United States General Accounting Office

GAO Testimony

Before the Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health,

Committee on Resources, House of Representatives

For Release

on Delivery

Expected at

10:00 a.m. EDT

Thursday

July 31, 1997

THE RESULTS ACT

Observations on the Forest

Service’s May 1997 Draft

Plan

Statement of Barry T. Hill, Associate Director,

Energy, Resources, and Science Issues,

Resources, Community, and Economic

Development Division

GAO/T-RCED-97-223

Madam Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:

We are pleased to be here today to discuss the implementation of the

Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 (often referred to as the

Results Act or GPRA) within the Department of Agriculture’s Forest

Service. My testimony today will discuss (1) the need to hold the Forest

Service accountable for its performance; (2) the importance of

agreed-upon, long-term strategic goals to the successful implementation of

the act and the reasons for the current lack of agreement on these goals;

and (3) our observations on how the Forest Service can improve critical

components, including the strategic goals component, of its draft plan to

make it more informative and useful to the Congress and other

stakeholders.

To comply with the requirements of the Results Act, Agriculture submitted

a draft strategic plan to the Congress in May 1997. Agriculture’s draft

strategic plan includes a Department-wide strategic overview, as well as 30

component mission area, subagency, and staff office plans, including one

for the Forest Service. My comments today are based primarily on our

April 29, 1997, report on the agency’s decision-making1

 and our July 10,

1997, report on Agriculture’s draft strategic plan.2

 In our decision-making

report, we conclude that the Results Act, if implemented successfully, will

strengthen the Forest Service’s accountability for performance and results

and improve the efficiency and effectiveness of its decision-making. In our

report on Agriculture’s draft strategic plan we conclude that, overall, the

plan does not fulfill the requirements of the Results Act.

My comments are limited to the Forest Service’s plan and to the agency’s

management of the 155 forests that make up the National Forest System.

They do not address the Forest Service’s other programs, including forest

research, state and private forestry, and international forestry, which are

also covered by the Forest Service’s plan.

In summary, Madam Chairman:

• Our report on the Forest Service’s decision-making identifies an

organizational culture of indifference toward accountability. The agency’s

historically decentralized management and recently increased flexibility in

fiscal decision-making have not been accompanied by sufficient

accountability for expenditures and performance. As a result, inefficiency

1

Forest Service Decision-Making: A Framework for Improving Performance (GAO/RCED-97-71).

2

USDA’s Strategic Plan (GAO/RCED-97-196R, July 10, 1997).

Page 1 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
and waste have cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, and

opportunities for both ecological and economic gains have been lost

through indecision and delay. Past efforts by the Forest Service to change

its behavior have not been successful. Decision-making within the agency

is broken and in need of repair.

• The Results Act, if implemented successfully, should help break the

existing cycle of inefficiency within the Forest Service. The strategic goals

in the Forest Service’s plan form the starting point and foundation for

holding the agency accountable for its performance. Hence, these goals

are critical to successfully implementing the act within the agency.

However, agreement has not been reached on the strategic goals in the

Forest Service’s plan. This lack of agreement reflects the controversy, both

inside and outside the Forest Service, over (1) which uses to emphasize

under the agency’s broad multiple-use and sustained-yield mandate and

(2) which management approach can best ensure the long-term

sustainability of legislatively mandated uses on the national forests. As a

result, the agency cannot begin to derive the benefits anticipated from

implementing the act.

• The consultations with the Congress prescribed by the Results Act provide

an opportunity for the Forest Service to better explain (1) its rationale for

emphasizing some legislatively mandated uses on the national forests

more than other uses, (2) the logic underlying its approach to managing

natural resources, and (3) the likely effects of its policy choices on the

types, levels, and mixes of uses on its lands. However, the Forest Service’s

plan is silent on these issues.

Background Laws guiding the management of the 155 national forests require the

Forest Service to manage its lands under the principles of multiple use and

sustained yield to meet the diverse needs of the American people. Under

these principles, the Forest Service is required to manage its lands to

provide high levels of six renewable surface uses—outdoor recreation,

rangeland, timber, watersheds and water flows, wilderness, and wildlife

and fish—to current users while sustaining undiminished the lands’ ability

to produce these uses for future generations. In addition, the Forest

Service’s guidance and regulations require the agency to consider

nonrenewable subsurface resources—such as oil, gas, and hardrock

minerals—in its planning efforts.

