United States Government Accountability Office

GAO Testimony before the Subcommittee on Government 

Management, Organization, and Procurement, 

Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, 

House of Representatives

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF 

AGRICULTURE 

Management of Civil Rights 

Efforts Continues to Be 

Deficient Despite Years of 

Attention

Statement of Lisa Shames, Director 

Natural Resources and Environment 

For Release on Delivery

Expected at 2:00 p.m. EDT

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

 

GAO-08-755T 
What GAO Found

United States Government Accountability Office

Why GAO Did This Study

Highlights

Accountability Integrity Reliability

May 14, 2008

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

Management of Civil Rights Efforts Continues to Be 

Deficient Despite Years of Attention 

Highlights of GAO-08-755T, a testimony 

before the Subcommittee on Government 

Management, Organization, and 

Procurement, Committee on Oversight 

and Government Reform, House of 

Representatives 

For decades, there have been 

allegations of discrimination in the 

U.S. Department of Agriculture 

(USDA) programs and workforce. 

Reports and congressional 

testimony by the U.S. Commission 

on Civil Rights, the U.S. Equal 

Employment Opportunity 

Commission, a former Secretary of

Agriculture, USDA’s Office of

Inspector General, GAO, and others 

have described weaknesses in 

USDA’s programs—in particular, in

resolving complaints of 

discrimination and in providing 

minorities access to programs. The 

Farm Security and Rural 

Investment Act of 2002 authorized 

the creation of the position of 

Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights 

(ASCR), giving USDA an executive

that could provide leadership for 

resolving these long-standing

problems. 

This testimony focuses on USDA’s 

efforts to (1) resolve discrimination

complaints, (2) report on minority

participation in USDA programs, 

and (3) strategically plan its efforts. 

This testimony is based on new and 

prior work, including analysis of 

ASCR’s strategic plan; 

discrimination complaint 

management; and about 120

interviews with officials of USDA 

and other federal agencies, as well 

as 20 USDA stakeholder groups. 

USDA officials reviewed the facts

upon which this statement is based,

and we incorporated their 

additions and clarifications as 

appropriate. GAO plans a future

report with recommendations. 

ASCR’s difficulties in resolving discrimination complaints persist—ASCR has

not achieved its goal of preventing future backlogs of complaints. At a basic 

level, the credibility of USDA’s efforts has been and continues to be 

undermined by ASCR’s faulty reporting of data on discrimination complaints 

and disparities in ASCR’s data. Even such basic information as the number of 

complaints is subject to wide variation in ASCR’s reports to the public and the 

Congress. Moreover, ASCR’s public claim in July 2007 that it had successfully 

reduced a backlog of about 690 discrimination complaints in fiscal year 2004

and held its caseload to manageable levels, drew a questionable portrait of 

progress. By July 2007, ASCR officials were well aware they had not 

succeeded in preventing future backlogs—they had another backlog on hand, 

and this time the backlog had surged to an even higher level of 885 

complaints. In fact, ASCR officials were in the midst of planning to hire 

additional attorneys to address that backlog of complaints including some 

ASCR was holding dating from the early 2000s that it had not resolved. In 

addition, some steps ASCR had taken may have actually been counterproductive and affected the quality of its work. For example, an ASCR official 

stated that some employees’ complaints had been addressed without resolving 

basic questions of fact, raising concerns about the integrity of the practice. 

Importantly, ASCR does not have a plan to correct these many problems. 

USDA has published three annual reports—for fiscal years 2003, 2004, and 

2005—on the participation of minority farmers and ranchers in USDA 

programs, as required by law. USDA’s reports are intended to reveal the gains 

or losses that these farmers have experienced in their participation in USDA 

programs. However, USDA considers the data it has reported to be unreliable

because they are based on USDA employees’ visual observations about 

participant’s race and ethnicity, which may or may not be correct, especially

for ethnicity. USDA needs the approval of the Office of Management and 

Budget (OMB) to collect more reliable data. ASCR started to seek OMB’s 

approval in 2004, but as of May 2008 had not followed through to obtain 

approval. ASCR staff will meet again on this matter in May 2008.

GAO found that ASCR’s strategic planning is limited and does not address key 

steps needed to achieve the Office’s mission of ensuring USDA provides fair 

and equitable services to all customers and upholds the civil rights of its 

employees. For example, a key step in strategic planning is to discuss the 

perspectives of stakeholders. ASCR’s strategic planning does not address the 

diversity of USDA’s field staff even though ASCR’s stakeholders told GAO that 

such diversity would facilitate interaction with minority and underserved 

farmers. Also, ASCR could better measure performance to gauge its progress 

in achieving its mission. For example, it counts the number of participants in 

training workshops as part of its outreach efforts rather than access to farm 

program benefits and services. Finally, ASCR’s strategic planning does not 

link levels of funding with anticipated results or discuss the potential for using 

performance information for identifying USDA’s performance gaps. 

To view the full product, including the scope 

and methodology, click on GAO-08-755T. 

For more information, contact Lisa Shames 

at (202) 512-2649 or shamesl@gao.gov. 
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee: 

I am pleased to be here today to discuss the U.S. Department of 

Agriculture’s (USDA) progress in addressing long-standing civil rights 

issues. My comments today are based on prior work as well as new work 

nearing completion resulting from a request from Senator Harkin, 

Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and 

Forestry; Senators Grassley and Lugar; and Chairman Baca of the 

Subcommittee on Department Operations, Oversight, Nutrition, and 

Forestry, House Committee on Agriculture; as well as you, Chairman 

Towns. 

USDA is responsible for enforcing statutes, regulations, and policies that

prohibit discrimination in its programs and workplace. USDA’s 

responsibilities extend to the programs that it delivers directly to 

customers through local offices throughout the country, such as the farm 

loan programs, as well as to programs that USDA and the states administer 

jointly, such as the Food Stamp Program. USDA’s workplace civil rights 

responsibilities cover about 100,000 employees at headquarters and at 

USDA offices around the country. 

For decades, USDA has been the focus of federal inquiries into allegations 

of discrimination against minorities and women both in the programs it 

administers and in its workforce. Numerous reports and congressional 

testimony by officials of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, the U.S. 

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, USDA, GAO, and others 

have described extensive concerns about discriminatory behavior in 

USDA’s delivery of services to program customers—in particular, minority 

farmers—and its treatment of minority employees. Many of these reports 

and testimonies described serious weaknesses in USDA’s management of

its civil rights programs—in particular, weaknesses in providing minorities 

access to USDA programs and in resolving discrimination complaints. 

Notable among these many reports was the 1997 report of the Secretary of 

Agriculture’s Civil Rights Action Team.1

 The Secretary’s team—composed 

of senior USDA officials—held a dozen “listening sessions” with USDA 

customers and employees throughout the country before issuing a report. 

The team’s report discussed USDA’s customers’ and employees’ concerns 

 1

Civil Rights at the United States Department of Agriculture: A Report by the Civil Rights 

Action Team, U.S. Department of Agriculture (Washington, D.C.: February 1997). 

Page 1 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
about patterns of discrimination in USDA programs and operations, and 

minority farmers’ concerns that USDA had played a part in the severe 

decline in minority farm ownership since the mid-1900s. Among other 

things, the report noted that USDA’s civil rights program had been in a 

“persistent state of chaos” because of numerous changes since the 1980s 

and declared that USDA’s process for resolving complaints about the 

delivery of program benefits and services was a “failure.” The report made 

many recommendations in four major areas—organizational structure, 

management commitment, program delivery and outreach, and workforce 

diversity and employment practices.

In addition to reports about USDA’s civil rights shortcomings, individuals 

and groups claiming discriminatory behavior on the part of USDA have 

sought redress through the courts—USDA has been and continues to be 

involved in large class action civil rights lawsuits.2

 In 1997, three AfricanAmerican farmers, on behalf of themselves and others similarly situated, 

filed a lawsuit—Pigford v. Glickman—that charged USDA with 

discrimination in the department’s lending and other farm programs 

between 1983 and 1997, as well as with failure to properly investigate 

discrimination complaints.3

 The case went forward as a class action, and in

January 1999 a settlement agreement was announced. In approving the 

consent decree settling the case, the court stated that for decades USDA 

had discriminated against African-American farmers by denying or 

delaying their applications for farm loan and other credit and benefit 

programs. The court also noted that USDA had disbanded its Office of 

Civil Rights in 1983 and stopped responding to claims of discrimination. 

