team are investing in transformative projects while reducing the amount of legacy systems. Most GSA systems are antiquated, and some are a quarter of a century old. While the systems run well, modernizing them would help reduce costs and make systems more flexible to meet emerging technology demands.

Federal Communications Commission CIO David Bray has similar challenges with legacy systems. Bray wants to find an easier way to port legacy systems to cloud-based providers.

-Nicole Blake Johnson, FedTechMagazine.com
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DHS management chief nominee's approach is data centric

As Russell Deyo sailed through his nomination hearing Wednesday to be the next undersecretary for management at the Homeland Security Department, his management approach and priorities centered on data.

The retired Johnson & Johnson executive told Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs lawmakers that getting DHS to have standard financial data will lead to better and more strategic decision making.

If confirmed, Deyo would replace Rafael Borras, who left in February after more than four years on the job.

DHS reached a milestone in 2013 when, for the first time ever, it received an unqualified opinion from auditors for its financial management processes.

Deyo said he recognizes that accomplishment and wants to make sure DHS doesn't slip back from there. 

At the same time, he said the next step toward better financial management has to happen sooner than later.

"The next big piece, as far as I can see so far, is we need to have a fully integrated financial management system across all the components. You have to have reliable information, so you can make smart budget decisions and have good analytics to make good strategic decisions. And having ledger sheets that don't match up, and you can't compare apples to apples across the groups, makes it very, very difficult to make informed, strategic decisions," Deyo said. "I think it's critical the agency have a long-term focus, and you can't do that if you don't have reliable data. So that is an existent high priority within the finance group and indeed the leadership of the department, and I strongly embrace that."

He said during his time at Johnson & Johnson, having a common financial system was essential in making strategic decisions.

DHS is heading down a path toward reducing the number of financial management systems used by the agency. Right now, there are 13 separate systems, but three components are moving to Interior's National Business Center, including the Transportation Security Administration and the Coast Guard.

-Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com
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IGs warn of potential threats to all inspectors general

Inspectors general from 47 agencies are backing three fellow auditors from the Justice Department, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Peace Corps over what they say are limits on access to information put on them by agency senior officials.

In a letter to the leaders of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, the IGs say auditors from those three agencies recently faced restrictions on their access to certain records.

"In each of these instances, we understand that lawyers in these agencies construed other statutes and law applicable to privilege in a manner that would override the express authorization contained in the IG Act," the IGs wrote. "These restrictive readings of the IG Act represent potentially serious challenges to the authority of every Inspector General and our ability to conduct our work thoroughly, independently, and in a timely manner."

In the letter to the oversight committees, the IGs detail their concerns for each of the three agencies.

The IGs asked for members of Congress to provide a strong reaffirmation of the powers granted them under the IG Act.

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) released the letter as part of his long-standing support of IG independence.

Congress has sought to empower IGs even more over the last few years. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) is drafting a bill to give small agency auditors more power.

At a hearing January before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, three agency IGs &mash; Justice, Peace Corps and the Small Business Administration — told lawmakers that slashed budgets and dwindling staff sizes are hindering their ability to conduct robust oversight.

Additionally, the Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency (CIGIE) wants Congress to give IGs more authority to use computer matching programs to root out waste, fraud and abuse.

IGs as a group last received a boost in 2008 when Congress passed and then- President George W. Bush signed into law the Inspectors General Reform Act.

-Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com
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DOT Official Brodi Fontenot Nominated as Treasury Dept CFO

Brodi Fontenot, currently a Transportation Department official, has received a presidential nomination to serve as the Treasury Department‘s next chief financial officer, the White House announced Thursday.

Fontenot’s roles at DOT include assistant secretary for administration, chief human capital officer and senior sustainability officer.

He joined that agency in 2009 as deputy assistant secretary of management and budget after serving on the Senate Budget Committee’s staff for three years.

Between 2001 and 2006, he worked as a Government Accountability Office analyst and helped the agency with budgeting, disaster assistance and housing matters.

He holds a master of public administration degree from the University of North Carolina and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Houston.