Strategic Planning The Forest Service has prepared two draft plans—one in May 1997 under

the Results Act and another in October 1995 to comply with the

Page 2 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
requirements of the Forest and Rangeland Renewable Resources Planning

Act of 1974 (known as RPA).

The Results Act is intended to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of

federal programs by establishing a system to set goals for the programs’

performance and to measure results. Specifically, the act requires

executive departments and agencies to prepare multiyear strategic plans,

annual performance plans, and annual performance reports.

As a starting point, the act requires virtually every executive department

and agency to develop a strategic plan covering a period that extends at

least 5 years beyond the fiscal year in which it is submitted. These

strategic plans are to include six critical components: (1) a comprehensive

statement of the department’s or agency’s mission, (2) the department’s or

agency’s long-term general goals and objectives—or strategic goals—for

all major functions and operations, (3) a description of the approaches (or

strategies) for achieving the goals and the various resources needed, (4) an

identification of key factors, external to the department or agency and

beyond its control, that could significantly affect its achievement of the

strategic goals, (5) a description of the relationship between the long-term

strategic goals and annual performance goals, and (6) a description of how

program evaluations were used to establish or revise strategic goals and a

schedule for future evaluations.3

In developing their strategic plans, departments and agencies are to

consult with the Congress and to solicit the views of other stakeholders.

They are to submit their first strategic plans to the Office of Management

and Budget (OMB) and the Congress by September 30, 1997. A letter

transmitting a strategic plan to OMB and the Congress should include,

among other things, a summary of stakeholders’ views that “disagree, in a

substantive and germane way, with the programmatic, policy, or

management courses of action presented in the plan.”

Next, the Results Act requires executive departments and agencies to

develop annual performance plans covering each program activity set

forth in their budgets. The first annual performance plans, covering fiscal

year 1999, are to be provided to the Congress after the President’s budget

is submitted to the Congress in January or February 1998. An annual

performance plan is to contain the department’s or agency’s annual goals,

3

See Preparation and Submission of Strategic Plans, Office of Management and Budget Circular A-11,

Part 2 ( Sept. 1995) and Agencies’ Strategic Plans Under GPRA: Key Questions to Facilitate

Congressional Review (GAO/GGD-10.1.16, May 1997).

Page 3 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
its measures to gauge its performance toward meeting those goals, and the

resources that it will need to meet its goals.

Finally, the Results Act requires executive departments and agencies to

prepare annual reports on program performance for the previous fiscal

year. The performance reports are to be issued by March 31 each year,

with the first (for fiscal year 1999) to be issued by March 31, 2000. In each

report, a department or agency is to compare its performance against its

goals, summarize the findings of program evaluations completed during

the year, and describe the actions needed to address any unmet goals.

RPA requires the Forest Service to, among other things, prepare a long-term

strategic plan every 5 years that recommends a level of future outputs and

associated costs. This plan is to be transmitted to the Congress along with

a presidential statement of policy, which indicates the President’s

intention to implement the plan through the annual budgeting process. The

Congress may accept or revise the statement of policy. Once approved, the

statement of policy and the RPA strategic plan serve as a guide to the

Forest Service’s future planning and as a basis for future budget proposals.

Finally, the agency prepares an annual report assessing its

accomplishments and progress in implementing the plan.

Status of the Results Act’s

Implementation

The department-wide strategic overview—included in Agriculture’s draft

strategic plan submitted to the Congress in May 1997—contains its overall

mission and goals. The overview refers the reader to the 30 component

mission area, subagency, and staff office plans for information on the six

critical components.

The Forest Service had pilot-tested the Results Act’s performance planning

and reporting requirements during fiscal years 1994 through 1996. The

agency has, over the past several weeks, briefed cognizant congressional

committees and subcommittees on the plan. The Forest Service’s plan will

be included in Agriculture’s final plan to be submitted to OMB and the

Congress by September 30, 1997.