The consent decree established a mechanism for members of the class to 

file claims to obtain relief. Over 97,000 people have filed claims—more 

than five times the number of claims anticipated. However, only about 

23,000 people met the filing deadline of October 12, 1999, and about 74,000 

people requested permission from the court to file a claim after the 

deadline. Except for a relatively few extraordinary cases, the court denied

the claims received after the filing deadline as not timely. Overall, as of 

April 7, 2008, more than 15,400 claims had been approved for payments 

and benefits totaling about $972 million, and almost 7,000 claims had been 

 2

A class action lawsuit is one in which a party sues on behalf of him or herself and a larger 

group similarly situated. 

3

Pigford v. Schafer, Civil Action No. 97-1978 (D.D.C. filed Oct. 23, 1997) (formerly Pigford 

v. Glickman). 

Page 2 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
denied.4

 In addition, USDA is currently defending itself against similar 

lawsuits brought by other customers—Native American, Hispanic, and 

women farmers—alleging discrimination in the delivery of farm programs 

and lending.

5

A congressional hearing during 2002 focused on the need for USDA to 

ensure that, among other things, farm programs are accessible to minority 

and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers, complaints of 

discrimination against USDA by customers and employees are resolved 

fairly and timely, and civil rights activities are conducted transparently so 

that public scrutiny is possible. That year, as you know, the Farm Security 

and Rural Investment Act of 2002 (2002 Farm Bill) authorized the 

Secretary of Agriculture to create the new position of Assistant Secretary 

for Civil Rights, elevating responsibility within USDA for carrying out 

USDA’s civil rights efforts. Under the 2002 Farm Bill, the Secretary could 

delegate responsibility for ensuring that USDA complies with all civil 

rights-related laws and considers civil rights matters in all USDA strategic 

planning initiatives to the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights. In 2003, the 

Assistant Secretary position was created with these and other delegated 

responsibilities, and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights 

(ASCR) was established. In addition, the 2002 Farm Bill requires USDA to 

report annually on minority participation in USDA programs.6

In 2002, we reported that USDA’s Office of Civil Rights continued to face 

significant problems in processing discrimination complaints in a timely 

manner.7

 We reported that the office had made only modest progress in 

processing complaints from customers and employees because (1) it had 

not established time frames for resolving complaints and (2) it had not 

addressed its severe human capital problems. For example, the office had 

long-standing problems in hiring and retaining staff with the right mix of 

skills, and severe morale problems were exacerbating problems with staff 

 4

Legislation has been introduced in the Congress to allow further consideration of claims

that were not filed timely. 

5

These cases include Keepseagle v. Schafer, Civil Action No. 99-03119 (D.D.C.); Garcia v. 

Schafer, Civil Action No. 00-02445 (D.D.C.); and Love v. Schafer, Civil Action No. 00-02502

(D.D.C.). 

6

Pub. L. No. 107-171, 116 Stat. 134 §10708, 522 (2002). 

7

GAO, Department of Agriculture: Improvements in the Operations of the Civil Rights 

Program Would Benefit Hispanic and Other Minority Farmers, GAO-02-942 (Washington, 

D.C.: Sept. 20, 2002). 

Page 3 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
productivity and retention. At that time, we recommended that USDA 

establish time frames for all stages of the complaint process and develop 

an action plan to address its staff turnover and morale problems. In 

commenting on the report, USDA stated that it had a long-term 

improvement plan that would address the human capital problems and 

agreed to formalize time frames for all phases of the process. 

My testimony today focuses on (1) ASCR’s continuing problems in 

resolving discrimination complaints, (2) USDA’s reporting on minority 

participation in USDA programs, and (3) ASCR’s strategic planning for 

ensuring USDA’s services and benefits are provided fairly and equitably. 

In summary, I would like to make three observations. First, ASCR’s 

difficulties in resolving discrimination complaints persist—ASCR has not 

achieved its goal of preventing future backlogs of discrimination complaints. 

At a basic level, the credibility of USDA’s efforts to correct long-standing 

problems in resolving discrimination complaints has been and continues to be

undermined by faulty reporting of data on discrimination complaints and 

disparities we found when comparing various ASCR sources of data. Even 

such basic information as the number of discrimination complaints is subject

to wide variation in ASCR’s reports to the public and the Congress. For

example, fiscal year 2005 data that ASCR reported to the public and to this

congressional subcommittee varied by hundreds of complaint cases, and data

reported to GAO on its complaint cases varied from one report to another.

Moreover, ASCR’s public claim in July 2007 that it had successfully reduced a

backlog of about 690 discrimination complaints in fiscal year 2004 and held its 

caseload to manageable levels drew a questionable portrait of progress. By

July 2007, ASCR officials were well aware the plan to prevent future backlogs

had not succeeded. ASCR had another backlog on hand, and this time the 

backlog had surged to an even higher level of 885 complaints. In fact, before

ASCR made its report to the public in 2007, ASCR officials were in the midst 

of planning to hire additional attorneys to address the backlog of complaints, 

including some complaints that ASCR was holding dating from the early 2000s 

that it had not resolved. In addition, steps that ASCR had taken to speed up its 

investigations and decisions on complaints may actually have been counterproductive and affected the quality of its work. For example, an ASCR official

stated that some employees’ complaints had been addressed without 

resolving basic questions of fact, raising concerns about the integrity of the 

practice. Importantly, ASCR does not have a plan to correct these many

problems. 

Second, the data that USDA reported to the Congress and the public on 

the participation of minority farmers in USDA programs are unreliable, 

Page 4 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
according to USDA. USDA has published three annual reports on the 

participation of socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers in USDA 

programs for fiscal years 2003, 2004, and 2005. However, much of the data

that USDA reports are unreliable, according to the statements in USDA’s 

reports, because USDA’s data on racial identity and gender are, for the 

most part, based on visual observation of program applicants. Data 

gathered in this manner are considered unreliable because individual traits 

such as race and ethnicity may not be readily apparent to an observer, 

especially ethnicity. To address this inherent shortcoming, according to 

USDA’s report, the agency needs standardized data collection directly 

from program participants, which requires the approval of the Office of 

Management and Budget (OMB). ASCR began the process of seeking 

OMB’s approval to collect these data in 2004, but did not follow through 

and has not obtained final approval. ASCR staff will meet again on this 

matter in May 2008. In addition, we found the data in ASCR’s reports to be 

of limited usefulness because, for example, ASCR did not include basic 

reference data such as the numbers of farmers in each county. Moreover, 

the data do not facilitate analysis because they are published in about 

1,370 separate tables and 146 maps that are not searchable files. If the data

were searchable, it could be possible to more easily compare minority 

participation by program, location, and year. 

Finally, ASCR’s strategic planning is limited and does not address key 

steps needed to achieve its mission. While ASCR has articulated a 

compelling strategic goal—to ensure USDA provides fair and equitable

services to all customers and upholds the civil rights of its employees—its 

implementation will require further development. For example, a key step

in strategic planning is to discuss the perspectives of stakeholders. Yet, 

ASCR’s plans vary from ASCR’s stakeholders’ interests which include such 

things as improving USDA’s methods of delivering farm programs to 

facilitate access by under-served producers. Also, while ASCR’s 

stakeholders are interested in assuring the diversity of USDA field office

staff to facilitate their interaction with minority and underserved farmers, 

ASCR’s strategic planning does not address the diversity of USDA’s field 

staff. In addition, ASCR could better measure performance to gauge its 

progress, and ASCR has not started to use performance information for 

identifying USDA performance gaps.

We provided USDA officials with an opportunity to comment on a 

statement of facts which was the basis for my statement today. We 

incorporated their additions and clarifications as appropriate. We plan to

issue a final report later in 2008 that will include recommendations to 

address the matters that I discuss in my testimony today. 

Page 5 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
This testimony is based on new and previously issued work. To assess ASCR’s 

efforts to resolve USDA’s persistent problems in handling discrimination

complaints, we conducted interviews with officials of ASCR, USDA’s Office of 

Inspector General (OIG), USDA’s agency-level civil rights offices, and the

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission; examined USDA documents

about efforts to resolve discrimination complaints, and analyzed data

provided by ASCR. To evaluate USDA’s reporting on minority participation in

USDA’s programs, we reviewed USDA reports and interviewed officials of

USDA, community-based organizations, and minority groups. To analyze 

ASCR’s strategic planning, we examined ASCR’s strategic plan and other 

relevant planning documents, and interviewed USDA officials and 

representatives of community-based organizations and minority groups,

among others. In addition, we considered GAO’s guidance for results-oriented

management. We conducted our work from December 2006 through May

2008, in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.

These standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings 

and conclusions based on our audit objectives. While our efforts were 

impeded by delays in gaining access to documents, we believe the evidence 

obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based 

on our audit objectives. Additional details on our scope, methodology, and 

access to USDA records is included in appendix I. 

The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights (ASCR) was created 

in 2003. For fiscal year 2007, ASCR had 129 staff and an annual budget of 

about $24 million. ASCR is composed of multiple offices, some of which 

were in existence within USDA prior to the creation of ASCR. 

Background 

Page 6 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Figure 1: Organization of USDA’s Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights 

Office of Adjudication

and Compliance

Conflict Prevention

and Resolution Center

Assistant Secretary for 

Civil Rights

Associate Assistant 

Secretary

Budget and Finance

Coordination and Analysis

Planning and Performance

Deputy Assistant Secretary

Office of Outreach

and Diversity

Source: USDA.

ASCR’s Office of Adjudication and Compliance (formerly the Office of 

Civil Rights) is to resolve customers’ and employees’ complaints of 

discrimination and to conduct civil rights compliance reviews of USDA’s 

agencies. The Conflict Prevention and Resolution Center is to provide 

guidance to USDA agencies on using Alternative Dispute Resolution 

methods to resolve conflicts. The Office of Outreach and Diversity is to 

develop ASCR’s diversity initiatives, and oversee the 1890 and 1994 

Programs. The 1890 Program offers educational scholarships to people 

seeking degrees at one of the 18 historically black land-grant institutions 

and requires one year of USDA service for each year of financial support. 

Similarly, through the 1994 Program, there is a comparable program 

operated with the 33 tribal colleges and universities designated as 1994 

land-grant institutions. Within the Office of Outreach and Diversity, the 

Office of Outreach is to provide coordination for USDA agencies on 

outreach efforts and produce a required annual report on the rates at 

which minorities participate in USDA programs. 

The first USDA Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights—Mr. Vernon Parker—

was sworn in on April 1, 2003, and served about 3 years until resigning in 

January 2006. At the outset of Mr. Parker’s tenure, over a 4 month period, a 

Page 7 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
few ASCR staff developed 13 initiatives to guide ASCR’s actions through 

fiscal year 2004 and beyond. These initiatives were intended to address the 

most immediate problems occurring at the time and concentrated on 

eliminating backlogs of unresolved discrimination complaints and taking

certain steps to reduce complaints in the future. Most notably, ASCR 

established annual “Partners Meetings” to create, for the first time, a 

substantive and ongoing dialogue between USDA and representatives of 

community-based organizations as a basis for improving the delivery of

USDA benefits and services. A list of ASCR’s initiatives for fiscal year 2004

is included in appendix II. The second and current Assistant Secretary for 

Civil Rights—Ms. Margo McKay—was sworn in on August 21, 2006. A list 

of Assistant Secretary McKay’s priorities and initiatives are also included 

in appendix II. 

The credibility of USDA’s efforts to correct long-standing problems in 

resolving discrimination complaints has been and continues to be

undermined by faulty reporting of data on discrimination complaints and

disparities we found when comparing various ASCR sources of data.

8

 For

example, fiscal year 2005 data that ASCR reported to the public and to this

congressional subcommittee varied by hundreds of complaint cases, and data

reported to GAO on its complaint cases varied from one report to another.

Moreover, ASCR’s public claim in July 2007 that it successfully reduced a

backlog of about 690 discrimination complaints in fiscal year 2004 and held its 

caseload to manageable levels through fiscal year 2005 drew a questionable

portrait of progress. By July 2007, ASCR officials were well aware that the 

plan to prevent future backlogs had not succeeded. ASCR had another

backlog on hand, and this time the backlog had surged to an even higher level 

of 885 complaints. In fact, before ASCR made its report to the public in 2007, 

ASCR officials were in the midst of planning to hire attorneys to address the 

backlog of complaints, including some complaints that ASCR was holding 

dating from the early 2000s that it had not resolved. In addition, some steps

that ASCR had taken to speed up its investigations and decisions on

complaints appear to have affected the quality of its work. These on-going

problems are a continuation of the inadequate conditions that we and 

USDA’s OIG have reported for over a decade. 

Problems Resolving 

Discrimination 

Complaints Persist 

 8

ASCR’s backlogs of discrimination complaints generally consist of numbers of complaints

for which ASCR has insufficient capacity to adjudicate promptly. 

Page 8 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
ASCR reporting on backlogs of discrimination complaints has been 

faulty and contains disparities. When ASCR was created, there was an 

existing backlog of complaints. In recognition of this problem, USDA’s 

Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights made discrimination complaint 

inventory reduction ASCR’s highest priority initiative. This initiative called 

for ASCR’s senior managers and employees to make a concerted 12-

month, $1.5 million effort to reduce the backlog of complaints that they 

had inherited. Moreover, according to a briefing book ASCR prepared for 

the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, this 

complaint inventory reduction initiative was to put lasting improvements 

in place to prevent future complaint backlogs. It also stated that USDA’s 

Office of Civil Rights would focus substantial resources on fair, equitable,

and legally supportable resolution of cases. 

About 4 years later, in July 2007, ASCR released a report to the public 

stating that its fiscal year 2004 backlog reduction initiative was a success.9

The report stated that the backlog of 573 complaints from employees and

120 complaints from customers had been resolved, and that ASCR had 

held the complaint inventory to manageable levels through fiscal year 

2005. However, the data ASCR reported lack credibility because a month 

earlier the Office had reported different data to this congressional 

subcommittee (see Table 1). Specifically, according to the June report, the 

numbers of complaints at the beginning of fiscal year 2005 was 552; 

according to the July report, the number was 363. Moreover, the June 

report cited the number of complaints at the end of fiscal year 2005 as 

1,275, and the July report said it was 404. The lower numbers reported to 

the public were not qualified and provided a more favorable impression 

than the data reported to this subcommittee. However, the Assistant 

Secretary’s letter transmitting data to the subcommittee contained a 

footnote qualification stating that USDA’s statistics on customers’ 

complaints were the best available, although they were incomplete and

unreliable. Before that letter was sent, ASCR’s former Director, Office of 

Adjudication and Compliance10 (former Office of Civil Rights), who had 

responsibility for the data, cautioned the Assistant Secretary about the 

poor data quality and stated that, if questioned, USDA would not be able to

explain its data. 

 9

USDA, First 1,000 Days, 2003-2006 (Washington, D.C.: July 2007). 

10We conducted our interviews with the former Director, Office of Adjudication and 

Compliance, prior to her resignation at about the end of August 2007. 

Page 9 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Table 1: Fiscal Year 2005 Customer Complaint Inventory as Reported by ASCR in

June and July 2007 

Report to congressional 

subcommittee, 

June 2007a

 

USDA’s 1,000 Days 

Report,

July 2007b

Number of complaints

 At the beginning of FY 2005 552 363

 At the end of FY 2005 1,275 404

 Resolved during FY 2005 N/Ac120

a

Letter of Margo M. McKay, Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, USDA, to the Chairman, 

Subcommittee on Government Management, Organization, and Procurement, House Committee on 

Oversight and Government Reform, June 29, 2007. 

b

USDA, First 1,000 Days, 2003-2006 (Washington, D.C.: July 2007).

c

As reported by USDA, without explanation. 

Moreover, ASCR’s July 2007 report claiming success in addressing the 

backlog of complaints is questionable because at least 2 months earlier, 

officials of ASCR and USDA’s Office of General Counsel (USDA OGC) had 

started discussing a plan of “triage” to address a backlog of complaints by 

hiring additional attorneys to draft final decisions on those cases. Also, in 

July 2007, the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights informed us that she was 

to brief the Secretary on her plan to reduce that backlog, but was not 

comfortable sharing the plan with GAO. We later learned that ASCR had 

identified a backlog of 885 customer and employee discrimination 

complaints, according to ASCR data. Furthermore, while claiming success, 

ASCR was holding old complaints from customers that it had not resolved. 

