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[Congressional Bills 114th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 3766 Introduced in House (IH)]

<DOC>

114th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 3766

   To direct the President to establish guidelines for United States 
  foreign development and economic assistance programs, and for other 
                               purposes.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            October 20, 2015

    Mr. Poe of Texas (for himself and Mr. Connolly) introduced the 
 following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL

 
   To direct the President to establish guidelines for United States 
  foreign development and economic assistance programs, and for other 
                               purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Foreign Aid Transparency and 
Accountability Act of 2015''.

SEC. 2. GUIDELINES FOR UNITED STATES FOREIGN DEVELOPMENT AND ECONOMIC 
              ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS.

    (a) Purpose.--The purpose of this section is to evaluate the 
performance of United States foreign development and economic 
assistance and its contribution to the policies, strategies, projects, 
program goals, and priorities undertaken by the Federal Government, to 
foster and promote innovative programs to improve effectiveness, and to 
coordinate the monitoring and evaluation processes of Federal 
departments and agencies that administer United States foreign 
development and economic assistance.
    (b) Establishment of Guidelines.--Not later than 18 months after 
the date of the enactment of this Act, the President shall set forth 
guidelines for the establishment of measurable goals, performance 
metrics, and monitoring and evaluation plans that can be applied with 
reasonable consistency to United States foreign development and 
economic assistance. Such guidelines shall be established according to 
best practices of monitoring and evaluation studies and analyses.
    (c) Objectives of Guidelines.--
            (1) In general.--The guidelines established under 
        subsection (b) shall provide direction to Federal departments 
        and agencies that administer United States foreign development 
        and economic assistance on monitoring the use of resources, 
        evaluating the outcomes and impacts of United States foreign 
        development and economic assistance projects and programs, and 
        applying the findings and conclusions of such evaluations to 
        proposed project and program design.
            (2) Objectives.--Specifically, the guidelines established 
        under subsection (b) shall require Federal departments and 
        agencies that administer United States foreign development and 
        economic assistance to take the following actions:
                    (A) Establish annual monitoring and evaluation 
                agendas and objectives to plan and manage the process 
                of monitoring, evaluating, analyzing progress, and 
                applying learning toward achieving results.
                    (B) Develop specific project monitoring and 
                evaluation plans, to include measurable goals and 
                performance metrics, and identify the resources 
                necessary to conduct such evaluations, which should be 
                covered by program costs, during project design.
                    (C) Apply rigorous monitoring and evaluation 
                methodologies to such programs, including through the 
                use of impact evaluations, ex-post evaluations, or 
                other methods as appropriate, that clearly define 
                program logic, inputs, outputs, intermediate outcomes, 
                and end outcomes.
                    (D) Disseminate guidelines for the development and 
                implementation of monitoring and evaluation programs to 
                all personnel, especially in the field, who are 
                responsible for the design, implementation, and 
                management of United States foreign development and 
                economic assistance programs.
                    (E) Establish methodologies for the collection of 
                data, including baseline data to serve as a reference 
                point against which progress can be measured.
                    (F) Evaluate at least once in their lifetime all 
                programs whose dollar value equals or exceeds the 
                median program size for the relevant office or bureau 
                or an equivalent calculation to ensure the majority of 
                program resources are evaluated.
                    (G) Conduct impact evaluations on all pilot 
                programs before replicating wherever possible, or 
                provide a written justification for not conducting an 
                impact evaluation where such an evaluation was deemed 
                inappropriate or impossible.
                    (H) Develop a clearinghouse capacity for the 
                collection and dissemination of knowledge and lessons 
                learned that serve as benchmarks to guide future 
                programs for United States development professionals, 
                implementing partners, the donor community, and aid 
                recipient governments, and as a repository of knowledge 
                on lessons learned.
                    (I) Distribute evaluation reports internally.
                    (J) Develop a summary of each evaluation, including 
                a description of the evaluation methodology and key 
                findings and recommendations made in the evaluation 
                within 90 days after the completion of the evaluation.
                    (K) Undertake collaborative partnerships and 
                coordinate efforts with the academic community, 
                implementing partners, and national and international 
                institutions that have expertise in program monitoring, 
                evaluation, and analysis when such partnerships provide 
                needed expertise or significantly improve the 
                evaluation and analysis.
                    (L) Ensure verifiable, valid, credible, precise, 
                reliable, and timely data are available to monitoring 
                and evaluation personnel to permit the objective 
                evaluation of the effectiveness of United States 
                foreign development and economic assistance programs, 
                including an assessment of assumptions and limitations 
                in such evaluations.
                    (M) Ensure that standards of professional 
                evaluation organizations for monitoring and evaluation 
                efforts are employed, including ensuring the integrity 
                and independence of evaluations, permitting and 
                encouraging the exercise of professional judgment, and 
                providing for quality control and assurance in the 
                monitoring and evaluation process.
    (d) Presidential Report.--Not later than 18 months after the date 
of the enactment of this Act, the President shall submit to the 
appropriate congressional committees a report that contains a detailed 
description of the guidelines established under subsection (b). The 
report shall be submitted in unclassified form, but it may contain a 
classified annex.
    (e) Comptroller General Report.--The Comptroller General of the 
United States shall, not later than 1 year after the report required by 
subsection (d) is submitted to Congress, submit to the appropriate 
congressional committees a report that analyzes--
            (1) the guidelines established pursuant to subsection (b); 
        and
            (2) a side-by-side comparison of the President's budget 
        request for that fiscal year of every operational unit that 
        carries out United States foreign development and economic 
        assistance and the performance of such units during the prior 
        fiscal year.