The strategic goals in the Forest Service’s May 1997 plan are based on the

strategic goals in a draft RPA strategic plan, that the Forest Service issued

for public review and comment in October 1995.4

 In May 1997, the Chief of

the Forest Service announced that the plan would be delayed for

approximately 10 more months to ensure that it fully reflects the most

4

The Forest Service Program for Forest and Rangeland Resources: A Long-Term Strategic Plan, Draft

1995 RPA Program, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Washington Office (Oct. 16, 1995).

Page 4 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
appropriate paths and priorities to care for the land and provide benefits

for the American people. He continued that during this period, the Forest

Service will conduct additional analysis related to a number of important

issues. As a result, the Congress has not had an opportunity to accept or

revise the statement of policy, as required by RPA.

The draft RPA plan included four long-term strategic goals: (1) protecting

ecosystems by ensuring their health and diversity while meeting people’s

needs; (2) restoring deteriorated ecosystems to improve the likelihood that

biological diversity, long-term sustainability, and future options are

maintained; (3) providing multiple benefits to meet people’s needs for

uses, values, products, and services within the capabilities of ecosystems;

and (4) ensuring organizational effectiveness by creating and maintaining

a multidisciplinary and multicultural workforce, respecting expertise and

professionalism, and empowering people to carry out the agency’s mission

while holding them accountable for achieving negotiated objectives. The

May 1997 plan combines the first two strategic goals in the draft RPA plan

into a single goal of restoring and protecting ecosystems, and it retains the

other two draft RPA goals (providing multiple benefits for people within the

capabilities of ecosystems and ensuring organizational effectiveness).

Each of the three long-term strategic goals in the May 1997 plan is

subdivided into objectives that the Forest Service believes are quantifiable

and can be linked to the current budget structure. For example, the

strategic goal of restoring and protecting ecosystems has been subdivided

into objectives for aquatic, forestland, and rangeland ecosystems; for

National Forest System lands and waters; and for threatened, endangered,

and sensitive species. Similarly, the strategic goal of providing multiple

benefits for people within the capabilities of ecosystems has been

subdivided into objectives for specific multiple uses, such as outdoor

recreation, wilderness, forage, timber, and mineral resources.

The Forest Service

Has Not Given

Adequate Attention to

Improving Its

Performance

Madam Chairman, let me briefly discuss why it is important to hold the

Forest Service accountable for its performance.

Our report on the Forest Service’s decision-making identifies an

organizational culture of indifference toward accountability. The agency’s

decentralized management and recently increased flexibility in shifting

funds within a simplified budget structure have not been accompanied by

sufficient accountability for expenditures and performance. The result is

inefficiency and waste.

Page 5 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
For example, according to a November 1995 internal Forest Service

report, inefficiencies within the agency’s decision-making process cost up

to $100 million a year at the individual project level alone. These costs are

not borne by the Forest Service, but by the American taxpayer, since the

agency accomplishes fewer objectives with its yearly appropriations.

Moreover, as we pointed out in our report and in our April 29, 1997,

testimony on the Forest Service’s process for revising the Tongass

National Forest plan,5

 the increased costs of inefficiency at every

decision-making level within the Forest Service should be measured not

only in dollars but also in lost ecological and economic opportunities. A

deteriorated aquatic or riparian ecosystem cannot be restored and the

critical habitat of an endangered species cannot be protected until a

decision is made. Similarly, a livestock grazing permit cannot be renewed

and a timber sale cannot be offered until the agency reaches a decision.

However, the most likely outcomes of the Forest Service’s current

decision-making process are indecision and delay.

Delays in finalizing forest plans, coupled with delays in finalizing

agencywide regulations and reaching individual project decisions, can

total a decade or longer. For example, the agency spent almost 10 years

revising the Tongass forest plan, and preparing a timber sale usually takes

another 3 to 8 years. As a result, those who are economically dependent on

the national forests are precluded from forming reasonable expectations

about the future availability of the forests’ uses. In addition, the forests’

health and productivity over time—whether measured by the diversity of

species, the availability of commodities, or any other indicators of

performance—are affected by the missed opportunities for improvement.