ASCR data show, for example, that it had 46 complaints dating from 2002 

and before, which remained open at least until August 2007.11

Based on our interviews, we attribute the growth of the latest backlog to

the lack of adequate management controls and vigilance. In December 

2006, we asked ASCR’s former Director, Office of Adjudication and 

Compliance, to provide us with management reports on the status of 

discrimination complaint cases. The former Director stated that she had 

no such management reports; that management reports on customer 

complaints were not required by law; and that since a backlog had been 

addressed in 2004, she was confident that the handling of complaints since

 11In addition, during this time period ASCR held in abeyance complaints associated with 

pending and potential class action litigation. 

Page 10 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
then had been timely. However, according to a briefing document that 

ASCR used within USDA: 

• The inventory of customer complaints had grown from 552 cases to 1,356

cases from the end of fiscal year 2004 to the end of fiscal year 2007. ASCR 

identified 395 customer complaints as backlogged. 

• The inventory of employee complaints stood at 1,444 cases and 1,306 cases 

at the end of fiscal years 2004 and 2007, respectively. ASCR identified 490 

employee complaints as backlogged.

To address the customers’ complaints, in August 2007 USDA contracted 

for six attorneys to draft final agency decisions and expected that this 

effort would be completed by the end of 2007. To address the employees’ 

complaints, USDA anticipated using these attorneys and to contract with 

the U.S. Postal Service as well, expecting that these cases would be 

completed by the end of fiscal year 2008. 

ASCR’s tardy case processing of certain customer complaints may prevent 

USDA from compensating a farmer even though USDA may find sufficient 

evidence of discrimination. This is because USDA believes it cannot settle 

certain claims filed with USDA once a 2-year period for filing in federal 

court has expired if the individual did not also file their claim in federal 

court, and regardless of whether the individual timely filed their claim 

with USDA.12 We are aware of one such case in which USDA found 

discrimination in 2005, but the farmer has not received a compensatory 

damage payment from USDA because the 2-year period for filing in federal 

court had expired. In addition, even though USDA’s final decision on the 

case stated that the farmer’s 1997 farm loan debt would be forgiven, a 

USDA official informed us that has not yet occurred. 

In addition, an ASCR document identified 92 cases that were being held in

abeyance—that is, ASCR had set these cases aside from receiving a final 

decision on the merits because the complainant is, or could be, a member 

of a class action lawsuit. If these cases are not certified as class actions, 

 12A customer may file a complaint (1) with the agency, (2) in federal court, or (3) both. He

or she need not file a claim with the agency before filing in federal court. Following a 

January 29, 1998 legal memorandum from the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal 

Counsel, USDA will not award administrative settlements for Equal Credit Opportunity Act

claims once the 2-year statute of limitations for filing such a claim in federal court has

passed, unless the farmer has timely filed a complaint in federal court. 

Page 11 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
then ASCR will consider each complaint individually. Of the 92 cases, 58 

appear to be complaints involving farm program litigation. 

• 31 cases were classified as Keepseagle-related cases filed with USDA 

between November 1996 and January 2003. The Keepseagle case was filed 

in November 1999 and is certified as a class action case. 

• 25 cases were classified as Garcia-related cases filed with USDA between 

March 1991 and January 2006. The Garcia case was filed in October 2000. 

• 2 cases were classified as Love-related cases filed with USDA in 1997. The

Love case was filed in October 2000. 

We also identified one active discrimination complaint filed in 1990, 18

years ago. This complaint involves the American Indians of the Fort 

Berthold Reservation in North Dakota.13 USDA investigated this case of 

alleged discrimination in farm lending in 1999. The lead complainant has 

requested USDA action many times, and in March 2008, a USDA 

administrative law judge approved this case for a decision. The judge has 

scheduled a June 2008 hearing on compensation, should he find in favor of

the complainants. 

Data ASCR provided contains additional disparities. In addition to its 

reporting to the Congress and the public, we identified other instances of 

disparities in the data reported by ASCR on its inventories of customer 

complaints, as illustrated in the following two tables. Table 2 shows that 

ASCR reported case resolution data differently to us than it did in an 

internal departmental briefing document 5 months later. Specifically, for 

fiscal year 2006, data we were given showed 290 complaints were 

resolved, while an internal briefing showed 991. Disparities were evident

in the earlier fiscal years as well. Table 3 shows disparities in the dates of 

10 discrimination complaint cases that ASCR provided us on two 

occasions. For example, in case number 7, data we were given first 

indicated that the case was open in May 2003, and subsequent data 

indicated 1998 or 1999, a 4- or 5-year variance.

 13A second and separate case involving American Indians of the Fort Berthold Reservation 

has been incorporated within the Keepseagle class action case. 

Page 12 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Table 2: USDA Customers’ Complaints of Discrimination Resolved by ASCR, Fiscal 

Years 2004 through 2006 

Data provided to GAO

August 2007

USDA briefing document

January 2008

FY 2004 953 1,561

FY 2005 258 N/Aa

FY 2006 290 991

Sources: ASCR data provided to GAO in August 2007 and an ASCR briefing document of January 2008. 

a

As reported by USDA, without explanation. 

Table 3: Examples of Variations in Opening Dates of Customers’ Discrimination Complaint Cases Provided by ASCR to GAO 

Case number 

assigned by GAO

Opening date reported to 

GAO in August 2007

Opening date reported 

to GAO in 

January 2008 Variance 

Case age based on

January 2008 data 

1 December 2005 March 1991 14 years 17 years

2 aNovember 1996 a11 years

3 aFebruary 1998 a10 years

4 aOctober 1998 a10 years

5 aOctober 1998 a10 years

6 aOctober 1998 a10 years

7 May 2003 1998-1999 4-5 years 9 years

8 September 2001 October 2000 11 months 7 years

9 June 2003 June 2001 2 years 6 years

10 April 2003 July 2002 11 months 5 years

Source: Data provided by USDA. 

Note: These cases are being held in abeyance by USDA (not being resolved at this time) because 

they have been associated with a class action lawsuit, or a potential class action lawsuit. 

a

No data on this case were provided in August 2007. 

ASCR officials and staff recognize that the data they use are unreliable. 

They provided us with examples of known data inaccuracies, including (1) 

data that are being transferred into the new ASCR database, which is 

intended to address the existing data management problems, and (2) data

that USDA reports to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on

employees’ complaints. Other ASCR officials and staff told us that 

erroneous data had been migrated to the new database, and start-up 

problems with the new system have further contributed to data

inaccuracies. Furthermore, ASCR staff reported that occasionally 

Page 13 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
customers’ case files cannot be readily found, the files are missing 

documents, and sometimes the files contain documents that pertain to 

other cases. Nevertheless, while correspondence from the former 

Director, Office of Adjudication and Compliance, to USDA’s OIG said that 

only verified data were entered into the new system to prevent “garbage 

in, garbage out,” USDA’s OIG reported that ASCR had not implemented a 

process to validate the accuracy of its data and did not have sufficient 

controls over the entry and validation of data into its new system. 

Steps ASCR took to speed up its work affected quality. We found that as

ASCR accelerated the pace of its work to reduce its backlogs of 

discrimination complaints in 2004, it took steps may have affected the 

quality of its work. First, ASCR’s plan to accelerate its work did not 

address how the quality of its work would be maintained. 

• ASCR’s plan called for USDA’s investigators and adjudicators, who 

prepare agency decisions, to nearly double their normal pace of casework 

for about 12 months. For example, ASCR’s investigators were expected to

increase their productivity from about 16 to 30 cases per year. 

• One technique that ASCR adopted was to have its investigators conduct 

interviews and interrogatories by phone and email whenever possible. 

Civil rights investigative standards indicate that interviews by telephone 

are acceptable under certain circumstances, such as when there is good 

reason to conclude that the complainant is the only person affected by the

allegations of discrimination.14 ASCR employees told us that it is now usual 

for ASCR investigations to be conducted by phone. 

• Another feature called for one employee to respond to about 3,000 “claims 

and inquiries” submitted as a result of a letter writing campaign. However, 

the plan did not make clear what procedures ASCR staff were to use for 

reviewing and responding to these cases or the quality controls that were 

to be applied. ASCR employees reported to us that an unknown portion of 

these claims and inquiries were either lost or disregarded. 

 14Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Investigation Procedures Manual for the

Investigation and Resolution of Complaints Alleging Violations of Title VI and Other

Nondiscrimination Statutes (Washington, D.C.: September 1998). In addition, the

President’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency, Quality Standards for Investigations

(December 2003) calls for due professional care in performing investigations by, among 

other things, achieving thoroughness through the application of appropriate techniques. 

