# Presentation: 730073

## Cooperative Agreements Process Improvement Team

- Final Report

## Introduction

- Project startup
- Complaints from cooperators in Fall 2004
- VS started to review process, then became APHIS project
- Cooperative Agreement Process Improvement Team (CAPIT)=
- Dr. Lane +
- Core team +
- Steering Committee

**Notes:**
Startup:
Explain start of project
VS started (work actually had begun)
Became APHIS project
Detailed on developmental project?
Team
Dr. Lane as lead and core team:
Steve Kidd
Kim Ogle
Cheri Oswalt
Mike Panchura
Ken Waters 
Steering Committee:
APHIS representation (Business and Program) (BRS, PPQ, VS, WS, MRP-BS)
3 Cooperators invited (Myers and Andrews active, Gaskalla/Riherd occasional)

## Objectives

- Improve Process
- 1. Review process
- 2. Identify improvement opportunities
- 3. Look at areas that relate to performance measures
- Identify Issues
- 4. Look at legal, regulatory & policy requirements
- Discover Best Practices
- 5. Find best practices to adopt

## Methodology

- Collected stakeholder perspectives
- Interviews, Focus Group Interviews Cooperator surveys, APHIS employee surveys, Stakeholder Workshop, AMT questionnaire
- Conducted benchmarking
- APQC & Preliminary
- Reviewed documentation
- Samples & Database

**Notes:**
VIEWS
5 interviews (3 current and former managers of Agreements Services Center)
9 Focus Group interviews (4 in regions (2 each business and program)), 5 in Riverdale (VS and PPQ staff, BEST, ASC) and 1 in Minneapolis (Payments)
4 cooperator surveys (1 National Plant Board (53), 1 National Assembly of State Animal Health Officials (45), 1 Berryman Institute (12), 1 Other (3))
1 Employee Survey:  (62 PPQ, 62 VS, 27 WS, 18 Other)
Stakeholder meeting (41 Employees and 13 cooperators)
BENCHMARKING
American Productivity and Quality Center Grants Benchmarking Study
Preliminary APHIS benchmarking– reviewed online materials and made some preliminary phone calls
DOCUMENTATION
APHIS sample documentation– 90 agreements and 7 grants
APHIS statistics (Agreements database and FFIS and BRIO reports)

## Overview 

- Cooperative Agreements have become a strategic tool for APHIS

**Notes:**
Last few years has been 20 to 25 percent (one fifth to one quarter of the budget)

## 2003 Statistics

**23.7M**

**Notes:**
This information is to help give you a sense of the numbers of cooperative agreements and how much is awarded in each one.  We used 2003 because that is the last fiscal year for which we have complete data

The  smallest award was for $928 (emergency management in AZ) and the largest was for almost 23.7 million (Boll Weevil Eradication –TX)
The mean or average was 199K
The Median (remember the median is the middle– half of the agreements were for more than 44K and half were for less)

## 2003 Statistics

**Notes:**
Note the distribution and that about 1/5 of the agreements were for amounts less than 10K (Yellow)

## Cooperative Agreements Process

**Core Business Process**
**Supporting Business Processes**

**Planning/ Budgeting**

**Announcement or Notification**

**Application and Award**

**Monitoring/ Reporting**

**Payments**

**Closeout**

**Training/ Guidance**

**Working Relationships**

**Communication**

***Mostly non-competitive***

***Highest rated***

***Continuing resolutions***

***APHIS rated low***

***Time issues***

***Priority 1--Workshop***

**Notes:**
Slide at beginning
Shows the process (Read them clockwise from planning and budgeting) and the supporting processes (Read)
Click 1:  Training and Guidance was the number 1 priority (needs the most work) according to the workshop participants
Click 2:  Planning and Budgeting was the number 2 priority according to the workshop; continuing resolutions make planning and budgeting more challenging
Click 3:  Most of APHIS agreements are non-competitive so the announcement is not like some other agencies
Click 4:  This was the third priority according to the workshop; the survey showed that there are two time issues here:  Cooperators especially said that there is not enough time between announcements and application deadlines; they also said that the time it takes from application to approval or denial takes too long
Click 5:  The cooperator reporting was rated very low by employees and pretty high by cooperators; this was the fourth priority according to the workshop
Click 6:  Payments was given the highest overall rating (but just over 3 or just above “good”  Scale was 1=poor, 2=fair, 3=good, 4=very good, 5=excellent)