Past efforts by the Forest Service to improve its performance have been

stymied by the organization’s highly decentralized management. At every

level, managers have considerable autonomy and discretion for

interpreting and applying the agency’s policies and directions. For

example, in response to congressional concerns about the Forest Service’s

inability to deliver what is expected or promised, the Chief, in the fall of

1991, formed an agencywide task force to review the issue of

accountability. The task force’s 1994 report set forth a process and

recommended changes to strengthen accountability. However, the task

force’s recommendations have never been implemented throughout the

agency.

5

Tongass National Forest: Lack of Accountability for Time and Costs Has Delayed Forest Plan Revision

(GAO/T-RCED-97-153).

Page 6 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
Agreement Has Not

Been Reached on the

Forest Service’s

Strategic Goals

The Results Act, if implemented successfully, should help break the

existing cycle of inefficiency within the Forest Service, strengthen the

agency’s accountability for performance and results, and improve the

efficiency and effectiveness of its decision-making. The strategic goals in

the Forest Service’s plan form the starting point and foundation for

holding the agency accountable for its performance. Hence, these goals

are critical to successfully implementing the act within the agency.

However, agreement has not been reached on the strategic goals in the

Forest Service’s plan, and the agency cannot begin to derive the benefits

anticipated from implementing the act.

The lack of agreement on the Forest Service’s strategic goals reflects the

controversy, both inside and outside the agency, over (1) which uses the

agency is to emphasize and (2) which management approach can best

ensure the long-term sustainability of legislatively mandated uses on the

national forests. The strategic goals in the Forest Service’s plan reflect

(1) an ongoing shift in emphasis under the agency’s broad multiple-use and

sustained-yield mandate from consumption (primarily producing timber)

to conservation (primarily sustaining wildlife and fish) and (2) a

significant change in the way the Forest Service considers and manages

natural resources (from managing primarily along administrative

boundaries to analyzing environmental issues and concerns along the

boundaries of natural systems, such as aquatic, forestland, and rangeland

ecosystems and the habitats of threatened, endangered, and sensitive

species). The increasing emphasis on conservation and ecosystem

management conflicts with the agency’s older emphasis on producing

timber and other commodities and will likely constrain future uses of the

national forests, such as recreation.

The Forest Service has been aware for some time of the controversy

surrounding its increasing emphasis on conservation and ecosystem

management and the likely effects of these changes in its management on

the types, levels, and mixes of legislatively mandated uses on the national

forests. These issues surfaced immediately after the Forest Service

conducted a briefing in January 1996 on its October 1995 draft RPA plan

(which includes the same strategic goals as the agency’s May 1997 plan).

The day after the briefing, the Chairman of the Subcommittee on National

Parks, Forests and Lands, House Committee on Resources, and the

Chairman of the Subcommittee on Forests and Public Land Management,

Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, wrote to the

Secretary of Agriculture stating, among other things, that (1) the

justification for the plan was “woefully inadequate,” (2) the plan

Page 7 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
represented an abandonment of the agency’s multiple use and sustained

yield principles, (3) the Chairmen would not endorse the goals contained

in the draft plan, and (4) the final plan would require substantial changes

to address their concerns.

The Forest Service’s

Plan Does Not

Adequately Address

Many Critical

Components

We recognize that Agriculture’s final plan—which will include the Forest

Service’s plan—is not due to the Congress and OMB until September 30,

1997, and that the Results Act anticipates that the final plan will be

continually refined as future planning cycles occur. We also recognize that

a strategic plan is dynamic and that Forest Service, Agriculture, OMB, and

congressional staff are continuing to revise the draft. However, given both

the importance of strategic goals to the successful implementation of the

act and the disagreement over the goals in the Forest Service’s plan, we

believe that the agency should have taken the opportunity presented by

the act to consult with the Congress to better articulate its positions on

controversial issues. Specifically, the Forest Service should have set forth

(1) its rationale for emphasizing some legislatively mandated uses on the

national forests more than other uses, (2) the logic underlying its reliance

on ecosystem management, and (3) the likely effects of its policy choices

on the types, levels, and mixes of multiple uses on its lands.

