Environmental Protection Agency: Management Challenges and Budget Observations
Released: 2011-10-12T00:00:00

Letter

Management of EPA’s Workload, Workforce, and Real Property

With respect to its workload and workforce, EPA has struggled for years to identify its human resource needs and to deploy its staff throughout the agency in a manner that would do the most good. In 2010, we reported that rather than establishing a process for budgeting and allocating human resources that fully considered the agency’s workload, EPA requested funding and staffing through incremental adjustments based largely on historical precedent. We noted that the agency had not comprehensively analyzed its workload and workforce since the late 1980s to determine the optimal numbers and distribution of staff agencywide. Moreover, EPA’s human capital management systems had not kept pace with changing legislative requirements and priorities, changes in environmental conditions in different regions of the country, and the much more active role that states now play in carrying out the day-to-day activities of federal environmental programs. We recommended, among other things, that EPA link its workforce plan to its strategic plan and establish mechanisms to monitor and evaluate its workforce planning efforts. EPA generally agreed with these recommendations.

Our recent work has also identified additional challenges related to workload and workforce management. For example, in July 2011, we reported that EPA had made considerable progress in meeting goals to contain and control contamination at high-risk hazardous waste sites. We also reported, however, that EPA had not rigorously analyzed its remaining workload or the resources it needed to meet its cleanup goals. We recommended that EPA assess its remaining cleanup workload, determine whether the program has adequate resources, and take steps to reallocate its resources or revise its goals. An assessment could also help EPA develop budget estimates and requests that align with program needs. EPA agreed with the recommendation.

Also in July 2011, we identified challenges EPA faces in managing its laboratories and its related workforce. EPA operates a laboratory enterprise consisting of 37 laboratories housed in 170 buildings and facilities located in 30 cities across the nation. We reported that EPA had not fully addressed findings and recommendations of independent evaluations of its science activities dating back to 1992 and that its laboratory activities were largely uncoordinated. We also found that, consistent with our 2010 report on workforce planning, EPA did not use a comprehensive planning process for managing its laboratories’ workforce. Specifically, we reported that EPA did not have basic information on its laboratory workload and workforce, including demographic data on the number of federal and contract employees working in its laboratories. Without such information, we reported, EPA could not successfully undertake succession planning and management to help the organization adapt to meet emerging and future needs. Because of the challenges identified in this report, we made recommendations to address workforce and workload planning decisions. EPA generally agreed with our findings and recommendations.

In September 2010, we reported on EPA’s library network and found that EPA had not completed a plan identifying an overall strategy for its libraries, implementation goals, or a timeline. EPA had developed a draft strategic plan, but it did not describe how funding decisions were made. We reported that setting out details for such decisions, to ensure that they are informed and transparent, was especially important because of the decentralized nature of the library network. We recommended, among other things, that EPA complete its strategic plan for the library network, including implementation goals and timelines. As part of this effort, we recommended that EPA outline details for how funding decisions were to be made to ensure they are informed and transparent. EPA concurred with our recommendations.

Finally, our July 2011 report on EPA laboratories also identified challenges related to EPA’s management of its real property. Federal real property management is an area we have identified as part of our high- risk series because of long-standing problems with over reliance on leasing, excess and underused property, and protecting federal facilities. The need to better manage federal real property was underscored in a June 2010 presidential memorandum that directed agencies to accelerate efforts to identify and eliminate excess properties to help achieve a total of $3 billion in cost savings by 2012. In July 2010 EPA reported to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that it did not anticipate the disposal of any of its owned laboratories and major assets in the near future because these assets were fully used and considered critical for the mission of the customer and agency as a whole. However, we found that EPA did not have accurate and reliable information called for by OMB on (1) the need for facilities, (2) property use, (3) facility condition, and (4) facility operating efficiency, to inform such a determination. We made several recommendations for EPA to improve its physical infrastructure and real property planning, including improving the completeness and reliability of operating-cost and other data needed to manage its real property and report to external parties. EPA concurred with the recommendations.

Coordination with Other Agencies to More Effectively Leverage Limited Resources

EPA relies on other federal and state agencies to help implement its programs. Given the federal deficit and the government’s long-term fiscal challenges, it is important that EPA improve coordination with its federal and state partners to reduce administrative burdens, redundant activities, and inefficient uses of federal resources. We have identified key practices for enhancing and sustaining collaboration among federal agencies, such as establishing the roles and responsibilities of collaborating agencies; leveraging their resources; and establishing a process for monitoring, evaluating, and reporting to the public on the results of collaborative efforts.

In a September 2011 report on Chesapeake Bay restoration efforts, for example, we found that federal and state agencies were not working toward the same strategic goals. We also surveyed federal officials who said that some form of collaboration was necessary to achieve the goals of a strategy for protecting and restoring the Chesapeake Bay watershed. This collaboration could be between federal agencies, federal and state agencies, or federal agencies and other entities. We recommended, among other things, that EPA work with federal and state stakeholders to develop common goals and clarify plans for assessing progress. EPA generally agreed with the recommendations.

