![](media/image1.png){width="0.875in"
height="0.8333333333333334in"}**University of Colorado Health Sciences
Center\
**

**Office of Grants and Contracts**

Fitzsimons, Building 500

Mail Stop F428

P.O. Box 6508

Aurora, Colorado 80045-0508

Phone: 303-724-0090

Fax: 303-724-0814

> November 14, 2023

Dr. Michael J. Holland

Office of Science and Technology Policy

1650 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, DC 20502

Re: Federal Register, August 6 and September 16, 2003 Notice and NSTC
Research Business Models Comments (68 FR 54226 and 68 FR 46631)

Dear Dr. Holland:

The University of Colorado Health Sciences Center (UCHSC) received
approximately \$217 million in federal awards during Fiscal Year 2003;
thus the rules of federal support have a substantial impact on UCHSC's
research and processes. We appreciate that you are gathering information
from affected parties. We support the evaluation of business models and
encourage the process to include and value the many hard-to-quantify
results of the research partnership between the federal government and
universities, e.g., new knowledge, educated students, and world-renowned
research investigators.

*Accountability:* The UCHSC has a strong commitment to the principles of
accountability for public monies. We too are reviewing our systems to
ensure efficient and effective use of public funds. UCHSC has funded two
new positions (a Director of Regulatory Compliance and a Financial
Compliance Auditor) to specifically target and make improvements in our
accountability and processes.

We encourage the OSTP and the Subcommittee on Research Models to define
accountability in terms of scientific outcomes, not
financial/administrative compliance. Universities have had an effective
partnership with the federal government that has built a strong research
enterprise.

Changes made to OMB Circular A-21 that capped the administrative
component of the Facilities and Administrative (F&A) costs rate and
defined certain costs as normally F&A costs were made in the
government's effort to cut costs without consideration for the long-term
result on research productivity. Our scientists must devote
ever-increasing hours to administrative details partly because of the
decision to restrict direct charging of administrative expenses while
capping the administrative reimbursement to universities and partly
because of additional unfunded compliance mandates such as HIPAA and
select agents.

The application of the Cost Accounting Standards to universities has
added considerable administrative burden. It is estimated by the Council
on Governmental Relations that the start-up costs of implementing CAS
and the Disclosure Statement (DS-2) at the top 100 universities was \$20
million. The requirement for a DS-2 and the expectation by federal
agencies that institutions will have an approved DS-2 and will not make
changes to cost accounting principles without approval is problematic
since the government has never reviewed most of those DS-2's and is not
addressing any of the changes.

*Inconsistency of policies and practices*: We support the principles
outlined in the Single Audit Act and OMB Circular A-133. We encourage
the Subcommittee to look for more ways to require standard
implementation of new requirements by federal agencies. Different
implementation by each agency makes it difficult for Universities to
achieve process improvements that could be provided through automation.

We are concerned about the agencies requests for additional audits,
particularly the disportionate amount of time the government is
advocating for Universities to take on for sub-recipient monitoring.

Variations in agency implementation (or lack of implementation) in a
system for disclosing significant financial interests present a
challenge for Universities and should be reviewed.

One system should be established that applies to all federal agencies so
there is not a proliferation of new forms and procedures. The
time-consuming processes of some agencies should not replace the more
efficient systems of other agencies. For instance, the NIH funding
mechanism is far superior to the Department of Education funding
mechanism. NIH allows letter of credit cash draws based on over-all
funding position with a quarterly reconciliation and reporting on a
grant-by-grant basis. Department of Education requires reconciliation
and reporting with each draw, a very time-intensive process.

*Inconsistencies and support mechanisms*: The difference in definitions
and requirements for different entities is an on-going challenge.
Recently, OMB clarified that for graduate students the IRS definition
and the NIH definition of employee-employer relationship do not have to
be the same. A similar clarification would be appropriate for
post-doctoral scholars who are essential to the research enterprise. Two
scholars may work side-by-side, but end up with different tax status,
expectations and benefits, depending on the support mechanism -- and the
support mechanism often changes over the tenure of a post-doctoral
appointment. (Visa requirements add an additional complication to the
scenario.)

*Best practices:* We appreciate the positive approach taken by NIH in
their recent "*Pro-active Compliance Site Visits*". We have long found
NIH to be a strong partner in the research enterprise. We have concerns
about its ability to continue that partnership, as NIH's staffing has
not keep pace with their workload.

*State requirements:* We have found that the State requirements are more
restrictive than Federal regulation; funding received through the State
covers less of the Institution's costs, and the funding includes
additional administrative requirements. This is particularly true if
funds are routed through state entities first, but also occurs because
UCHSC is subject to State requirements. For instance, we currently have
to apply all rules of State Procurement when sub-granting funds to other
entities under a grant. We have not yet been able to implement the
simpler sub-award document developed by the Federal Demonstration
Partnership.

*Research support and multidisciplinary/collaborative research:* We
strongly support the peer-review system for funding research. It
provides the accountability for scientific outcomes and at the same time
encourages scientific progress. Designation of funding for
multi-disciplinary work is also critical to encouraging innovative,
cross-disciplinary work. Program/project grants out of NIH are an
effective tool for promoting collaborative research. We also find the
grant mechanism, which is designed to ensure the best science is funded,
superior to the contract vehicle, which is designed to reward the lowest
bid, for funding university research. Collaborative research will be
discouraged if universities must monitor each sub-award and cannot use
the A-133 audit as confirmation of sound practices and compliance.

*Research infrastructure*: If the federal government wants to partner
with universities to increase research productivity as was seen during
the doubling of the NIH budget, additional resources for research
infrastructure need to be made available. UCHSC received twice as many
award dollars in Fiscal Year 2003 than it did seven years earlier. In
the same period, there has been a 50% increase in the number of awards.
In order to accommodate the significant growth, UCHSC is actively
rebuilding its campus on one of the decommissioned Army Medical posts in
Aurora, Colorado. State funding is not available for building and so
much of the investment is from bond funding which commits future
Facilities and Administrative Cost Recovery dollars and thus limits our
flexibility to support other infrastructure costs.

*Information technology:* We have found the lack of development and lack
of standardization to not be conducive to automating our own systems. We
are also concerned by the expectation that although the governmental
agencies have taken a long time to develop their systems, we need to
adjust and use them quickly. Each agency and many entities within
agencies are pursuing agency specific solutions to electronic
development. Purchasing or developing a system is very costly, perhaps a
\$1 to \$3 million investment and yet we do not yet know where each of
the federal agencies will end up and how much the government's move to
privatization will affect what we need.

NIH has been releasing their new e-Grants system. With NIH's expertise,
I expect that it will be one of the better systems over time and yet it
requires Universities to re-key all data directly into its system. The
system does not allow for computer-to-computer interface. For instance:
a) reports done in Excel at UCHSC have to be input a second time to
submit to NIH, and b) NIH institutes are encouraging faculty members to
get access to e-Grants in order to obtain a priority scores, but
institutions are responsible for security access and it appears we have
to manually input each faculty member to get the faculty member access
instead of uploading information from UCHSC system to e-Grants.

We appreciate OSTP's efforts to strive for sound research policy as it
tries to implement sound business practices. Thank you for the
opportunity to comment. If you would like clarification or additional
information, please feel free to contact me at 303.724.0096 or
<twila.reighley@uchsc.edu>.

Sincerely,

Twila Fisher Reighley

Director, Grants and Contracts