Coast Guard: Actions Needed to Improve Data Quality and Transparency for Reporting on Mission Performance and Capital Planning
Released: 2018-03-07T00:00:00

Letter

Background

With a staff of over 47,000 members, the Coast Guard operates a multimission fleet of 201 fixed and rotary-wing aircraft and over 1,400 boats and ships. Operational control of surface and air assets is divided into two geographic Areas (Pacific and Atlantic), within which are nine Districts consisting of 37 sectors and the stations within them. The Coast Guard’s program oversight, policy development, and personnel administration are carried out at the Coast Guard’s headquarters. As shown in table 1, the Coast Guard is responsible for 11 statutory missions identified in the Homeland Security Act of 2002, as amended. The Coast Guard manages these missions through six mission programs, also listed in table 1. As part of its marine safety mission, for example, the Coast Guard conducts, among other activities, safety inspections and vessel accident investigations, including those involving commercial fishing vessels, which are part of an industry with one of the highest death rates of any industry in the United States.

For each of its 11 missions, the Coast Guard has developed goals and targets to assess and communicate agency performance. The Coast Guard’s performance assessment process also includes identifying performance gaps and implementing corrective actions to address unmet performance goals. As part of its process, the Coast Guard is to establish targets for the current and subsequent 2 fiscal years, according to Coast Guard officials. Each target is set by the Coast Guard, but according to the Coast Guard’s Annual Performance Report (APR), some are derived from external factors. For example, DHS requires that Coast Guard set a 100 percent target for the percent of people in imminent danger saved in the maritime environment. Further, several of the Coast Guard’s assets used to conduct these missions are approaching the end of their intended service lives. As part of its efforts to modernize its assets used to carry out various missions, the Coast Guard has begun acquiring new vessels, such as the National Security Cutter, the Fast Response Cutter as well as other assets. However, concerns surrounding the affordability of this effort remain as the Coast Guard continues to pursue multiple new acquisitions without long-term planning to guide the affordability of its acquisition portfolio. Figure 1 shows the Coast Guard’s Fast Response Cutter and National Security Cutter.

Coast Guard Actions that Could Improve Data Quality

We previously reported on actions the Coast Guard could take to ensure that, among other things, it addresses limitations posed by incomplete data, the use of unrealistic asset performance data, and limitations with its performance goal data, for more effective program management. Examples of data limitations that we have recommended that the Coast Guard take action on are below.

Improve completeness of mission data. In December 2017, we found that several different federal agencies play a role in overseeing and promoting commercial fishing vessel safety, including the Coast Guard. As part of its marine safety activities, the Coast Guard conducts, among other activities, safety inspections and vessel accident investigations. Commercial fishing has one of the highest death rates of any industry in the United States and vessel disasters are the leading cause of fatalities among fishers, according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. However, our December 2017 review found that more information is needed to calculate vessel safety statistics that could enhance the Coast Guard’s knowledge about accident, injury, and fatality trends involving commercial fishing vessels.

The Coast Guard collects some data on commercial fishing vessels that operate in federal waters—including a vessel’s length and construction date—but data on the population of the active U.S. commercial fishing vessel fleet are not complete. Between 2006 and 2015, the Coast Guard investigated 2,101 commercial fishing vessel accidents that were identified as occurring in federal waters. While the number of accidents generally increased over this time period, the number of injuries and fatalities declined over the same 10-year period. However, we could not assess the number of accidents, injuries, and fatalities by fishery— meaning the area in which a certain type of fish (e.g., shrimp, salmon, crab) is caught—because the Coast Guard’s data is not complete. Further, we were unable to calculate the rates of commercial fishing vessel accidents, injuries, and fatalities, because reliable data on certain information needed to do so—including the total number of vessels that are actively fishing and the fishery or region in which the vessel operates—are either not maintained or are not collected by the Coast Guard or other federal agencies. Having this information could be useful to carrying out the Coast Guard’s marine safety mission, which includes enforcing laws to prevent death, injury and property loss in the marine environment.