## Findings

**Processing has become decentralized due to increase in cooperative agreements **

**473**

**Notes:**
As the numbers of cooperative agreements went up, APHIS went from a mostly central approach to processing to a more decentralized approach.
There have always been many people involved in negotiating and supporting cooperative agreements.  That was true in 1995 as it is today.  The processing went from headquarters only (or mostly) to being done at a a combination of headquarters, regions and scientific staffs.  As an indicator of that trend, APHIS had 4 specialists in 1995 in headquarters and 21 today at the regions and at headquarters.

## Findings 

**Communication, guidance and follow up has not kept up**

_**1995**_

_**2004**_

**Notes:**
With a small central staff, guidance can be dispensed at a meeting, and work can be monitored on a daily basis. With specialists in the regional offices of PPQ, VS, PPQ, some at CEAH, CPHST, and NWRC, some at headquarters along with people involved in processing agreements in state director and area offices, as well as the financial, personnel involved in Riverdale and Minneapolis, new strategies are needed for communicating, providing guidance and monitoring work. 

As cooperative agreements have become more decentralized in APHIS, central policy development and communication have not kept up with the need.  In recent years, as the agreement processing workload has increased for the center (including a heavy workload during the recent END and BSE emergencies), policy development and communication, a core business process for the center, has suffered.  Unfortunately this coincided with the influx of new regional agreement specialists in need of clear guidance, training and feedback on their work. 

## Findings

**APHIS cooperative agreements processes are inconsistent**

**Jan****	****11**
**Feb****	****  1**
**Mar****	****  3**
**Apr****	****  7**
**May****	****  5**
**Jun****	****  4**
**Jul****	****  9**
**Aug****	****  4**
**Sep****	****22**
**Oct****	****14**
**Nov****	****  0**
**Dec****	****  1**

**Starting Months for **
**the 97 **
**Sample Cooperative Agreements**

**Notes:**
Start dates for agreements vary., PPQ is moving to a calendar year for most of its agreements.  Also, note the number of starts in September.  While this can be attributed to a number of factors, it is important to note that starting late in the year causes some problems (not allowing states their clearance process, not being able to use funds that are not used in the cooperative agreements – money goes back to the treasury after the end of the fiscal year)  

One issue that came up at the stakeholder workshop was the inconsistent way cooperator questions and concerns are handled in APHIS.  For some cooperators, this is something that APHIS does well:  their questions are answered fully and promptly.  Others say that their questions go unanswered even though they ask repeatedly.  One participant pointed out that the issue is not that Cooperators want the answer to be yes all the time, rather they want a full explanation of why the answer is no. 

## APHIS cooperative agreements processes are inconsistent

|  | APHIS | PPQ | VS | WS |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Cooperator Ratings | 2.72 | 2.79 | 2.49 | 3.81 |
| APHIS Ratings | 2.45 | 2.64 | 2.11 | 2.61 |

**Ratings of APHIS Processes**

**APHIS cooperative agreements processes are inconsistent**

- Findings

**Notes:**
Another indication of inconsistency is the difference in ratings by cooperators of the PPQ, VS and WS processes.  See the table of composite ratings:

Summary of the situation in the Eastern Region VS– how tough it is to get practices consistently applied

