Dear Secretary:
We wanted to bring your attention to an important issue that we have been focusing on for some time that could save your agency and Americans significant tax dollars. As you know, information technology (IT) has changed the way agencies operate. Over the past decade or so IT has transformed the way agencies accomplish their missions, allowing them to be more efficient and effective. Federal agencies' track records, however, of keeping costs down and delivery dates firm when it comes to IT investments is lacking. In fact, many of these challenges are long-standing and deep-rooted issues that require your attention.
In fiscal year 2009, the federal government spent nearly $79 billion on IT projects to accomplish their missions, including keeping our troops safe overseas, our borders secure at home, and our government transparent and accountable to taxpayers. In fact, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) estimates that federal agencies will likely invest about the same amount, if not more, on new and ongoing IT investments in the next few years in order to continually improve the way agencies operate.
Unfortunately, not all of that $79 billion is spent as wisely as we would hope or expect. Poor agency oversight has led to hundreds of millions of dollars being wasted on IT programs that were planned poorly from the start and managed even worse. For example, the Census Bureau's mismanagement led to a costly malfunction of handheld data collection devices used by Census workers to conduct the recent 2010 Census. The data collection devices did not perform as promised, causing the Census Bureau to spend an additional $1 billion to revert the 2010 Census non-response follow-up operations to a paper-based system. Furthermore, the Internal Revenue Service struggled for more than 20 years and spent over $4 billion to modernize its IT systems to more efficiently process annual tax returns before they finally decided in June 2009 to abandon the program entirely. Even worse, over the past few years the Department of Homeland Security invested $52 million toward a financial system that failed and they are now starting from scratch with a new project that is estimated to potentially cost between $450 million and $1 billion. These are only a few examples of IT investments that experienced poor planning and faulty project oversight.
To address these challenges, we authored the Information Technology Investment Oversight Enhancement and Waste Prevention Act of 2009, which was approved by the U.S. Senate on May 20, 2010. Our bill would address many of the problems highlighted above by requiring agencies to properly plan projects from the outset and to conduct an independent cost estimate for projects prone to mismanagement. Further, our bill gives the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) a unique weapon that would help root out problems and put IT projects back on the right track before they spiral out of control. The bill also would require agencies to alert Congress when an IT investment significantly exceeds the expected cost estimate and mandates that the agency conduct a rigorous analysis to get it back on track. Lastly, the bill calls for OMB to create a website that provides an accurate analysis of all major IT investments.
We were pleased, then, when OMB took our advice to create a website and launched the "IT Dashboard" on June 30, 2009. The IT Dashboard is a one-stop clearinghouse of information about IT investments, which enables Congress and the taxpayers to hold agencies accountable for results. The IT Dashboard has been critical in stressing the importance of properly planning and managing the significant investments the federal government makes in technology projects. In fact, just last week OMB updated and improved its IT Dashboard to help better track complex investments and make it easier to highlight those that may need high-level attention.
Today, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its first report on the effectiveness of the IT Dashboard and found that the website has increased the level of transparency and oversight of IT investments. GAO also concluded that not all agencies were providing accurate and timely information on the status of their IT projects. Specifically, the GAO reported that some agencies fail to regularly provide updated data, provide conflicting or inaccurate cost and schedule information, and make it difficult to understand whether an investment was on target or needed some serious help. This needs to change because it deprives OMB, Congress and taxpayers the opportunity to hold agencies accountable for spending their money wisely. Accurate and timely data on IT projects are key to effective oversight and prevention of cost and schedule overruns.
To this end, we urge you to ensure your agency provides the necessary focus and attention on this important issue. We ask that you work with your staff to prioritize the planning and management of major IT investments and ensure your agency's data on IT investments is accurately portrayed on the IT Dashboard. We have asked GAO to continue to closely monitor the IT Dashboard to determine whether agencies are improving the accuracy and reliability of this cost and schedule information. We would like you to provide, by August 9 in writing, information about what your agency is doing to more regularly update accurate data on the IT Dashboard.
We appreciate your attention to this important matter and look forward to continuing to work with you on this and many other issues.
Sincerely,
Susan Collins
Ranking Member
Tom Carper
Chairman, Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services, and International
Source: U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