In an August 2011 report on pharmaceuticals in drinking water, we found that an interagency work group of eight federal agencies (including EPA) tasked with developing a better understanding of the risks from pharmaceuticals in drinking water and identifying areas for future federal collaboration had disbanded in 2009 without producing a final report. We also reported that EPA coordinated informally with the Food and Drug Administration and the United States Geological Survey to collect data that could support regulatory decisions, but it did not have a formal mechanism for sustaining this collaboration in the future. We recommended that EPA establish a work group or formal mechanism to coordinate research on pharmaceuticals in drinking water. EPA agreed with the recommendation.

In a 2009 report on rural water infrastructure, we reported that, from fiscal years 2000 through 2008, EPA and six federal agencies obligated $1.4 billion for drinking water and wastewater projects to assist communities in the U.S.-Mexico border region. We found that the agencies’ efforts to fund these projects were ineffective because the agencies, except the Indian Health Service, had not comprehensively assessed the region’s needs and did not have coordinated policies and processes for selecting and building projects. As a result, we suggested that Congress consider establishing an interagency task force to develop a plan for coordinating funding to address the region’s most pressing needs.

Related to our findings on interagency coordination issues, our past and present work seeks to assist Congress and federal agencies in identifying actions needed to reduce duplication, overlap, and fragmentation; achieve cost savings; and enhance revenues. In March 2011, we issued our first annual report to Congress in response to a new statutory requirement that GAO identify federal programs, agencies, offices, and initiatives—either within departments or government-wide—which have duplicative goals or activities. The report identified 34 areas where agencies, offices, or initiatives had similar or overlapping objectives or provided similar services to the same populations or where government missions were fragmented across multiple agencies or programs. The report also identified 47 additional areas—beyond those directly related to duplication, overlap, or fragmentation—offering other opportunities for agencies or Congress to consider taking action that could either reduce the cost of government operations or enhance revenue to the Treasury. With respect to EPA, the report included our findings on rural water infrastructure, as well as the agency’s role in duplicative efforts to support domestic ethanol production.

Related to the statutory requirement that GAO identify and report on federal programs, agencies, offices, and initiatives with duplicative goals or activities, we are monitoring developments in the areas already identified and will address any additional significant instances of duplication as well as opportunities for cost savings in future annual reports. We are developing a methodology to ensure that we conduct a systematic review across the federal government and report on the most significant instances of duplication, overlap, or fragmentation through the issuance of annual reports in 2012 and 2013, as well as the report we issued in March 2011. Our 2012 and 2013 reports will include the results of present and planned work related to EPA.

Observations on EPA’s Budget Justifications

In addition to our published work, we periodically assist appropriations and authorizing committees by reviewing agency budget justification documents. To this end, we review agencies’ budget requests, conduct selected analyses, and evaluate the support for and adequacy of agencies’ justifications for these requests. We often review the justification for programs of congressional interest, new programs and initiatives, and existing programs and practices. We typically provide the results of our analysis in data sheets or briefings to appropriating and authorizing committees.

Over the years, our periodic review of EPA’s budget justification documents has led to two recurring observations. First, EPA has not consistently provided detailed justification for its activities when requesting new or expanded funding. In some cases, we have noted that such requests have not included (1) clear justification for the amount of funding requested or a detailed description of the type and scope of activities the funding would support, or (2) information on the management controls, such as a schedule for spending the requested funds, EPA would use to ensure the efficient and effective use of requested funding.

Second, our reviews have often focused on the agency’s efforts to make use of unliquidated balances, or those funds that have been appropriated and properly obligated but not expended. In particular, this situation results from circumstances where no-year budget authority was obligated to a contract, grant, or interagency agreement that has expired with some level of funding remaining unexpended. Over the years, we have encouraged EPA to recover these unliquidated amounts through a process known as “deobligation.” When EPA deobligates funds from expired contracts, grants, or interagency agreements, it can “recertify” and re-use these funds, subject to certain restrictions, assuming the amounts have not expired and remain available for new obligations. Use of recertified funds can offset some need for new funding. Over the years, we have observed that EPA has made progress in its efforts to recover unliquidated funds from expired contracts, grants, and interagency agreements. For example, in 2010, EPA deobligated and recertified about $163 million, primarily in its Superfund, State and Tribal Assistance Grants, and Leaking Underground Storage Tanks accounts. While we have observed progress in recovering these funds, we have also observed that EPA’s budget justification documents do not describe the amount of deobligated and recertified funding available for new obligations. We have also observed that such information could be useful to Congress because the availability of recertified amounts could partially offset the need for new funding.

Chairman Stearns, Ranking Member DeGette, and Members of the Subcommittee, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be pleased to answer any questions that you may have at this time.

Staff Contact and Acknowledgments

For further information about this testimony, please contact David Trimble at (202) 512-3841 or trimbled@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this statement. Contributors to this testimony include Michael Hix (Assistant Director), Ross Campbell, Ellen W. Chu, Tim Guinane, Kristin Hughes, Karen Keegan, Felicia Lopez, Jamie Meuwissen, and Cheryl Peterson.

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