## Findings

**APHIS cooperative agreements processes are inconsistent**

**Notes:**
Finally, cooperator reporting is inconsistent as well.  In VS there is the issue of inconsistent reporting requirements in the Eastern Region (See the sidebar on page 8).  In the workshop, participants acknowledged that reporting and monitoring can work well when there is 1) “good communication between the cooperator and the ADODR,” and when 2) “the cooperative agreement clearly spells out reporting requirements.”  Often, however, reporting and monitoring does not work well.  
There is concern agency wide over the adequacy and timeliness of cooperator reporting.  According to our focus group interviews, the surveys and the workshop, APHIS employees have three issues with the way cooperators report results:
Poor quality of the reports
Reports not done on time 
Reports not submitted at all  
Also, APHIS employees rated cooperator reporting very low in the survey.  The only part of the process that employees rated lower than timelines of reports was the adequacy of guidance and training that APHIS provides to cooperators. 

## Findings

**Training and guidance are poor or inconsistent**

**Notes:**
Participants at the workshop identified training overall as the number one area to improve. 

Overall, in rating aspects of the cooperative agreements, respondents to the surveys rated cooperator training and guidance as the worst component of the APHIS agreement process (See Appendix C for more details of the ratings).  Sixty four percent of all respondents rated it poor or fair.  Ratings of APHIS training were low as well with over 47 % of the respondents rating it poor or fair.  In the focus groups, however, some of the training offered, especially by PPQ’s Eastern Region, was regarded as pretty good. Also, inconsistencies in the agreements process mentioned in the previous finding are an indication of poor or inconsistent training and guidance

## Findings

**Less time available to accomplish the work**

**Poor**
**Planning**
**(CR)**

- J     F     M     A     M     J     J     A    S    O    N    D

**Paperwork**

**One size**

**Time Limits**

**Notes:**
There is an increasing squeeze on the time allowed for cooperators to complete their work.  The beginning is rushed because of poor planning and a problem with continuing resolutions (when appropriation bills don’t pass Congress before the beginning of the fiscal year, funding occurs through continuing resolutions making funding for the year uncertain and good planning problematic).   Once planning is done, the process itself is cumbersome, paper-based and when the award is small, according to some cooperators, is not worth the effort.  Finally, APHIS authorities prevent, in most cases, extending the funding and the time for completing the work beyond one year. 

## Amount of paperwork

## Findings

**Flexibility is considered a strength**

**Notes:**
Even though the team identified a need for more consistency, our data also shows that many consider APHIS flexibility to be a strength.  It is important that in resolving inconsistency issues and improving training, guidance and communication that when circumstances call for flexibility, APHIS programs have the ability to adjust so that Agency and cooperator needs are met.

## Commitments

- Hire additional person (training & communication)
- Hold annual meeting
- Allow maximum time
- Don’t exceed OMB requirements

**Notes:**
At the end of the Stakeholder Workshop and based on participant findings and recommendations (See Appendix D Stakeholder Workshop Results), Kevin Shea, Associate Administrator committed APHIS to the following actions:
1.  The Agreements Services Center will be given an additional position to develop and implement a training program and improve communication
2.  An annual meeting for both Cooperators and APHIS will be developed and implemented to share information and conduct planning
3.  APHIS will allow maximum time for agreements 
4.  No APHIS office will require cooperators to report results or financial information that exceeds OMB guidance without first receiving an OMB waiver. 

## Recommendations

**Improve consistency across the Agency especially in training and guidance**
**Streamline the process**
**Explore other opportunities**

**Notes:**
This is an overview of the recommendations.  I will go into detail about each one.

## Recommendation #1

**Improve consistency across the Agency**
- Standardize APHIS practices
- Get a consistent message out about expectations and practices
- Improve follow-up

**Notes:**
Intro screen just read what is here

## Recommendation #1 (cont)

**Standardize APHIS practices**
- Follow calendar-year based cycle of planning and operating (for ongoing agreements)
- Standardize formats
- Standardize process for resolving issues promptly
- Revise Agency guidance
- Standardize cooperator reporting