The Forest Service seems to recognize the importance of reaching

agreement on its strategic goals to the successful implementation of the

act. For example, as the agency was drafting its plan, the Chief

commented on a draft of our decision-making report, stating that

(1) clarifying the agency’s mission was one of the Forest Service’s “highest

priorities,” (2) the agency was taking actions to clarify its long-term

strategic goals, and (3) the Forest Service intends to use the Results Act to

articulate these “mission principles.” However, the May 1997 plan does

less than the draft RPA plan to articulate the rationale for the agency’s

strategic goals and management approach. Furthermore, the May 1997

plan is silent on the likely effects of the goals and management approach

on the legislatively mandated multiple uses on the national forests.

In addition, we believe that the Forest Service’s May 1997 plan falls short

of adequately addressing critical components required by the Results Act,

especially in identifying key external factors that could affect achievement

of the plan’s strategic goals and objectives.

Page 8 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
A Comprehensive Agency

Mission Statement and

Agencywide Long-Term

Strategic Goals

The May 1997 plan captures the Forest Service’s broad multiple-use and

sustained-yield mandate, stating that the agency’s mission is to “achieve

quality land management under sustainable multiple use management

concepts to meet the diverse needs of the land and people.” This mission

allows the agency to be all things to all people. However, the Forest

Service is increasingly unable to avoid, resolve, or mitigate conflicts

among competing uses on national forests by separating them among

areas and over time. As a result, the agency must make hard policy choices

concerning which of the competing multiple uses to emphasize and how to

resolve conflicts or make choices among these uses on its lands.

The multiple-use laws which guide the management of the nation’s forests

provide little guidance for the Forest Service in resolving conflicts among

competing uses. Often, the emphasis that the agency gives to particular

uses responds to factors supplementing these acts, such as requirements

in planning and environmental laws and their judicial interpretations. For

example, section 7 of the Endangered Species Act represents a

congressional design to give greater priority to the protection of

endangered and threatened species than to the current primary missions

of the Forest Service and other federal agencies. When proposing a

project, the Forest Service bears the burden of demonstrating that its

actions will not likely jeopardize listed species.

The strategic goals included in the plan reflect hard policy choices that the

Forest Service has made among competing uses. For example, in his

April 21, 1997, written comments on a draft of our decision-making report,

the Chief of the Forest Service stated that: “Simply stated, the Forest

Service believes that without first securing the health, diversity, and

productivity of the land, we [the agency] simply cannot meet the needs of

people.” Hence, the goals are controversial. Had the Forest Service not

only made the hard choices but also articulated its rationale for making

them, it would have better equipped the Congress to understand its

decisions.

An Identification of Key

External Factors

The May 1997 plan does not discuss key external factors that could affect

the achievement of the plan’s strategic goals and objectives.

OMB Circular A-11 instructs that a department’s or agency’s strategic plan

briefly describe each key external factor that could affect the achievement

of the plan’s strategic goals and objectives, indicate the factor’s link with a

particular goal or goals, and describe how the achievement of a goal could

Page 9 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
be affected by the factor. Early in our review of the Forest Service’s

decision-making, agency officials voiced concern about the many external

factors that affect the outcomes of the agency’s decisions and can prevent

the Forest Service from achieving its objectives.6

 These factors include

changes in natural conditions and in funding, as well as new information

and events, such as the listing of a species as endangered or threatened.

Because these factors can have such an important effect on its

accomplishments and are largely beyond its ability to control, the Forest

Service has proposed removing from its forest plans measurable

objectives for goods and services, such as quantities of wood for lumber

and forage for livestock and numbers of opportunities for recreation.

However, the Forest Service discussed none of these external factors in its

draft plan.

Forest Service officials identified differences in the requirements of

numerous planning and environmental laws, enacted primarily during the

1960s and 1970s, and differing judicial interpretations of the same

statutory requirements that make it difficult for the agency to predict

when any given decision can be considered final and can be implemented.