We recommended in our December 2017 report that the Coast Guard ensure that data it collects during commercial fishing vessel incident investigations is accurately captured. We also recommended that the Coast Guard work with stakeholders to form a working group to determine an efficient means to establish a reliable estimate of the population of active commercial fishing vessels. The Coast Guard agreed with both recommendations, and in February 2018 informed us that it is in the process of developing additional data fields to capture more information, such as the fishery in which the commercial fishing is involved, and is engaging stakeholders to establish an appropriate working group. We will continue to monitor these actions.

Use more realistic asset performance data. In our May 2016 report on Coast Guard strategic planning, we found that the Coast Guard did not provide field units with realistic goals for allocating assets, by mission. We reported that the Coast Guard’s strategic allocations of assets were based on unrealistic assumptions about the performance capacity of its assets and did not reflect asset condition and unscheduled maintenance. This was due, in part, to the Coast Guard not including information from its field units on the actual performance of its assets. For example, agency officials noted that one of its classes of cutters was 50 years old and these cutters were hampered by mechanical failures requiring emergency dry dock repairs, which resulted in reduced availability to carry out their missions during the year. In another example, a field unit stated that based on historical use, it planned for 575 hours per vessel for one type of cutter instead of the 825 hours performance capacity.

Because actual asset use has consistently fallen below asset performance capacities, there is not a direct alignment between the Coast Guard’s strategic operational goals and its prospects for achieving those goals. As a result, the headquarters’ strategic intent, which is based on asset capacity rather than actual performance, did not provide the field with strategic, realistic goals for allocating assets by mission. Agencies should use quality information that is appropriate, current, complete, accurate, accessible, and timely to achieve objectives and address related risks. We recommended that the Coast Guard incorporate field unit input, such as information on assets’ actual performance, to inform more realistic asset allocation decisions. The Coast Guard concurred with this recommendation, and in February 2018 informed us that it plans to address this recommendation through changes to two process documents that are under revision, with an expected completion date in March 2018.

Improve performance goal data. In our October 2017 review of Coast Guard performance goals, we reported that the Coast Guard and DHS identified limitations with two of the seven selected performance goals we reviewed, including the five year average number of recreational boating deaths and injuries. In particular, officials believe that many recreational boating injuries that do not require hospitalization are not reported to the Coast Guard. These officials believe that the amount of underreporting may vary over time due to changes in industry trends, making it difficult to accurately determine actual injury rates and program performance. We determined that the data for this performance goal was not sufficiently reliable for the purposes of our reporting objectives due to these likely limitations. We found that the Coast Guard did not report the possible extent of these limitations with this performance goal in its fiscal year 2016 APR.

For the other performance goal, the Coast Guard and DHS identified limitations with the number of detected incursions of foreign fishing vessels violating U.S. waters, which is publicly reported in DHS’s APR. DHS’s review of this performance goal, reported in August 2015, raised questions about the validity of this goal—that is, whether it provides a useful measure of the Coast Guard’s performance. Specifically, the review noted that this performance goal is intended to measure a deterrence effect, but doing so is inherently difficult and may lead to contradictory interpretations of performance. In October 2017, we found that the data for this performance goal was sufficiently reliable for our reporting objective purposes, but questions remain about its validity. Reliable data is not a useful indication of performance unless it is also a valid representation of the goal being addressed. DHS officials reported that they did not include a discussion of the limitations for this performance goal in DHS’s fiscal year 2015 APR because the performance goal met the minimum threshold for data reliability despite the goal’s limitations. Coast Guard officials reported they were aware of these limitations and were working with DHS and OMB to improve the performance goal and implement corrective actions within 1 to 2 years. We recommended that the Coast Guard assess the extent to which documentation on performance data reliability contains appropriate information on known data reliability limitations and update these documents, as needed, based on the results of the assessment. The Coast Guard concurred and in February 2018, informed us that it had taken initial actions to address our recommendation. However, our preliminary review of these actions indicates that further action will be needed to fully address our recommendation, such as documenting and reporting the limitations of performance data.

Coast Guard Actions that Could Improve Transparency of Data for Reporting on Its Mission Performance and Capital Planning

Our previous reports have identified areas in which the Coast Guard could improve the transparency of its data used for reporting on its mission performance and planning.