-Mary-Louise Hoffman, ExecutiveGov.com
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Government made $100B in improper payments

WASHINGTON (AP) -- By its own estimate, the government made about $100 billion in payments last year to people who may not have been entitled to receive them -- tax credits to families that didn't qualify, unemployment benefits to people who had jobs and medical payments for treatments that might not have been necessary.

Congressional investigators say the figure could be even higher.

The Obama administration has reduced the amount of improper payments since they peaked in 2010. Still, estimates from federal agencies show that some are wasting big money at a time when Congress is squeezing agency budgets and looking to save more.

Some improper payments are the result of fraud, while others are unintentional, caused by clerical errors or mistakes in awarding benefits without proper verification.

In 2013, federal agencies made $97 billion in overpayments, according to agency estimates. Underpayments totaled $9 billion.

The amount of improper payments has steadily dropped since 2010, when it peaked at $121 billion.

The Obama administration has stepped up efforts to measure improper payments, identify the cause and develop plans to reduce them, said Beth Cobert, deputy director of the White House budget office. 

Agencies recovered more than $22 billion in overpayments last year.

-Stephen Ohlemacher, Associated Press/FederalNewsRadio.com
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Senate lawmakers to extend greater power to CIOs

Senate lawmakers will propose major changes to how federal chief information officers oversee IT investments, including giving them full budget authority and approval over all IT contracts.

In their version of the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA), Sens. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), chairman and ranking member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, respectively, will offer an amendment in the nature of a substitute for the House's version of FITARA at a committee markup Wednesday.

In documents obtained by Federal News Radio, the Senate's draft version of FITARA would require "the director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to require in its annual IT capital planning guidance that the CIO of the agency (I) approve the agency's information technology budget request; (II) certify that IT investments are implementing incremental development as defined by OMB; and (III) work with the Chief Human Capital Officer to review all IT positions requested in the budget to ensure the needs of the agency are being met."

Additionally, the draft bill would give CIOs power to review and approve IT contracts or other agreements for technology products or services, and sanction any request to reprogram funds for IT.

The Senate's draft version, however, doesn't follow the House's lead in requiring only one person with the title CIO. But it does give the agency CIO the right to "approve the appointment of any other employee with the title of Chief Information Officer at the agency, or who functions in the capacity of Chief Information Offer, for any component organization within the agency."

The House passed its version of FITARA in May as part of the Defense Authorization bill.

-Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com
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Bill to track every federal dollar headed to Obama’s desk

The House on Monday gave final congressional approval to a bipartisan bill that would require federal agencies to report all of their expenditures online in a single location, sending the measure to the White House for President Obama’s signature.

Both chambers of Congress passed the DATA Act unanimously this month, representing a rare showing of widespread agreement between Democrats and Republicans. Sens. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) sponsored the legislation.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), who sponsored a similar measure in 2011 with Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), described the DATA Act as “a win for good government, moving the federal bureaucracy into the digital age and setting the stage for real accountability.”

Transparency advocates have complained that federal agencies rarely make spending data readily available under the current system. The Data Transparency Coalition applauded the House vote on Monday, calling on Obama to sign the bill and commit the Office of Management and Budget to “pursue robust standards throughout federal financial, budget, grant and contract reporting.”

Comptroller General Gene Dodaro, who heads the Government Accountability Office, said during testimony this month that the DATA Act is the “single biggest thing” lawmakers could do to identify wasteful federal spending.

-Josh Hicks, WashingtonPost.com
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Budget proposal fleshes out OMB's management agenda

More than six months after President Barack Obama announced his second-term management agenda, the Office of Management and Budget is putting some specifics behind it.

As part of the fiscal 2015 budget request sent to Congress Tuesday, the administration described initiatives around improving customer service at the IRS and the Social Security Administration. OMB also plans to fund and launch a civilian property realignment board and to include more funding for the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Standards and Technology to make federally funded data more widely available.

OMB said it will also launch new and improved employee training programs and three pilot programs to enhance how agencies hire employees.

"The agenda is focused on delivering a 21st century government that is more effective, efficient and supportive of economic growth," said Beth Cobert, OMB's deputy director for management, Tuesday during a teleconference with reporters.

