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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (27487)	2/2/2004 8:12:02 AM
From: LindyBill	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793671

Most everybody in a position to know has agreed that a huge mistake has been made. Typical "Milbank." The article reads as if the decision to go into Iraq was the mistake. He will pound and pound on Bush.

To: Lane3 who wrote (27487)	2/2/2004 8:17:40 AM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793671

Finding Ways to Trim Budget Bush to Suggest Cuts in Programs, Improper Outlays By Christopher Lee Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, February 2, 2004; Page A15 President Bush plans to increase efforts to reduce improper government spending and will recommend the elimination of about one dozen low-performing federal programs in his fiscal 2005 budget proposal to be released today. Clay Johnson III, deputy director for management at the Office of Management and Budget, said the government could save $100 billion over 10 years by whittling down "erroneous" payments by federal agencies. Such payments, through fraud or administrative mistakes, often go to ineligible people or organizations or simply are the wrong amount. Studies by the General Accounting Office routinely have found billions of dollars in erroneous payments in such programs as Medicare, food stamps and Social Security. "We pay out money in some big Medicare programs and Social Security programs," Johnson said in an interview last week. "We're going to invest in more quality-control reviews of programs and make sure that we're paying money to the people that are supposed to be getting the money." Paul Light, a government professor at New York University, said trying to corral improper payments is a timeworn budget tool dating to the mid-1970s. Although such efforts make managerial sense, their success or failure is notoriously hard to measure, Light said. "It's very difficult money to recover," Light said. "In fact, the conventional wisdom is you have to spend money to get it." In another initiative, Bush will propose scrapping 13 programs next year that the administration believes no longer deserve funding. Johnson said the move would save more than $1 billion but added that he would not disclose which programs are on the chopping block until today. All of the programs fared poorly in the White House's ongoing effort to evaluate hundreds of programs annually on such matters as whether they are well-designed to meet their goals and whether they manage their resources effectively. Of 234 programs rated in the last budget cycle, 6 percent were found "effective," and 24 percent were "moderately effective." Meanwhile, 14.5 percent were "adequate," and 5.1 percent were "ineffective." Just more than half, 50.4 percent, lacked enough data to demonstrate definitive results. OMB officials say the ratings system can be used to determine whether it is possible to rescue a failing program. But they stressed that a poor rating does not necessarily mean the program's funding is in jeopardy. "There are programs where they don't perform that we recommend more money [for], or . . . we recommend that the program be changed," Johnson said. "The idea is that performance information is an important variable to consider." Johnson said that, including last year's reviews, OMB has scrutinized the performance of four out of every 10 federal programs. That figure should climb to six out of 10 by next year, he said. Also last week, OMB released the administration's third annual management scorecard measuring agencies' performance. The scorecard employs a traffic-light system of green for success, yellow for mixed results and red for unsatisfactory. The Department of Energy and the Office of Personnel Management won praise from Johnson as the only two agencies without any red scores in five management areas, such as financial performance and determining whether more government work should be done by contractors. Several agencies received a red rating in every area, including the Department of Housing and Urban Development, Treasury, the Agency for International Development and the Smithsonian. Johnson pointed out that OMB, the administration's repository of sound management practices and principles, got a red score in every area. The OMB management guru's message to other agencies, Johnson said sheepishly, is: "Do as we say, not as we do."