## Recommendation #1 (cont)

**Get a consistent message out about expectations and practices**
- Clarify expectations
- Make guidance readily available
- Hold an annual meeting
- Make training mandatory for APHIS
- Make guidance and training available to cooperators

**Notes:**
1)  Clarify expectations:  Internally, all APHIS employees need to understand the expectation that when working on cooperative agreements, they will focus on customer service to those involved both inside and outside the Agency.  This could be done in an annual update memo from the Agreements Service Center and reminders could be given at the Annual Meeting, but more importantly, it needs to be done through the supervisor/employee relationship.  For example, supervisors would clearly require that questions asked by employees and cooperators will be answered courteously, promptly and fully.  Frequently asked questions and answers will be available on the web site.  
2)  Make guidance readily available:  Consider moving guidance to electronic formats.  This will help with revising the information and getting the revisions quickly to everyone involved.  A version of the manual should be available on-line so that both APHIS employees and cooperators have easy access.  The web site needs to include an option to ask questions on-line and the expectation that all questions will receive a timely answer.  The flow chart and the Frequently Asked Questions that are available now are a good start for the web site development.  Updates to guidance should be posted promptly and be sent using a list serve (e-mails sent automatically to those involved in APHIS cooperative agreements—both inside and outside of the Agency).  
3)  Hold an annual meeting:  Each year, a meeting will be held to provide the cooperative agreement community with updates, listen to stakeholder concerns and plan for the upcoming year.     
4)  Make training mandatory for APHIS:  Everyone in APHIS who is involved in the cooperative agreements process should be trained.  The training should be mandatory.  The training should be tailored to meet the needs of all those involved by letting them know what to do and how to it.  A review of the criteria for when and how to use assistance (e.g. cooperative agreements or grants) or procurement (contracts or purchase orders) instruments should be included.  
The curriculum would include courses from Management Concepts Incorporated, train-the-trainer approaches, face-to- face training and include cooperators whenever possible.  The curriculum should provide for regular, required, refresher training for APHIS employees.  
5)  Make guidance and training available to cooperators:  As agency guidance is updated, it will be made available to cooperators through various venues such as meetings, mailings, web, etc.  APHIS will create specific cooperator guidance on roles and responsibilities and agency processes designed to be used parallel to the agency guidance documents.  Also, APHIS will make training for cooperators available in a variety of training modes (classroom, on-line, interactive etc.) and will encourage all of its cooperators to participate. 

## Recommendation #1 (cont)

**Improve follow up**
- Ensure APHIS accountability
- Ensure cooperator accountability
- Expand reviews

**Notes:**
1)  Ensure APHIS accountability:  New behaviors will not take effect consistently without management support.  While clarifying expectations is important, consistency requires that managers also hold their employees accountable.  Holding employees to Agency customer service standards as well as individual employee performance standards would help with accountability.  
2)  Ensure cooperator accountability:  It is important that cooperators get their reports done well and in on time.  Clear expectations, including a standard reporting format and a timeline for progress and final reports will be documented in the agreement.  This being said, the agency needs to decide what the consequences will be, if any, when the cooperator fails to adhere to the terms of the agreement.
3)  Expand reviews:  It is important to check regularly on progress.  Reviews that are currently being done by the Financial Management Division, Review and Analysis Branch should continue.  In addition, the Agency should plan for regular regional level (include regular CEAH, CPHST and NWRC reviews) and Agency level reviews too. 