Improve transparency of data on mission performance. In our October 2017 report on performance goals, we found that the Coast Guard’s APR has not been released publicly since 2011 due to a previous DHS leadership decision. Consequently, there has not been full visibility over performance across all of the Coast Guard’s missions. For example, one of the Coast Guard’s missions—defense readiness—has no goals that are publicly reported or shared with Congress, even though measures related to defense readiness are included in the Coast Guard’s APR.

Coast Guard officials stated that they could see the benefit of publicly releasing their APR; however, DHS’s decision to limit the number of performance goals shared publicly has so far deterred the Coast Guard from pursuing the public release of its APR. DHS officials told us that the department is concerned about conflicting information that a component’s APR might present because it is vetted and produced separately from the DHS APR. However, the lack of transparency regarding performance data shared publicly and with Congress can result in an incomplete picture of mission performance and can limit effective oversight of Coast Guard operations. As a result, the public and Congress may be unable to determine the extent to which the Coast Guard is meeting its missions. We recommended that future Coast Guard APRs be available on the Coast Guard’s public website. The Coast Guard concurred with this recommendation and in February 2018, the Coast Guard informed us that it had completed its 2017 APR and are determining an appropriate approach for making it publicly available.

Improve capital planning transparency. In our previously issued work on the Coast Guard’s annual 5-year capital investment plan (CIP), we found that the CIP does not consistently reflect current total cost estimates or the effects of tradeoffs that are made as part of the annual budget cycle. We made several recommendations in recent years intended to help the Coast Guard plan for future acquisitions and the difficult tradeoff decisions it will likely face. The Coast Guard generally concurred with these recommendations and is in various stages of implementation. For example, in 2017 we reported that we have made recommendations that DHS and the Coast Guard take several actions to gain an understanding of what the Coast Guard needs to meet its mission within its likely acquisition funding levels. These recommended actions included the Coast Guard: (1) conducting a comprehensive portfolio review across all its acquisitions to develop revised baselines that meet mission needs and reflect realistic funding scenarios and (2) developing a 20-year plan that identifies all necessary recapitalization efforts and any fiscal resources likely necessary to complete these efforts. For example, in 2014 we recommended the Coast Guard develop a 20-year fleet modernization plan that identifies all acquisitions needed to maintain the current level of service and the fiscal resources needed to acquire them. Without these efforts, the Coast Guard will continue, as it has in recent years, to plan its future acquisitions through the annual budgeting process, an approach that has led to delayed and reduced capabilities.

In 2016, the Coast Guard revised its 2005 Mission Needs Statement, which provides a basic foundation for long-term investment planning that is to serve as the basis for evaluating the effectiveness of various fleet mixes, and inform the Coast Guard’s CIP. However, the 2016 Mission Needs Statement did not identify specific assets the Coast Guard needs to achieve its missions, nor did it update the annual hours it needs from each asset class to satisfactorily complete its missions. The Coast Guard has stated it is developing a 20-year Long-term Major Acquisition Plan, but it has not stated when the plan will be completed or what will be included in this plan, such as potential trade-offs that could be made across the Coast Guard’s portfolio of acquisitions to better meet mission needs within realistic funding levels. A long-term plan with a tradeoff analysis would facilitate a full understanding of the affordability challenges facing the Coast Guard while it builds the Offshore Patrol Cutter. DHS concurred with our 2014 recommendation, but it is unclear when the Coast Guard plans to complete the 20-year plan.

Chairman Hunter, Ranking Member Garamendi, and members of the sub- committee, this completes my prepared statement. I would be happy to respond to any questions you may have at this time.

GAO Contacts and Staff Acknowledgments

If you or your staff members have any questions about this testimony, please contact Nathan Anderson at (202) 512-3841 or andersonn@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this statement. Other individuals making key contributions to this work, and the underlying reports on which it is based, include Dawn Hoff (Assistant Director); Andrew Curry (Analyst-in-Charge); Chuck Bausell; David Bieler; Richard Cederholm; John Crawford; Timothy J. DiNapoli; Michele Fejfar; Laurier R. Fish; Peter Haderlein; Eric Hauswirth; Laura Jezewski; Tracey King; Benjamin Licht; Marie A. Mak; Gary Malavenda; Diana Moldafsky; Heidi Nielson; Meg Ullengren; and Kayli Westling.

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