SEC. 3. INFORMATION ON UNITED STATES FOREIGN DEVELOPMENT AND ECONOMIC 
              ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS.

    (a) Publication of Information.--
            (1) Update of existing web site.--Not later than 90 days 
        after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of 
        State shall update the Department of State's Internet Web site, 
        ``ForeignAssistance.gov'', to make publicly available 
        comprehensive, timely, and comparable information on United 
        States foreign development and economic assistance programs, 
        including all information required pursuant to subsection (b) 
        of this section that is then available to the Secretary of 
        State.
            (2) Information sharing.--The head of each Federal 
        department or agency that administers United States foreign 
        development and economic assistance shall, not later than 2 
        years after the date of the enactment of this Act, and on a 
        quarterly basis thereafter, provide to the Secretary of State 
        comprehensive information about the United States foreign 
        development and economic assistance programs carried out by 
        such department or agency.
            (3) Updates to web site.--Not later than 2 years after the 
        date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of State shall 
        publish, through the ``ForeignAssistance.gov'' Web site or a 
        successor online publication, the information provided under 
        subsection (b) of this section and shall update such 
        information on a quarterly basis.
    (b) Matters To Be Included.--
            (1) In general.--The information described in subsection 
        (a) shall be published on a detailed award-by-award and 
        country-by-country basis unless assistance is provided on a 
        regional level, in which case the information shall be 
        published on an award-by-award and region-by-region basis.
            (2) Types of information.--
                    (A) In general.--To ensure transparency, 
                accountability, and effectiveness of United States 
                foreign development and economic assistance programs, 
                the information described in subsection (a) shall 
                include all regional, country, and sector assistance 
                strategies, annual budget documents, congressional 
                budget justifications, obligations, expenditures, 
                evaluations and summaries of evaluations as required 
                under section 2(c)(2)(J), and basic descriptive 
                summaries for United States foreign development and 
                economic assistance programs and awards under such 
                programs. Each type of information described in this 
                paragraph shall be published or updated on the Internet 
                Web site not later than 90 days after the date of 
                issuance of the information.
                    (B) Rule of construction.--Nothing in subparagraph 
                (A) shall be construed to require a Federal department 
                or agency that administers United States foreign 
                development and economic assistance to provide any 
                information that does not relate to or is not otherwise 
                required by the United States foreign development and 
                economic assistance programs carried out by such 
                department or agency.
            (3) Report in lieu of inclusion.--
                    (A) Health or security of implementing partners.--
                If the head of a Federal department or agency makes a 
                determination that the inclusion of a required item of 
                information online would jeopardize the health or 
                security of an implementing partner or program 
                beneficiary or would require the release of proprietary 
                information of an implementing partner or program 
                beneficiary, the head of the Federal department or 
                agency shall provide such determination in writing to 
                the appropriate congressional committees, including the 
                basis for such determination and shall--
                            (i) provide a briefing to the appropriate 
                        congressional committees on such information; 
                        or
                            (ii) submit to the appropriate 
                        congressional committees such information in a 
                        written report.
                    (B) National interests of the united states.--If 
                the Secretary of State makes a determination that the 
                inclusion of a required item of information online 