## Recommendation #2

**Streamline the process**
- Implement APHIS e-approaches
- Use more simplified approaches for getting work done
- Shift processing to regional staffs

**Notes:**
Intro screen

## Recommendation #2 (cont)

**Implement APHIS e-approaches**
- Support USDA and Government approaches
- Mostly competitive
- Ensuring fair competition
- Pursue e-solutions for APHIS
- Variety of approaches
- Ensure consistency

**Notes:**
The President’s e-Gov initiative is outlined in a long-term plan under PL106-107 and includes many electronic options for agreements.  These initiatives focus not only on streamlining the process for competitive cooperative agreements and grants but also on increasing the ability of interested parties to easily obtain information on opportunities to participate in APHIS assistance.  Even though implementation has been slow, we applaud APHIS participation in these efforts to pursue electronic solutions and in ensuring competition when appropriate.  
Since most of APHIS agreements are not competitive, the Agency should actively pursue electronic solutions to meet its own needs apart from the Department and government-wide efforts.  We suggest electronic solutions include using e-mail to exchange revised plans as the agreements are being negotiated, more use of electronic signatures, exploring collaborative writing environments, using fill-in-the-blank workplans and financial plans, developing electronic reporting formats and even faster electronic payments.  While there is room for experimentation, any solutions that prove to be helpful should be adopted Agency wide. 

## Recommendation #2 (cont)

**Use more simplified approaches for getting work done**
- Simplified acquisitions
- Fee-based type agreements
- Umbrella agreements
- Other agency agreements
- Simplified agreements

**Notes:**
Simplified acquisitions – sometimes cooperative agreements are being used when a simple acquisition would be quicker and easier to use
Fee-based type agreements – These are not exactly an acquisition and not exactly a cooperative agreement and are being used in VS for BSE surveillance.  These are being used successfully for about 80% of BSE surveillance program.  
Umbrella agreements – One cooperative agreement that includes more that one work plan.  These have been used successfully in the PPQ CAPS program.  These may work best when the projects are related.   As this approach is implemented, Agency financial personnel need to address issues raised about tracking and shifting money from one project to another.   
Other agency’s agreements – sometimes it may be worth it to have another agency process the agreement so that APHIS concentrates on the work that needs to be done
Simplified agreements – With a substantial number of small awards (more than 20% under 10 K in 2003), it may be time to explore a simplified process that is easily and quickly approved when the risk, complexity and dollar amounts are all low.    

## Recommendation #2 (cont)

**Shift processing workload to regional staffs    **
- Allow ADODRs to focus more on managing projects and measuring/reporting results.
- Allow ASC to focus more on policy development, guidance and training
- Use PPQ ER as a “model”

**Notes:**
3)  Shift agreement processing workload to regional staffs:  All of the processing of agreements currently done at the state and area level should shift to the Agreements Specialists who work on the regional staffs.  Any processing that is done at the Agreement Service Center (ASC) that is more appropriately done regionally should shift to the regional staffs too.  PPQ’s Eastern Region is a model for the others in APHIS to follow.  Shifting the processing workload to the regional staffs in all of APHIS will allow the ADODR's and their staffs to concentrate on the program side of the agreements and allow them to focus their efforts on working with cooperators in managing the projects and measuring and reporting results.
The Agreements Service Center (ASC) will always be responsible for some agreement processing (for agreements initiated by headquarters staffs and for those agreements with cooperators who represent national organizations such as NASDA) and is the source of definitive advice for the specialists in the regional offices.  Even though the ASC will always play those roles, it is also responsible for policy development, guidance, training and communication.   These roles are the ones that have suffered in recent years due to the expansion of the use of agreements, the hiring of new staff and the response to several emergencies.  With the hiring of the new staff person (One of Mr. Shea’s commitments) and the regional staffs taking more of the processing burden, the ASC should be able to handle these roles more easily. 