Cobert said the management agenda is focused on four themes:

• Effectiveness — delivering better, faster, smarter services to citizens and businesses.
• Efficiency — increasing quality and value in the government's core administrative functions.
• Economic growth — opening government funded data and research to the public to spur innovation and economic growth.
• People and culture — unlocking the full potential of the federal workforce and building the workforce the government needs for the future.

- Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com
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Agencies can’t always tell who’s dead and who’s not, so benefit checks keep coming

The U.S. government has a problem with dead people. For one thing, it pays them way too much money.

In the past few years, Social Security paid $133 million to beneficiaries who were deceased. The federal employee retirement system paid more than $400 million to retirees who had passed away. And an aid program spent $3.9 million in federal money to pay heating and air-conditioning bills for more than 11,000 of the dead.

These mistakes are part of a surprising glitch at the heart of the federal bureaucracy. Because of a jury-rigged and outdated system meant to track deaths, the government has trouble determining exactly which Americans are deceased.

As a result, Washington is bedeviled by both the living dead and the dead living.

The task of tracking deaths for the federal bureaucracy is an enormous one; about 2.5 million Americans die each year. Federal officials say the vast majority of these cases are handled correctly: The death is recorded. Government money is no longer sent to that person.

But not always. In fact, glitches in the system have paid more than $700 million to the dead, according to government audits performed since 2008.

The trouble with dead people often begins with something called the Death Master File, which is kept by the Social Security Administration. Every day new reports are added, provided by relatives, funeral homes and the state agencies that issue official death certificates.

The list contains 90 million reports.

The problem is that not all of them are correct.

Now, after years of inattention, President Obama and two senators have laid out ideas to improve the system. In his 2014 budget, Obama requested $22 million to improve the death reports that come in from states by upgrading their systems to transmit faster and more accurate data.

In the Senate, Carper and Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) have written a bill that would require all federal agencies to check the Death Master File before paying benefits. It would also give all agencies access to the full file, not just the partial one. And it would require new efforts to make sure the data in the file are accurate.

-David A. Fahrenthold, WashingtonPost.comREAD MORE...

AGA's Financial Management Standards Board (FMSB) Seeks Input on New Reporting Framework

FMSB seeks input on the development of a new reporting framework targeting executive and legislative decision-makers. 

Comments due by December 1st.

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Bill puts contract spending on the hook if Pentagon misses audit deadline

New legislation introduced by Sens. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) aims to push the Pentagon toward being ready for a full financial audit by restricting spending on major weapons programs if DoD fails to get its books in order.

Coburn, who has introduced similar legislation in the past, said a full financial audit will help DoD better prioritize funding.

"This summer the Pentagon canceled important training and furloughed thousands of civilian personnel while it continued to waste billions on non-defense spending that had nothing to do with its core mission," he said in a statement. "A full and complete audit is the only way the department will be able to make better decisions about how it uses valuable taxpayer dollars."

Under the Audit the Pentagon Act of 2013, if DoD fails to obtain a clean audit opinion by 2018, the military services would be barred from spending money to fund new major acquisition programs beyond what's known as "milestone B" — in essence, the actual engineering and manufacturing of new systems.

In addition, the bill would prohibit DoD from purchasing off-the-shelf IT systems if they would take more than three years to install. The bill would require DoD to include terms in its contracts allowing for the termination of IT system contracts that aren't delivered on schedule.

Congress has mandated DoD pass a full financial audit by the end of fiscal 2017. Meanwhile, DoD leadership has set an interim deadline to provide auditable Statement of Budgetary Resources — a full accounting of money flowing in and out of the Pentagon — by the end of 2014.

-Jack Moore, FederalNewsRadio.com
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Senate poised to confirm first DoD IG in nearly two years

The Senate Armed Services Committee took the next step to fill four vacancies in the Defense Department, including one that has been vacant for almost two years.

The department has been without a Senate-confirmed inspector general since December 2011.