Page 14 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Second, ASCR’s former Director, Office of Adjudication and Compliance, 

commented in writing on the quality of USDA’s work on employees’ 

complaints in fiscal year 2004. The former Director stated that contractors’ 

work in preparing draft decisions was fair to average and required much

revision. In addition, the former Director related that USDA issued many 

“summary” decisions on employees’ complaints that did not resolve 

questions of fact, leading to the appeal of many USDA decisions to the Equal 

Employment Opportunity Commission. The former Director expressed 

concern that such summary decisions by USDA “could call into question the 

integrity of the process because important issues were being overlooked.” 

Finally, as in the past, inadequate working relationships and 

communications within ASCR have complicated its efforts to produce 

quality work products, and adversely affected employees. According to 

ASCR documents and our interviews, instability in ASCR’s civil rights 

offices resulting from reorganizations, management and staff turnover, low 

morale, and concerns about the treatment of staff in ASCR’s civil rights 

offices have been a serious obstacle to improving the management of 

these programs. Over the past 5 years, many complaints of discrimination 

have been filed against ASCR program managers and officials. In addition,

some staff have feared retaliation for reporting program and management 

related problems, or for raising questions about management actions. 

USDA’s OIG and GAO have long reported on problems in resolving 

discrimination complaints. USDA’s stated policy is to efficiently respond 

to discrimination complaints, but over the past years it has not done so. 

USDA’s OIG and GAO have together invested heavily in reporting on and

developing recommendations to overcome USDA’s untimely handling of 

discrimination complaints. In 1999, for example, while we reported that 

USDA had exceeded four target dates for closing backlogs of customers’ 

complaints and three for employees’ complaints, we made 

recommendations to address USDA’s continual management turnover in

civil rights offices, frequent reorganizations, inadequate staff and 

managerial expertise, and poor working relationships and communication 

within the Office of Civil Rights.15 USDA management agreed with these 

reports and committed to implement our recommendations. 

 15GAO, U.S. Department of Agriculture: Problems Continue to Hinder the Timely

Processing of Discrimination Complaints, GAO/RCED-99-38 (Washington, D.C.: 

Jan. 29, 1999). 

Page 15 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
However, by 2000, USDA’s OIG stated that it was making its seventh 

attempt to provide USDA’s Office of Civil Rights with constructive ways to

overcome its case processing inefficiencies.16 The OIG also stated that 

officials of the Office of Civil Rights had agreed to a major transformation 

of the system for processing complaints, but, in fact, the office did not 

make any significant changes. The OIG stated that unless the Office of 

Civil Rights provided effective leadership, changed the organizational 

culture, and addressed its customer focus and process engineering, it 

would be questionable whether further complaints of discrimination 

would receive due care. In 2002, USDA officials again committed to setting 

and meeting time frames for processing discrimination complaints. In 

2003, we identified the processing of discrimination complaints as a 

significant management challenge for USDA.17 Four years later, in August 

2007, USDA’s OIG designated civil rights as a major management challenge 

at USDA.18 The OIG commented that because of the conditions it had 

found, public confidence in USDA’s upholding of civil rights might be lost. 

In addition, in 2007, USDA’s OIG reported that material weaknesses 

persisted in ASCR’s civil rights control structure and environment for 

processing employees’ discrimination complaints.19 The OIG found that 

although USDA’s Office of Civil Rights had reduced the average time for 

processing employees’ complaints, the average exceeded the Equal 

Employment Opportunity Commission’s standard of 270 days. According 

to the OIG, 67 cases took, on average, over 500 days, which the OIG 

considered to be representative of cases in which ASCR had to issue a 

decision on the merits of the complaint. In addition, the OIG reported that: 

• 13 of the 64 case files that the OIG selected to review could not be located 

for a month; one required 6 months to locate; and one had to be recreated; 

 16USDA Office of Inspector General, Office of Civil Rights Status of the Implementation of

Recommendations Made in Prior Evaluations of Program Complaints, Audit Report No.

60801-4-Hq (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 10, 2007).

17GAO, Major Management Challenges and Program Risks: Department of Agriculture, 

GAO-03-96 (Washington, D.C.: January 2003).

18USDA Office of Inspector General, Management Challenges (Washington, D.C.: Aug. 1,

2007). USDA’s OIG previously identified civil rights as a major management challenge for 

USDA in August 2004. 

19USDA Office of Inspector General, Review of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s 

Accountability for Actions Taken on Civil Rights Complaints, Audit Report 

No. 60601-04-Hy (Washington, D.C.: May 14, 2007). 

Page 16 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
• 21 of the 64 case files had missing documentation; and 

• 11 of the 64 cases had incorrect data recorded in ASCR’s database, 

including one case in which the complainant was incorrectly identified as 

white rather than African-American. 

ASCR’s former Director, Office of Adjudication and Compliance, 

responded that there were several causes for these conditions: the Equal

Employment Opportunity Commission standards were unrealistic, there 

was a substantial backlog of cases, there had been an influx of new cases, 

there were staffing and resource shortages, and individual USDA agencies

were not meeting their responsibilities. ASCR’s former Director also 

claimed that these weaknesses in resolving employees’ discrimination 

complaints would be addressed in 5 years. However, the OIG observed 

that ASCR did not have an effective plan to get this done. 

ASCR has published three annual reports on the participation rate of 

socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers in USDA programs, which are 

required by section 10708 of the 2002 Farm Bill.20 Over time, these reports 

could help make more transparent the progress made by socially 

disadvantaged farmers and ranchers in accessing USDA programs. 

However, as USDA discloses in these reports, the data USDA has reported 

are statistically unreliable. In addition, our analysis of the USDA reports 

shows that they do not include basic reference data needed for 

understanding the reports and examining trends.

The reports are to provide statistical data on the participation of farmers 

and ranchers in USDA programs by race, ethnicity, and gender, and in 

addition, USDA has included descriptions of its success stories in 

providing outreach and assistance to socially disadvantaged farmers and 

ranchers. USDA has stated that through these reports, it intends to make 

clear that it is committed to and accountable for fair and equitable service 

to all customers. However, the statistical data USDA reports on program 

ASCR’s Reports on 

Minority Participation 

in Programs Are 

Unreliable and of 

Limited Usefulness 

 20USDA, Bridges to the Future: 2003 Annual Report of the Participation of Socially 

Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers in USDA Programs, The Section 10708 Report 

(Washington, D.C.: December 2004); Bridges to the Future: 2004 Annual Report of the

Participation of Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers in USDA Programs, The

Section 10708 Report (Washington, D.C.: December 2005); and, Bridges to the Future: 

2005 Annual Report of the Participation of Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and 

Ranchers in USDA Programs, The Section 10708 Report (Washington, D.C.: June 2007).

Page 17 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
participation are unreliable. USDA stated that it does not have a uniform 

method of reporting and tabulating race and ethnicity data among its 

component agencies. More specifically, according to USDA, it does not 

have approval from OMB to implement standardized data collection of 

demographic information directly from program participants. For 

example, according to USDA, the Cooperative State Research, Education,

and Extension Service; the Rural Business and Cooperative Service; and 

the Risk Management Agency are not authorized to collect race and 

ethnicity data for 18 programs. USDA reported that only the Farm Service 

Agencies’ farm loan program collects reliable and complete information on 

socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers. Except for the data of the 

Farm Service Agency, most of USDA’s demographic data are gathered by

visual observation of the applicants, and USDA states in its reports that it 

considers visual observation to be unreliable, especially for ethnicity. 

Individual traits, such as ethnicity, may not be readily evident to an 

observer. In addition, for some Farm Service Agency programs, applicants

who chose not to identify their race were, until 2004, designated as “white 

male.” When taken together, according to USDA, the mixture of data 

available for reporting is statistically unreliable. 

In 2004, to overcome these conditions, ASCR published a notice in the 

Federal Register seeking public comment on its plan to collect additional 

data on race, ethnicity, gender, national origin, and age. While ASCR 

received some public comments, it did not follow through and obtain 

OMB’s approval to collect the data. In a January 2008 briefing document,

an ASCR work group stated that ASCR does not have the staff or financial 

resources to proceed with this project. On May 8, 2008, ASCR officials said

that they plan to meet again in the near future to further discuss this 

matter. 