## Recommendation #3

**Explore other opportunities**
- Review sufficiency of current authorities
- Exploit current authorities
- Explore new authorities
- Pass through funding
- Multi-year agreements
- Multi-year funding

**Notes:**
3.  Explore other opportunities 
The CAPIT team identified 3 final areas that require attention. These recommendations are listed last because they are more long term solutions to some of the issues raised.  These areas are extremely important to explore to be able to extend work beyond the current one-year limit.    
A. Review sufficiency of authorities  
While we believe that APHIS has the authority to adopt all of the recommendations in this paper so far, implementers should ensure that authorities and policies are in place to support the changes.  
B.  Exploit existing authorities  
The current APHIS policy of starting agreements at any time during the fiscal year and continuing for 1 year after the start date was developed in the mid 1990’s.  Some we talked with thought that APHIS could run agreements for periods of time that exceed the currently acceptable one year (in addition to the exception for non-severability).  It also may be that APHIS could use authorities available to other USDA agencies (such as the more flexible authorities given to the Forest Service).  The implementers should explore these possibilities further.   
C.  Explore new authorities  
1)  Pass through funding:  APHIS should explore possible authorities that would allow the Agency to pass earmarked funding directly to the recipient.  This would eliminate the administrative burden of working through the cooperative agreement process. 

2)  Multi-year agreements:  APHIS should consider multi-year agreements tailored after contractual vehicles which have a base year with optional periods of contract extension.  This approach will reduce the administrative burden, increase the planning horizons of both APHIS and its cooperators, and retain the flexibility of work and spending plan changes required in the optional periods. 
3)  Multi-year funding:  APHIS should seek multi-year funding authority sufficient, not to exceed 5 percent of the program appropriation line, to enable programs to continue cooperative efforts during continuing resolutions. 

## ImplementationDraft Action Plan

- F      M       A       M       J       J        A       S       O      N      D     J

**TRANSITION TO WG**

**PLAN IMPROVEMENTS**

**IMPLEMENT CHANGES**

**1. IMPROVE CONSISTENCY ACROSS THE AGENCY**

**2.  STREAMLINE THE PROCESS**

**3.  EXPLORE OTHER OPPORTUNITIES**

**Notes:**
TRANSITION TO WG -  The transition to the workgroup can take place as soon as you—the AMT—choose who from your program will be on the team.  The “knowledge, skills & abilities” that we believe will be needed by all or some of the members of the workgroup are:  IT Skills, Project Planning Ability, Business Process Reengineering Skills, Knowledge of the Grants/CA process and procedures, what else?, etc. etc.  We (CAPIT) have already reserved a room for March 29-31 to hold the transition meeting; therefore, we request the names of your members by March 15.
If any of these “skills” are not available in APHIS, you may want to consider hiring an outside contractor to complete all or some of the recommended improvements.  We recommend including some real-live cooperators on the work group to ensure that their perspective is included from the planning stage through the implementation stage.

PLAN IMPROVEMENTS – The member of the new workgroup with project planning skills will lead the WG in the development of the final action plan (next steps)/timeline.

IMPLEMENT CHANGES – We believe the changes should be implemented in this order shown on the slide; however, the WG will obviously have the flexibility to decide what the best order of implementation will be for them based upon their own judgment.

## ImplementationNext steps 

- Transition to working group (1 month)
- Develop plan (2nd month)
- Get input on plan (3 weeks)
- Get plan approved by PLG
- Implement plan (first year):
- Improve consistency across the Agency
- Streamline the process
- Explore other opportunities
- Transition to ‘communities of practice.’

**Notes:**
APHIS should create a Working Group to develop and implement the recommendations endorsed by the APHIS AMT and the commitments made by Mr. Kevin Shea.  After decisions are made on what needs to be done, the working group would be formed to carry out the following:
Make the transition from this review to the working group (1 month)
Meet to develop the implementation plan (2-3 days early in second month) 
Collect input from internal and external stakeholders involved in cooperative agreements (allow about 3 weeks from the time plan is posted)
Gain approval for the final plan from the Program Leaders Group (PLG) (Next meeting after plan is finalized)
Continue implementation with scheduled progress reports from the manager of the ASC and the leader of the working group to the PLG (other reports could be scheduled as needed).  Priorities for implementation are as follows (ongoing for first year): 
Improve consistency across the Agency
Streamline the process 
Explore other opportunities 
Ensure a smooth transition from working group to ‘communities of practice.’  First level of ‘community of practice’ to include the ASC and the specialists at the regions and science centers.  The second level would include the program level specialists along with the ADOs and ADODRs for that program. (by end of first year) 