                would be detrimental to the national interests of the 
                United States, the Secretary of State shall provide 
                such determination in writing to the appropriate 
                congressional committees, including the basis for such 
                determination and shall--
                            (i) provide a briefing to the appropriate 
                        congressional committees on such information; 
                        or
                            (ii) submit to the appropriate 
                        congressional committees the item of 
                        information in a written report.
                    (C) Form.--Any briefing or item of information 
                provided under this paragraph may be provided in 
                classified form, as appropriate.
            (4) Failure to comply.--If a Federal department or agency 
        fails to comply with the requirements of subsection (a), 
        paragraph (1) or (2) of this subsection, or subsection (c) with 
        respect to providing information described in subsection (a), 
        and the information is not subject to a determination under 
        subparagraph (A) or (B) of paragraph (3) of this subsection not 
        to make the information publically available, the Director of 
        the Office of Management and Budget, in consultation with the 
        head of such department or agency, shall submit to the 
        appropriate congressional committees not later than September 
        1, 2016, a consolidated report describing, with respect to each 
        required item of information not made publicly available--
                    (A) a detailed explanation of the failure of not 
                making such information publicly available; and
                    (B) the department's or agency's plan and timeline 
                for immediately making such information publicly 
                available, and for ensuring that such failures do not 
                take place in following years.
    (c) Scope of Information.--The online publication required by 
subsection (a) shall, at a minimum, provide the information required by 
subsection (b)--
            (1) in each fiscal year from 2016 through 2019, such 
        information for fiscal years 2012 through the current fiscal 
        year; and
            (2) for fiscal year 2020 and each fiscal year thereafter, 
        such information for the immediately preceding five fiscal 
        years in a fully searchable form.

SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS.

    In this Act:
            (1) Appropriate congressional committees.--The term 
        ``appropriate congressional committees'' means--
                    (A) the Committee on Foreign Relations and the 
                Committee on Appropriations of the Senate; and
                    (B) the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the 
                Committee on Appropriations of the House of 
                Representatives.
            (2) Evaluation.--The term ``evaluation'' means, with 
        respect to a United States foreign development and economic 
        assistance program, the systematic collection and analysis of 
        information about the characteristics and outcomes of the 
        program, including projects conducted under such program, as a 
        basis for making judgments and evaluations regarding the 
        program, to improve program effectiveness, and to inform 
        decisions about current and future programming.
            (3) United states foreign development and economic 
        assistance.--The term ``United States foreign development and 
        economic assistance'' means assistance provided primarily for 
        the purposes of foreign development and economic support, 
        including assistance authorized under--
                    (A) part I of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 
                (22 U.S.C. 2151 et seq.), other than--
                            (i) title IV of chapter 2 of such part 
                        (relating to the Overseas Private Investment 
                        Corporation);
                            (ii) chapter 3 of such part (relating to 
                        International Organizations and Programs); and
                            (iii) chapter 8 of such part (relating to 
                        International Narcotics Control);
                    (B) chapter 4 of part II of the Foreign Assistance 
                Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2346 et seq.; relating to 
                Economic Support Fund);
                    (C) the Millennium Challenge Act of 2003 (22 U.S.C. 
                7701 et seq.); and
                    (D) the Food for Peace Act (7 U.S.C. 1721 et seq.).
                                 <all>
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