In addition, our analysis of these USDA reports shows that they are of

limited usefulness because they do not include the basic reference data

needed for understanding the reports and examining trends. USDA has 

published its demographic data as the percentage of program participants 

by county and state. While observers can track the percentage changes in

program participation over time, the data are of limited usefulness without 

knowing the actual number of program participants and the census data 

for each county and state. For example, USDA would now report that in a 

particular county, 20 percent of the farm program participants were 

minority farmers and 80 percent were nonminority farmers. Greater 

insight would be provided if USDA also reported that there were 100 

program participants in the county—the report reader would then know 

that 20 were minority program participants. Further insight would be 

Page 18 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
provided if USDA reported from census data that in this county, 125 of the 

1,000 farmers were minority farmers. By including census data, USDA 

could also facilitate the observation of population shifts along with 

changes in program participation. Furthermore, USDA’s Web-based tables 

that contain data on program participation do not facilitate analysis. USDA 

publishes its data in about 1,370 separate tables and 146 maps that are not 

searchable files. Because the underlying data are not searchable, readers 

cannot make simple comparisons that would enhance data interpretation. 

If the data were searchable, it could be possible to compare minority 

participation by program, geographic location, and year. 

Finally, a section of the report includes highlights of 16 USDA agencies’ 

efforts to reach out to minority and socially disadvantaged farmers. While 

these highlights provide useful perspective on agency activities to serve 

socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers, the information is somewhat

limited because the many positive agency activities are reported as 

anecdotes, which do not reveal the full extent of USDA agency outreach

activities. The following examples illustrate USDA’s reporting of its 

outreach efforts for fiscal year 2005. 

• Farm Bill Forums. USDA reported that in anticipation of the 2007 Farm 

Bill, the Office of Outreach assisted with planning and conducting 

“listening sessions” in various locations with minority farmers and 

ranchers. 

• Partners Meetings. USDA reported that a second annual partners meeting 

was held in August 2005. The meeting provided opportunities for more 

than 125 representatives of community-based organizations for farmers 

and ranchers to engage with USDA officials about issues that affect the 

continued well-being of the minority and small farm and ranch community. 

• The Tobacco Buyout Program. USDA reported that a comprehensive 

multimedia campaign was conducted to inform tobacco quota holders and 

farmers of the buyout program, and to encourage them to sign up for the 

buyout program. The Office of Outreach participated in the design of 

communication strategies to help ensure that small and limited-resource 

producers received accurate information about the buyout in a timely 

manner and the office also called attention to the need to promote 

financial investment planning and transitioning to alternative crops. 

Page 19 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
In light of USDA’s history involving significantly controversial issues, 

including allegations of systemic discrimination against USDA customers 

carried out through the design and delivery of USDA programs as well as 

discriminatory treatment of USDA employees, strategic planning is vital 

for providing proactive ASCR leadership. Results-oriented strategic

planning provides a roadmap that clearly describes what an organization is

attempting to achieve, and over time, it can serve as a focal point for 

communication with the Congress and the public about what has been 

accomplished. Results-oriented organizations follow three key steps in 

their strategic planning: (1) they define a clear mission and desired 

outcomes, (2) they measure performance to gauge progress, and (3) they 

use performance information for identifying performance gaps and 

decision making to hone the strategic plan. Taken together, ASCR has 

started to develop a results-oriented approach as illustrated in its first 

strategic plan entitled Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights: Strategic 

Plan, Fiscal Years 2005-2010 and its ASCR Priorities for Fiscal Years 

2007 and 2008. The elements of these plans are summarized in appendix

II. However, ASCR has a long distance to go before its approach and plans 

can be effective. 

ASCR has designed its missions and strategic goal. We found that ASCR 

has made progress by describing a compelling mission and strategic goal, 

but has not involved stakeholders, assessed the environment, and aligned 

its activities, core processes, and resources to achieve its mission and 

strategic goal. 

ASCR’s Strategic 

Planning Is Limited 

and Does Not Address 

Key Steps Needed to 

Achieve Its Mission 

• One of ASCR’s missions is to ensure that USDA is in compliance with civil 

rights laws and regulations. This mission calls for ASCR to process 

employees’ discrimination complaints as required by the Equal 

Employment Opportunity Commission, and to review USDA agencies’ 

implementation of civil rights laws and regulations. 

• ASCR’s second mission is to provide leadership to promote equal 

opportunity, equal access, and fair treatment for all USDA employees and

customers. 

ASCR also has a strategic goal—to ensure USDA provides fair and 

equitable services to all customers and upholds the civil rights of its 

employees. This two-part strategic goal was the basis for the development 

of ASCR’s strategic plan.

Results-oriented organizations take several steps to effectively implement 

their mission and achieve their desired outcomes. They (1) involve 

Page 20 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
stakeholders, (2) assess the environment, and (3) align activities, core 

processes, and resources. However, we found that ASCR’s planning has 

several shortcomings. First, while results-oriented organizations base their 

strategic planning, to a large extent, on the interests and expectations of 

their stakeholders, ASCR’s strategic plan states that ASCR relied on input

from a variety of internal and external customers in developing its 

strategic plan. However, the plans do not identify who provided input or 

contain a discussion of the interests and perspectives of ASCR’s 

stakeholders. For example, while ASCR’s stakeholders are interested in 

assuring the diversity of USDA field office staff to facilitate their 

interaction with minority and underserved farmers, ASCR’s strategic 

planning does not address the diversity of USDA’s field staff. ASCR’s 

external stakeholders said that they have a high degree of interest in 

ASCR’s planning, and several discussed their involvement in ASCR’s 

annual meetings. ASCR refers to its stakeholders as “partners”—which 

include representatives of community-based organizations and minority 

interest groups. These partners have attended ASCR’s annual partners 

meetings and discussed their wide ranging interests in ASCR’s mission. 

However, ASCR’s partners’ interests vary from ASCR’s strategic plan. We 

developed a summary of ASCR’s partners’ interests based on interviews 

with the representatives of a selection of USDA’s partners’ groups, and we 

also considered issues identified in past studies of USDA. For example, 

ASCR’s partners are interested in improvements in (1) USDA’s methods of

delivering farm programs to facilitate access by underserved producers, 

(2) the county committee system so that they are better represented in 

local decisions, and (3) the diversity of USDA employees who work with 

minority producers. A list of these interests is included in appendix III. 

In response, ASCR’s Director of Outreach stated that some of ASCR’s 

fiscal year 2008 priorities for outreach respond to particular interests of 

ASCR’s partners. The Director referred, for example, to ASCR’s initiatives 

to coordinate and report on USDA-wide outreach activities, to help ensure

that USDA agencies have formal outreach programs with full-time staff, to 

train outreach coordinators, and to improve ASCR’s annual reporting on 

minority participation in USDA programs. 

Second, by building an environmental assessment into the strategic 

planning process, results-oriented organizations identify external and 

internal factors that can influence the achievement of their long-term 

goals. For example, some information about the civil rights environment 

Page 21 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
as it affects farmers is described in a study of the Mississippi Delta area by

the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, and in a report on minority and women 

farmers by USDA’s Economic Research Service.

21 ASCR’s report does not 

discuss the development or use of such information. An assessment of the 

external environment is especially important because ASCR’s Office of 

Outreach is to provide national leadership and coordination for USDA 

programs and services to ensure equal and timely access for all of USDA’s 

constituents, especially the underserved. As for the internal environment, 

ASCR recognizes that the efforts of various USDA agencies and offices 

that perform critical functions are necessary for full implementation of 

ASCR’s strategic goal. However, ASCR’s planning does not identify the 

most critical agency functions that relate to ASCR’s strategic goal 

including their culture, management practices, and business processes. 

While this is a significant endeavor, getting a good understanding of these 

facets of USDA operations could help contribute to determining what 

ASCR may need to accomplish and how ASCR could best work with other 

USDA agencies and offices. ASCR’s Director of Outreach reported that her 

office is making some progress in developing relationships with USDA’s 

agencies in their efforts to improve outreach to minority farmers. 