## Implementation (Communities of Practice)

- CAPIT

- ASC

- NVSL

- ER

- WR

- WG

- NWRC

- CEAH

- CPHST

- AMT

- PLG

**Notes:**
Here is how it might work:
We are giving the AMT the report of our findings
First click:  I and the core team will brief the Working group along with the service center, and key people (at least the specialists) at the regions, and science centers

Second click:  The Working group will take over (being monitored by and reporting to the PLG) by working closely with the center and the specialists (and any others who are key) to build a community of practice.  Communities of practice as described in Communities of Practice:  A New Tool for Government Managers provide the benefits of centralization while maintaining a geographically and programmatically dispersed work force.  They are ultimately a way to better and more consistently share information, best practices and to learn from one another. More specifically, the Agreements communities of practice should include agency employees and stakeholders from the agreements area to solve common problems, share ideas, set standards, build tools and develop relationships with each other.  We envision two levels of communities. This is the first level the next slide will explain the second.

Third click:  Note that when the work is done, the PLG and WG will go away and the community with the ASC at the center will remain with the changes you decide on today in place.

## Implementation (Communities of practice)

- ASC

- ER-PPQ
- CAS
- ADO

- ER-VS
- CAS
- ADO

- HDQTRS

- CPHST

- ER-WS
- CAS
- ADO

- HDQTRS

- HDQTRS

- ADODR

- ADODR

- SPHD

- ADODR

- SD

- AVIC

- WR-CEAH

- WR-NWRC

- COOP

- WR-PPQ

- COOP

- COOP

**Notes:**
This slide will show the second level by focusing on the Eastern Region.  Note that the community created previously is still in place.  

First click:  The second level would be an off-shoot of the first and would be coordinated by Regional Agreements and Grants Specialists.  This group would include headquarters and field personnel involved in Agreements and Grants along with the cooperators themselves.  The community would be program specific and would be used to exchange and share information specific to the needs of that program.

Second click:  This shows how each community is created and connected 

Third click:  Also, remember that the connections to the other regions and science centers will still be in place

## Core Team	

- Stephen Kidd
- Kim Ogle
- Cheri Oswalt
- Mike Panchura
- Ken Waters
- Thanks to:
- Mattie Bocchi, Julie Marquis,  Kathy Schrack and Mary Thornhill

## Steering Committee

**Laura Andrews, The Berryman Institute**
- Stacie Cain, Plant Protection and Quarantine
- Margaret Crabtree, Plant Protection and Quarantine
- Irene Fernandez, Animal Care
- Judy Garrison, Biotechnology Regulatory Services
**Richard Gaskalla, Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services**
- Cindy Gordon, Plant Protection and Quarantine
- Inez Hockaday, Veterinary Services
- Aretha Johnson, Marketing and Regulatory Programs – Business Services
**Lee Myers, Georgia Department of Agriculture**
- Michele Nicol, Wildlife Services
- Linda Schepers, Plant Protection and Quarantine
- Steve Shelor, Civil Rights Enforcement and Compliance
- Mary VanDenk, Marketing and Regulatory Programs – Business Services

## Follow up

- What’s been done
- Ended practices that exceed OMB guidance
- Begun process to hire new person to focus on training and guidance
- Planning annual meeting
- What is left to do
- Form working group to address 3 recommendations
- Improve consistency especially in Training and Guidance
- Streamline process
- Explore other opportunities

## CAPIT Implementation

- APHIS has appointed an implementation team
- CAPIT Web site for information
- www.aphis.usda.gov/mrpbs/capit
- Bi-weekly progress report
- CAPIT email
- Implementation Plan
- Discussion Bulletin Board

## CAPIT Implementation

## Cooperative Agreements Process Improvement Team

- Final Report