While NARA has continued to make progress on the ERA system, that progress cannot be fully quantified because NARA’s expenditure plan does not clearly identify what functions have already been delivered, how much was spent to provide each function, or how much is required to maintain the delivered increments. NARA’s current plan similarly lacks details on the functions to be provided in future increments and the costs associated with them, including development efforts scheduled to take place in the remainder of this year. In addition, although NARA has been using Earned Value Management to track program cost, schedule, and performance, weaknesses in its EVM data limit NARA’s ability to accurately report on the project’s progress. Without more specific and accurate information on the immediate and long-term goals of the program and the outcomes expected from its resulting efforts, NARA will be hindered in effectively monitoring and reporting on the cost, schedule, and performance of the ERA system, and congressional appropriators will lack information necessary to evaluate the agency’s requests for funds. Although NARA certified that the EOP portion of the ERA system had achieved initial operating capability as planned in December 2008, the system has been of limited use because of delays in ingesting electronic records into the system. Further, even though it has obligated nearly $40 million on EOP, NARA has instead answered requests for Bush electronic records by using existing systems or replicating White House systems that cost less than $600,000. Under its current schedule, the Bush Administration records will not be fully ingested into the system until October 2009. However, even when the data are fully ingested, the system’s lack of a complete, fully tested contingency plan increases the risk that a system failure or disruption will result in the system being unavailable for several days or more. We recommend that the Archivist of the United States take the following actions: Report to Congress on the specific outcomes to be achieved by ERA program funding for the remainder of fiscal year 2009. Provide detailed information in future expenditure plans on what was spent and delivered for deployed increments of the ERA system and cost and functional delivery plans for future increments. Strengthen the earned value process so that it follows the practices described in GAO’s guide and more reliable cost, schedule, and performance information can be included in future expenditure plans and monthly reports. Include in NARA’s next expenditure plan an analysis of the costs and benefits of using the EOP system to respond to presidential records requests compared to other existing systems currently being used to respond to such requests. Develop and implement a system contingency plan for ERA that follows contingency guidance for federal systems. In written comments on a draft of this report, which are reprinted in appendix II, the Acting Archivist of the United States stated that she appreciated the insight into the expenditure plan observations addressed in the report. She stated that she was pleased to note our recognition that the Fiscal Year 2009 ERA Expenditure Plan met the legislative conditions. In addition, the Acting Archivist summarized actions taken or planned in response to four of our five recommendations. Specifically, she stated that NARA provided a briefing to Congress on the specific outcomes to be achieved by the ERA program on April 27, 2009, and that further detail will be added to the next expenditure plan to address costs and functions delivered to date and what is planned for future increments. She further stated that NARA is in the process of upgrading its EVM system and will strive to comply with all 13 best practices. Finally, the Acting Archivist stated that an ERA Contingency Plan has been developed and is in final review. The Acting Archivist disagreed with our observation that the EOP system is not currently fulfilling its intended purpose. She stated that this observation failed to differentiate between what the system is capable of doing and the work currently being done on the system. She added that the system does provide required functionality—including searching any records ingested in the system—and that all the remaining data from the Bush Administration will be ingested by the end of the fiscal year. The Acting Archivist also stated that the problem was with the copies of the records that NARA received from the White House, not with the EOP system, and that the data issues have been resolved. We disagree with the Acting Archivist’s statements because the EOP system still lacks the capability to search and retrieve all Bush Administration records in NARA’s possession. Specifically, as we reported in our briefing, NARA used the EOP system to satisfy one request for presidential records during the first 3 months of the transition, but used the less expensive replicated systems to answer another 24 requests. In addition, before the transition, NARA estimated that it would not complete ingesting data until May 2009, limiting the capability of the system in the transition’s early months regardless of the replication errors that ultimately occurred. Finally, the Acting Archivist’s estimate that the Bush data will not be fully ingested until the end of the fiscal year further highlights the fact that NARA still possesses Bush Administration electronic records that cannot be searched using EOP. Until all the Bush Administration records are ingested, the EOP system will not be performing its stated function. Regarding our recommendation that NARA include in its next expenditure plan an analysis of the costs and benefits of using the EOP system to respond to presidential records requests compared to the systems currently being used, the Acting Archivist stated that it did not seem cost- effective to conduct a retrospective analysis as to whether there might have been technology solutions for systems that have already been retired. However, NARA has not yet provided evidence that the mitigation plan systems have been retired. In addition, we are not recommending a study of past alternatives, but a study of the ongoing costs and benefits of using the EOP system compared with the technology used under NARA’s risk mitigation plan. This would provide the agency with useful information in planning future spending, given that NARA was able to respond to requests for Bush Administration records using systems costing significantly less than what has been spent to date on the EOP system. Such an analysis could also inform the contingency plan the Acting Archivist said is being finalized in response to our recommendation. We are sending copies of this report to the Archivist of the United States. The report will also be available at no charge on the GAO Web site at http://www.gao.gov. If you or your staffs have any questions concerning this report, please contact me at (202) 512-9286 or by e-mail at pownerd@gao.gov. Contact points for our Office of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this report. GAO staff who made major contributions to this report are listed in appendix III. Since 2001, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA or the Archives) has been working to develop a modern Electronic Records Archive (ERA). This major information system is estimated to cost more than $550 million and is intended to preserve and provide access to massive volumes of all types and formats of electronic records, including presidential records, independent of their original hardware or software. NARA plans for the system to manage the entire life cycle of electronic records, from their ingestion through preservation and dissemination to customers. It is to consist of infrastructure elements, including hardware and operating systems; business applications that will support the transfer, preservation, dissemination, and management of all types of records; and a means for public access via the Internet. Because of the system’s complexity, NARA awarded a contract to Lockheed Martin to develop ERA in phases, or increments, the first of which was originally scheduled to achieve initial operating capability (IOC) in September 2007. However, the contractor did not meet the original cost and schedule milestones due, in part, to productivity issues with its initial development team. In response, NARA and Lockheed Martin agreed to a revised schedule and strategy, consisting of a two-pronged development approach. First, they agreed to continue development of the original system but delayed capabilities to later increments. According to NARA, IOC for this system, now referred to as the “base” ERA system, was achieved in June 2008 as planned under the revised schedule. Second, NARA conducted parallel development of a separate system dedicated initially to receiving electronic records from the outgoing Bush Administration in January 2009. This system, referred to as the Executive Office of the President (EOP) system, uses a different architecture from that of the ERA base: it was built on a commercial product that was to provide the basic requirements for processing presidential electronic records, such as rapid ingestion of records and the ability to search content. NARA believed that if it could not ingest the Bush records in a way that supported search and retrieval immediately after the transition, it risked not being able to effectively respond to requests from Congress, the new administration, and the courts for these records—a critical agency mission. NARA certified the EOP system for IOC in December 2008. As mandated by the Omnibus Appropriations Act, NARA is required to submit an expenditure plan before obligating multiyear funds for the ERA program. As in the previous year, the plan must satisfy the following legislative conditions: meet the capital planning and investment control review requirements established by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), including Circular A-11; comply with the agency’s enterprise architecture; conform to the agency’s enterprise life-cycle methodology; comply with the acquisition rules, requirements, guidelines, and system acquisition management practices of the federal government; be approved by the agency and OMB; and be reviewed by GAO. tion Act, 2009, Pub. L. No. 111-8, div. D, title V, 123 St. 524, 667 (Mr. 11, 2009).