President Barack Obama nominated current Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation IG Jon Rymer for the job. Rymer made his case Thursday during his confirmation hearing before the committee. Rymer has been the FDIC IG since 2006. He recently retired from the Army Reserve with more than 30 years of service between his active and reserve duty. He is a graduate of the Army's Inspector General School. His experience in the private sector includes seven years in consulting and interval auditing at a major accounting firm and 15 years as a senior manager in the banking industry.

While very familiar with the Army's prevention programs, Rymer said he believed the role of the IG is to provide oversight for the effectiveness of the programs in place and an analysis of the money spent by each of the services.

-Lauren Larson, FederalNewsRadio.com
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Agencies not working together to quell improper payments

The Social Security Administration needs to work with other federal agencies and state government and share data to make sure Social Security payments are made properly, Office of Federal Financial Management Controller Daniel Werfel told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee May 8.

Werfel said an example of how agencies can work together is on curbing Supplemental Security Income payments to those people living overseas.

SSI recipients are ineligible when outside the country for more than 30 days.

SSA and the Homeland Security Department should develop a process so that SSA could access DHS-collected travel data on individuals who enter and leave the United States, O'Carroll said. As of April 2013, SSA was pursuing access to this data and developing a database matching agreement, he said.

There has been some success in lower improper payments, though. In fiscal 2012, SSA investigators recovered $96.5 million in SSA restitution and projected $398.5 million in savings from programs such as the Cooperative Disability Investigations initiative, which works with state agencies to detect potential fraud and reduces the number of fraudulent disability payments, O'Carroll said.

Read more: Agencies not working together to quell improper payments - FierceGovernment http://www.fiercegovernment.com/story/agencies-not-working-together-quell-improper-payments/2013-05-09#ixzz2Sp7a0300
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OMB clarifies agency authorities for implementing sequestration cuts

The Office of Management and Budget has directed agencies to take full advantage of the funding flexibilities they have under the law as they implement the automatic budget cuts, known as sequestration, that went into effect March 1.

In an April 4 memo, OMB Controller Danny Werfel also directed agency and department leaders to be mindful of certain types of performance awards and to work with agency inspectors general before making cuts to IG offices.

Many agencies' hands are tied when it comes to implementing the cuts because of their across-the-board nature.

"However, depending on an agency's account structure and any existing flexibilities provided by law, some agencies may have a limited ability to realign funds to protect mission priorities," Werfel wrote.

In fact, the 2013 appropriations bill passed by Congress last month blunted some of the impact of the cuts by shifting funding priorities and, in some cases, granting new increases.

"Agencies with reprogramming or transfer authority should continue to examine whether the use of these authorities would allow the agency to minimize the negative impact of sequestration on core mission priorities," Werfel wrote in the memo.

He told agencies to consider long-term mission goals when making decisions about how to implement the cuts.

The memo reiterated that funding for agencies' independent inspector general offices is subject to sequestration.

"To the extent an agency has discretion in implementing reductions to IG funding due to sequestration, agency heads should be mindful of the independence of the Office of Inspector General and should consult with the IG on a pre-decisional basis on matters that may impact IG funding," the memo stated.

In fact, in cases where IG funding is its own budget line-item (and not "intermingled" with other types of funding), the IGs themselves should be granted the discretion to implement the cuts, Werfel said.

Werfel said the administration continues to urge Congress to eliminate sequestration "as part of a balanced agreement on deficit reduction."

- Jack Moore, FederalNewsRadio.com
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Federal News Radio coverage of the 2013 AGA National Leadership Conference

The Association of Government Accountants' National Leadership Conference brings together financial-management experts from across government to share best practices and to discuss the latest management and accountability techniques.

The 2013 Association of Government Accountants National Leadership Conference was held Feb. 12-13 in Washington, D.C. Federal News Radio attended the event and spoke with several of the key speakers ahead of their respective panel discussions.

- FederalNewsRadio.com
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Thankless DOD Inspector General routinely ignored

What do you call someone with all of the authority to hold public officials accountable, but none of the power required to enforce anything? An inspector general.