This uncertainty reduces the agency’s ability to achieve its objectives. In

addition, as we emphasized in our April 29, 1997, testimony on revising the

Tongass forest plan, disagreements with federal regulatory agencies over

the best approaches to achieving environmental objectives and

implementing laws and regulations have also delayed forests plans and

projects. However, the Forest Service’s plan does not discuss these

external factors, even though the agency suggested options for changing

the current statutory framework in 1995.

A Description of the

Relationship Between the

Long-Term Strategic Goals

and Annual Performance

Goals

The May 1997 plan does not indicate how the Forest Service intends to

measure progress toward achieving its strategic goals. For example, it

does not specify how the agency proposes to measure (1) the impact of

ecosystem management on the health of forests and degraded rangelands

and (2) the effects of its policy choices on the types, levels, and mixes of

uses on its lands. Instead of discussing the relationship between strategic

and performance goals in the plan, as instructed by OMB Circular A-11, the

Forest Service has deferred this discussion for Agriculture’s fiscal year

1999 annual performance plan that the Department is to submit to the

Congress in February 1998.

6

Forest Service: Issues Relating to Its Decisionmaking Process (GAO/T-RCED-96-66, Jan. 25, 1996) and

Forest Service: Issues Related to Managing National Forests for Multiple Uses (GAO/T-RCED-96-111,

Mar. 26, 1996).

Page 10 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
According to the Chief of the Forest Service, the agency’s performance

measures will result in “tangible social and ecological benefits.” However,

the Forest Service has had difficulty establishing performance measures

and annual target levels to assess its progress. In its June 1990 Critique of

Land Management Planning,

7

 the Forest Service states that “meaningful

production goals for recreation, water, wildlife, and fisheries have yet to

be established, even in theory, and reported accomplishments would be

nearly impossible to evaluate objectively or even verify independently.” An

April 22, 1997, draft of the Forest Service’s plan stated that indicators of

performance would have to be used to measure progress toward achieving

some objectives until outcome measures can be fully developed.

A Description of How

Program Evaluations Will

Be Used

Our report on the Forest Service’s decision-making identifies problems in

the agency’s data and information systems dating back 17 years. These

problems include (1) not adequately monitoring the effects of past

management decisions to more accurately estimate the effects of similar

future decisions and to modify decisions when new information is

uncovered or when preexisting monitoring thresholds are crossed and

(2) not maintaining comparable environmental and socioeconomic data

that are useful and easily accessible. We and others have recommended

steps that the Forest Service could take to improve its data and systems,

but it has deferred action on these recommendations.

OMB Circular A-11 instructs that a department’s or agency’s strategic plan

include a schedule for future program evaluations. However, the Forest

Service’s draft plan defers action, proposing to take approximately 2 years

to develop “a clear and shared understanding of how to assess results at

the corporate level and select the best methodology.” This is consistent

with the agency’s tendency to study and restudy issues without reaching

closure. Without these evaluations, the agency will not be able to produce

the reliable performance and cost data needed to set goals, evaluate

results, and improve performance, and the Congress will lack a potentially

critical source of information to ensure the validity and reasonableness of

the agency’s goals and strategies, as well as to identify factors affecting

performance.

In conclusion, Madam Chairman, the inefficiencies and ineffectiveness of

the Forest Service’s decision-making, combined with the agency’s

7

Critique of Land Management Planning, Vol.2, National Forest Planning: Searching for a Common

Vision, Forest Service (FS-453, June 1990).

Page 11 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
reluctance to change, give urgency to implementing the Results Act. The

agency’s plan should provide the starting point for establishing the

measures and annual target levels to be used in assessing the Forest

Service’s progress toward achieving strategic goals. However, the draft

plan’s silence on the Forest Service’s rationale for its strategic goals, its

management approach, and the likely effects of its policy choices on

multiple uses on the national forests has contributed to a stalemate on the

agency’s strategic goals which threatens successful implementation of this

landmark legislation.

Madam Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. We will be

pleased to respond to any questions that you or Members of the

Subcommittee may have.

(141084) Page 12 GAO/T-RCED-97-223
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