Third, results-oriented organizations align their activities, core processes, 

and resources to support their mission and desired outcomes. Such 

organizations start by assessing the extent to which their programs and 

activities contribute to meeting their mission and make linkages between 

levels of funding and their anticipated results. ASCR used an 

organizational framework for developing its planning, according to an 

ASCR official, and developed objectives for each of ASCR’s existing 

offices. However, these plans do not reflect consideration of the extent to

which each of its office’s activities is to contribute to ASCR’s missions. For 

example, one ASCR strategic objective is to strengthen partnerships with 

historically black land-grant universities through scholarships provided by 

USDA, but it is not clear how scholarships bear significantly on ASCR’s 

mission. Moreover, the plans do not make linkages between levels of 

funding and ASCR’s anticipated results—without such a discussion it is 

not possible to determine whether ASCR has the resources needed to

achieve its strategic goal. 

 21U.S. Civil Rights Commission, Racial and Ethnic Tensions in American Communities: 

Poverty, Inequality, and Discrimination, Volume VII: The Mississippi Delta Report 

(Washington, D.C.: February 2001) and U.S. Department of Agriculture, Economic 

Research Service, Minority & Women Farmers in the U.S. (Washington, D.C.: May 1998). 

Page 22 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
ASCR could better measure performance to gauge progress. Resultsoriented organizations establish performance measures that demonstrate 

results, are limited to the vital few performance measures, respond to 

multiple priorities, and link to responsible programs. In addition, they pay 

special attention to issues relating to data collection. Moreover, they have

to balance the cost of collecting data against the need for data that are

complete, accurate and consistent enough to document performance and 

support decision making at various organizational levels. In this area, 

ASCR’s plans leave room for many forward steps. 

• While ASCR identified its Office of Outreach as having responsibility for 

providing national leadership and coordination for programs and services 

across USDA agencies to ensure customers have equal and timely access, 

the measures it adopted focus on counting participants at USDA training 

workshops, rather than on the outcome of its outreach efforts on access to 

benefits and services. 

• ASCR’s planning does not link to the plans of USDA agencies or 

department as a whole, and does not discuss the potential for linkages to

be developed. 

• To measure progress that USDA agencies make in compliance with 

relevant USDA government regulations and laws, ASCR states it will use a 

percentage of agencies in compliance, but had not established the baseline 

and targets.

ASCR’s plans have an important gap in the area of performance 

measurement, especially in an era of limited resources.They do not 

discuss the kinds of data that USDA agencies collect or analyze that would 

demonstrate progress towards ASCR’s strategic goal. To leverage 

resources, potential sources of data may be USDA’s National Agricultural 

Statistics Service, which conducts the Census of Agriculture, and the 

Economic Research Service, which analyzes and reports on trends in 

agriculture, including social changes. 22

 22Measuring racial discrimination is important to understanding where it occurs, the extent 

of its impact, and what to do about it. Researchers have recommended that agencies 

explore the use of field studies, such as has been done since the 1970s to detect racially 

based discrimination in housing. See National Research Council, National Academy of

Sciences, Measuring Racial Discrimination (Washington, D.C.: 2004). 

Page 23 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
ASCR’s planning has not considered the use of performance information 

for identifying performance gaps. Results-oriented organizations—after 

building a performance measurement system—put performance data to

work to identify gaps in their performance, report on that performance, 

and finally use that information to improve their performance to better 

support their missions. However, the data that ASCR now identifies in its 

plans, such as the number of persons who are aware of USDA programs, 

will contribute relatively little to an understanding of USDA’s performance 

gaps in meeting ASCR’s strategic goal. For example, such data will not 

provide any insight into how well USDA staff work with and assist 

minority and limited-resource customers, whether the programs provide 

for equitable treatment, and how well USDA upholds the civil rights of its 

employees. Also, ASCR will need to work closely with other USDA 

agencies, such as the Farm Service Agency, the Natural Resources 

Conservation Service, Cooperative State Research, Extension, and 

Education Service, and the Rural Development Mission Area, but the 

ASCR plans do not discuss how their data can be used to contribute to 

identifying gaps in USDA’s performance. Nevertheless, ASCR officials said 

that they have taken steps in this direction through annual reviews of the 

performance of USDA agency heads. Through these reviews, ASCR 

officials said they are making some recommendations for agency change, 

although the USDA agencies are not required to follow those 

recommendations. 

USDA has been addressing allegations of discrimination for decades. One 

lawsuit has cost taxpayers nearly a billion dollars in payouts to date, and 

several other groups are seeking redress for similar alleged discrimination. 

While ASCR’s policy is to fairly and efficiently respond to complaints of 

discrimination, its efforts to establish the management system necessary 

to implement the policy have fallen far short. For example, both we and 

USDA’s OIG have observed that ASCR does not have oversight and control 

over its inventory of discrimination complaints—controls that are vital to 

effective management. Despite the numerous past efforts to provide this 

office with constructive analysis, including recommendations to set 

timeframes for resolving complaints from beginning to end, significant 

management deficiencies remain. Such resistance to improve its 

management system calls into question USDA’s commitment to more 

efficiently and effectively address discrimination complaints both within 

the department and in its programs. 

Concluding 

Observations 

Page 24 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be pleased

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

Subcommittee may have. 

Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public 

Affairs may be found on the last page of this statement. For further 

information about this testimony, please contact Lisa Shames, Director, 

Natural Resources and Environment at (202) 512-3841 or 

shamesl@gao.gov. Key contributors to this statement were Charles M. 

Adams, Kevin Bray, Robert Cramer, Nancy Crothers, Richard Egan, 

Ronald Fecso, Bart Fischer, Cardell Johnson, Elizabeth Johnston, Karen 

Keegan, Kerry Lipsitz, Nhi Nguyen, Andrew O’Connell, Terry Richardson, 

and Susan Sawtelle. 

Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments 

Page 25 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

Page 26 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 

Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

During this performance audit, we reviewed relevant reports prepared by 

the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), USDA’s Office of Inspector 

General (OIG), the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, the U.S. Equal 

Employment Opportunity Commission, and GAO, among others. We also

conducted over 50 interviews with officials and staff of USDA’s Office of 

the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights (ASCR); over 65 interviews with 

staff of USDA’s Farm Service Agency, Natural Resources Conservation 

Service, Rural Development Mission Area, Cooperative State Research, 

Extension, and Education Service, the National Agricultural Statistical 

Service, and USDA field offices in California, Florida, North Carolina, 

Texas, and Washington; 20 interviews with USDA stakeholder groups, 

including The Rural Coalition, United Farmers USA, the Federation of 

Southern Cooperatives, South East Asian American Farmers Association, 

the Intertribal Agricultural Council, the National Tribal Development 

Association, the Hispanic Farmers and Ranchers of America, the National

Black Farmers Association, National Hmong American Farmers, and the 

Coalition of USDA Minority Employees; and three interviews with officials 

of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and the U.S. Equal Employment 

Opportunity Commission. In addition, we considered GAO and the Office 

of Management and Budget’s (OMB) guidance on strategic planning and 

performance.1

Unlike our prior reviews of USDA civil rights activities when we readily 

obtained access to records that were necessary for our work, in this case 

our efforts were impeded by delays in obtaining records. We made 

repeated requests for USDA records—including requests directly to the 

Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights and the Deputy Secretary. These 

requests concerned records relating to ASCR’s priorities, ASCR’s strategic 

plan, ASCR civil rights related performance assessments of agency heads,

correspondence between ASCR and USDA’s Office of General Counsel, 

unresolved discrimination complaints, outreach, ASCR office budgets, and 

USDA’s request for OMB approval to collect data needed for reporting on 

minority farmer participation in USDA programs, among others. In 

January 2008, we requested the Deputy Secretary’s cooperation and 

assistance in arranging for access to USDA records, and we subsequently 

received many, but not all, of the records we sought. Nevertheless, the 

records we received were sufficient for our work to meet generally 

accepted government auditing standards. These standards require that we

 1

GAO, Executive Guide: Effectively Implementing the Government Performance and

Results Act, GAO/GGD-96-118 (Washington, D.C.: June 1996). 
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology 

plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to 

provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our 

audit objectives. We believe the evidence obtained provides a reasonable

basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

Furthermore, starting in January 2008, several USDA employees contacted 

us with certain allegations pertinent to our work, such as the possible 

destruction of records and manipulation of discrimination complaint data 

related to GAO’s engagement. Consequently, we and USDA’s OIG 

conducted a number of additional interviews with agency staff. Based on 

the interviews we conducted, we learned of additional deficiencies in the 

handling of discrimination complaints, among other things, but did not 

find evidence that our work had been purposely undermined. Also, several 

allegations not directly related to our work came to our attention that we 

will refer to USDA’s OIG and the Department of Justice for further 

investigation. 