At the office of the Department of Defense Inspector General (DOD IG), a roster of 63 unfinished cases reveals how Pentagon offices have ignored or not completed, sometimes for several years, IG recommendations to take corrective “actions” for various degrees of Pentagon mismanagement, poor accounting and other legal concerns.

According to the DOD IG’s latest semiannual report to Congress, at the end of fiscal 2012 the types of “actions pending” on IG audits ranged from updating Defense Department security clearance guidance, some of which dated as far back as 1987, to accurately tabulating overtime hours at the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, cancelling poorly-planned wind turbine projects in Alaska, and determining the legality of using military surveillance assets to fight wildfires in the United States.

The list reveals how the inspector general is trying to make the Pentagon a somewhat more efficient $600 billion-a-year behemoth. It also is a microscope into bureaucratic minutiae preventing it from happening. At DOD, the IG does not publish full reports until the corrective actions are completed, so the public has no way of knowing exactly what actions have been taken as long as the case remains “pending.”

The topics of pending IG reports range widely from organizational management to combat. After one July 2011 audit of Marine Corps spending in 2008 on the global war on terror, the inspector general called for the Marines to update their “Financial Management Standard Operating Procedure Manual,” which was by then four years old. One year later, the Department of the Navy, which includes the Marine Corps, said it needed more time.  

-Kevin Baron, E-Ring, ForeignPolicy.com
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Treasury jobs relocation on hold

The Treasury Department won’t start relocating hundreds of federal employees from Maryland to West Virginia until the end of 2019, according to news releases.

Treasury has put plans on hold to move 450 Financial Management Service employees based in Hyattsville, Md., to Parkersburg, W.Va., giving workers a six-year reprieve. Treasury sought to move the jobs in late 2013 as part of an effort to consolidate the department’s Financial Management Service and the Bureau of Public Debt into the Fiscal Service. Employees initially had until January 2015 to relocate or separate from the government.

The department this week announced the relocation won’t begin until Dec. 31, 2019. Affected jobs include those in accounting, information technology and some management and related support positions.

Maryland’s congressional delegation and the National Treasury Employees Union fought the plan to move employees to another state and negotiated for the delay. 

-Kellie Lunney, GovExec.com
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Secretary Geithner Sends Debt Limit Letter to Congress

Today, Secretary Geithner sent the following letter to Congress regarding the debt limit.

*** 

December 26, 2012

The Honorable Harry Reid

Majority Leader

United States Senate

Washington, DC  20510

Dear Mr. Leader:

I am writing to inform you that the statutory debt limit will be reached on December 31, 2012, and to notify you that the Treasury Department will shortly begin taking certain extraordinary measures authorized by law to temporarily postpone the date that the United States would otherwise default on its legal obligations. 

These extraordinary measures, which are explained in detail in an appendix​ to this letter, can create approximately $200 billion in headroom under the debt limit.  Under normal circumstances, that amount of headroom would last approximately two months.  However, given the significant uncertainty that now exists with regard to unresolved tax and spending policies for 2013, it is not possible to predict the effective duration of these measures.....

-Matt Anderson, U.S. Department of the Treasury
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OMB delaying budget passback guidance, creating uncertainty

The fiscal 2014 budget is on hold.

Agency officials across the government have not received budget passback documents and likely will not until the White House and Congress agree on deficit reduction steps or both parties give up and let sequestration take place. An Office of Management and Budget official confirmed in an email to Federal News Radio the administration "has held off on passbacks to agencies to determine if adjustments will be needed based on the current negotiations. No decisions have been made at this point regarding budget timing." OMB traditionally sends passback, or budget guidance, which includes both actual spending numbers and policy guidance for the current and upcoming fiscal year, right around Thanksgiving. But several long-time senior agency leaders said they can't remember a time when OMB held up the communications this long.

OMB did provide agencies with initial planning guidance in May, but nothing since departments submitted their spending requests to the White House in September.

The OMB official said they asked agencies for additional information and analysis after September to update the estimates in the Sequestration Transparency Act report. The administration is using the data to finalize calculations of the spending reductions that would be required. The request was of a technical nature. For example, OMB requested the sequestrable federal administrative expenses in otherwise exempt mandatory accounts.

-Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com
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