Page 27 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Appendix II: USDA ASCR Initiatives, and

Strategic and Priority Plans 

Page 28 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 

Appendix II: USDA ASCR Initiatives, and 

Strategic and Priority Plans 

Table 4: ASCR Initiatives for Fiscal Year 2004 

Challenges Initiatives/Accomplishments

Status as of

Dec. 2007 

Organization Consolidated USDA offices with civil rights focus into 

ASCR 

Complete 

Staff were temporarily assigned to address

discrimination complaints

Complete 

Systems Develop a professional system for managing

discrimination complaints

On-going 

Procedural Regulations are being drafted to address the relationship 

between USDA’s Office of General Counsel and ASCR’s

Office of Adjudication and Compliance 

On-going 

Operational Created a unit to handle incoming phone calls for ASCR Complete

Reduced backlogs of customer and employee

discrimination complaints

Complete 

USDA’s alternative dispute resolution policy was

amended in April 2006 to enhance the use of alternative 

dispute resolution 

Complete 

Conduct a public awareness campaign—several public 

forums and “listening sessions” have been held to 

discuss partnerships, the Minority Farm Registry, the 

Notice of Farm Loan Application Receipts, and the next 

Farm Bill 

On-going 

Accountability Prevent program complaints—ASCR has convened 

three Partners Meetings with community based 

organizations and groups representing minority and 

limited resource farmers to address concerns about 

access to farm programs

On-going 

Prevent employee complaints—training for managers on 

equal employment opportunity is mandatory, and 

employee development programs are being 

implemented

On-going 

Implement the “No Fear Act”—Public Law 107-174 

requires federal agencies to be held accountable for 

violations of anti-discrimination laws—USDA’s quarterly 

reports are being posted on time, and all employees

have received training 

Complete 

ASCR completed an accountability policy for USDA—

USDA’s Office of Human Resources will ensure that all 

USDA managers are held accountable for discriminatory 

actions

Complete 

An annual civil rights conference has been established Complete

Source: USDA ASCR briefing document as of November 2007. 
Appendix II: USDA ASCR Initiatives, and

Strategic and Priority Plans 

Table 5: ASCR Strategic Objectives for Fiscal Years 2005 through 2010 

Objective 

Selected Key Performance Indicator for 

2010 

Strengthen partnerships between USDA 

and 1890 Community (historically black 

land-grant institutions). 

Increase student scholarships provided by 

USDA from 25 to 33. 

Strengthen partnerships between USDA 

and 1994 land-grant institutions (Native 

American tribal colleges). 

Increase student scholarships provided by 

USDA from 5 to 9 by 2010. 

Enhance the Office of the Secretary and 

Departmental Office employees’ 

knowledge of the fairness, neutrality, and 

confidentiality of alternative dispute 

resolution (ADR) usage. 

Increase the knowledge of employees

familiar with alternative dispute resolution 

from 100 to 950. 

Ensure USDA agencies and offices are in 

compliance with USDA regulations and

government-wide ADR laws and 

regulations. 

Percentage of agencies in compliance—

baseline and targets to be determined. 

Achieve an efficient USDA-wide outreach 

program for all customers. 

Numbers of socially and economically 

disadvantaged persons who received

training for the first time—baseline and

targets to be determined. 

Create and strengthen partnerships with 

community and faith-based organizations, 

corporations, foundations, educational 

institutions and other targeted

communities to build coalitions for USDA 

programs and opportunities. 

Increase number of partnerships and 

coalitions from 10 to 50. 

Increase the awareness of USDA 

programs and opportunities for the 

socially and economically disadvantaged 

persons and also under-represented 

persons. 

Increase number of individuals aware of 

participation requirements from 100,000 to 

160,000. 

Develop and implement an efficient 

complaint process that adheres to civil 

rights laws and regulations. 

Increase the number of cases processed

within regulatory timeframe from 40 to 100 

percent for employee complaints and from 

16 to 100 percent for customer complaints. 

Ensure USDA agencies and offices are in 

compliance with EEO laws. 

Percentage of USDA agencies brought into 

compliance—baseline and targets to be 

determined. 

Meet EEOC standards for a Model EEO

Program. 

Increase percentage of EEOC indicators that 

are met from 33 to 100 percent by 2009. 

Source: USDA. 

Page 29 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Appendix II: USDA ASCR Initiatives, and

Strategic and Priority Plans 

Table 6: List of Civil Rights Priorities and Selected Initiatives for Fiscal Years 2007 

and 2008 

Fill senior executive position to lead ASCR’s Outreach and

Diversity Division 

Add workplace diversity as a core value 

Develop and conduct mandatory Diversity Awareness Training 

for all supervisors and employees

Offer training, including a disability training conference and an 

AgLearn training module on sexual orientation 

Diversity 

Establish a diversity forum to foster communication between

USDA senior management and internal customers of USDA

Develop and implement a comprehensive USDA-wide outreach 

plan 

Provide oversight and coordination of minority participation data

Outreach 

Conduct a joint review with USDA’s Agricultural Research 

Service of the Hispanic Serving Institutions National Program 

Create an Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) video on 

mediation 

Recommend establishing dedicated ADR Director positions in 

USDA agencies

Conflict Prevention 

and Resolution

Conduct a USDA-wide ADR awareness survey

Comply with No FEAR Act requirements

Update civil rights directives, regulations, and policies as needed 

Continue to strive to ensure that Final Agency Decisions meet 

legal sufficiency standards and time requirements

Continuing Civil 

Rights Initiatives

Convene biennial USDA Civil Rights Conference in 2008 

Create a strategic marketing campaign focused on ASCR goals

and civil rights accomplishments by USDA agencies

Communications

and Public 

Awareness Recognize and award internal and external stakeholders for civil 

rights best practices

Source: USDA. 

Page 30 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 
Page 31 GAO-08-755T USDA Civil Rights 

Appendix III: Interests of Selected USDA 

Stakeholders in Civil Rights Related Matters 

as Identified by GAO in 2007 and 2008 

USDA Programs 

USDA outreach programs for underserved producers could be much better. 

Systematic data on minority participation in USDA programs are not available. 

The 10708 Report and Minority Farm Register have been ineffective. 

Outreach Programs 

Partnerships with community-based organizations could be better used.

Methods of USDA program delivery need to better facilitate the participation of underserved producers

and address their needs. 

USDA could do more to provide assistance in accessing markets and programs. 

USDA could better address cultural and language differences for providing services. 

Some USDA program rules and features hinder participation by underserved producers. 

Some USDA employees have little incentive to work with small and minority producers. 

County offices working with underserved producers continue to lack diversity, and some have poor 

customer service and/or display discriminatory behaviors towards underserved producers. 

USDA lacks a program that addresses farm worker needs.

There continues to be reports of cases where USDA is not processing loans for underserved 

producers. 

Program Delivery 

Some Hmong poultry farmers with guaranteed loans facilitated by USDA are experiencing 

foreclosures. 

The county committee system does not well represent minority producers. 

Minority advisors are ineffective because they have no voting power. 

County System

USDA has not done enough to make underserved producers fully aware of county committee 

elections, and underserved producers have difficulties winning elections. 

Investment There is a lack of USDA investment in research and extension services that would determine the 

extent of minority needs. 

Census of Agriculture The Census of Agriculture needs to better count minority producers. 

Foreclosure USDA may continue to be foreclosing on farms belonging to producers who are awaiting decisions on 

discrimination complaints. 

USDA Internal Issues 

Authority ASCR needs authority to exercise leadership for making changes at USDA. 

Resources USDA and ASCR need additional resources to carry out civil rights functions. 

Diversity Greater diversity among USDA employees would facilitate USDA’s work with minority producers. 

Access Producers must still access services through some USDA employees who discriminated against them. 

Management Structure The Office of Adjudication and Compliance needs better management structure and function. 

Backlogs of discrimination complaints need to be addressed. 

Alternative dispute resolution techniques to resolve informally employee complaints should be used 

consistently and documented.

Civil rights compliance reviews of USDA agencies are behind schedule and should be conducted. 

General Counsel Review USDA’s Office of General Counsel continues to be involved in complaint cases. 

Source: GAO Analysis of 18 interviews with USDA stakeholders and review of 16 reports related to civil rights at USDA. 

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