[Budget Supplement]
[Making Government Work]
[13. Improving Government Performance]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office, www.gpo.gov]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
[[Page 119]]
We know big Government does not have all the answers. We know there's not a program for every problem. We
know, and we have worked to give the American people a smaller, less bureaucratic Government in Washington. And
we have to give the American people one that lives within its means. The era of big Government is over. But we
cannot go back to the time when our citizens were left to fend for themselves.
President Clinton
January 1996
----------------------------------------------------------------------
As the President told the Nation, he and his team have worked hard
since 1993 to create a leaner, but not meaner, Federal Government, one
that works hand-in-hand with States, localities, businesses, and
community and civic associations to manage resources wisely while
helping those Americans who cannot help themselves.
The President has delivered.
Since 1993, the Administration has cut the Federal workforce
by over 200,000 employees, creating the smallest Federal
workforce in 30 years--and, as a share of the total civilian
workforce, the smallest Federal workforce since 1931.
The Administration is creating a Government that provides
better service to the American people by building on the four
principles of Vice President Gore's National Performance
Review--putting customers first, empowering employees to get
results, cutting red tape, and cutting back to basics.
The Administration is transforming agencies into lean,
flexible organizations that emphasize performance: measuring
the results of programs, not just the amount of money spent on
them; making the Government an effective buyer and manager,
especially of complicated information systems; and providing
financial accountability for Government spending.
The job has not always been easy. After all, the Administration is
trying to transform a Federal Government with vestiges of early 20th
Century thinking and organization into one suited for the next century.
And, as the Government moves toward a balanced budget, it will have to
do as private organizations have done--that is, more with less.
The engines of change are the Federal workers themselves. They are why
we can reduce the size of the workforce and still improve service. They
are working harder and smarter each and every day.
The President proposes a three percent pay raise for both civilian
employees and the military. Once again, the Administration will consult
with employee organizations and others before recommending how to
allocate the civilian pay raise between locality pay and a national
schedule adjustment.
[[Page 121]]
13. IMPROVING GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE
In past years, debates about Government programs were usually
dominated by discussions over how much the Government should spend,
rather than on what the spending would accomplish. But for Americans,
the debates were largely academic. For well over a decade, the public
has been saying that Government simply is not working.
Americans expect and deserve common sense Government--a Government
that performs well, uses their tax dollars wisely, views them as valued
customers, does not impose excessive burdens, and makes a positive
impact on their lives when it addresses such problems as crime and
poverty and the challenges of employment and education.
To answer the call, the Administration is making Government smaller,
better managed, and more efficient. It is, in fact, creating a
Government that ``works better and costs less.''
A GOVERNMENT THAT WORKS BETTER
Putting Customers First
In 1993, the President issued an Executive Order directing all
agencies to develop a comprehensive program of customer surveys,
training, standard setting, and benchmarking to enable the Government to
deliver service ``equal to the best in business.'' A year later, the
National Performance Review (NPR) published the Government's first
comprehensive set of customer service standards.
The focus on customer service is bearing fruit, as the NPR outlined in
Putting Customers First. Consider the following successes:
Social Security Administration's (SSA) Customer Service Line: Business
Week reported in mid-1995 that an independent survey of some of the
Nation's best 1-800 customer service lines ranked SSA's service on top,
ahead of companies like L.L. Bean, Federal Express, and Disney. SSA's
reputation for solving problems quickly and courteously earned it the
highest overall score.
Customs Service--Streamlining Inspections: In Miami, the airlines and
Federal agencies formed partnerships to overhaul Customs procedures for
international travelers, eliminating three-hour delays and missed
connecting flights. Officials from the Customs Service, the Immigration
and Naturalization Service (INS), and the Agriculture Department worked
with airline officials to reduce clearance times to 45 minutes, on
average.
Veterans Affairs Department (VA)--Responding to Customers: Responding
to complaints about long waits to see benefits counselors, the VA
promised veterans it would cut waiting times to 30 minutes or less.
Having met that promise, the VA in the past year has aimed higher; it
now promises veterans no more than a 20-minute wait and is meeting that
goal 90 percent of the time.
The Administration has used advances in information technology (IT) to
serve customers faster, more accurately, and more reliably. IT is not an
end in itself, but a means for agencies to work smarter, faster, and
better. By making data more easily accessible, the electronic
dissemination of information not only better serves current users but
expands the potential audience.
Previously, for information about benefits or services, citizens
typically had to visit a Federal office during business hours. Now, the
Government is increasingly using 1-800 numbers and on-line connections
to deliver such information 24 hours a day.
The information that only the Government collects is vital for many
reasons. Businesses and markets depend on census data and other economic
statistics to make sound and timely decisions, and access to the results
of federally-funded scientific and technical research helps increase the
competitiveness of U.S. businesses. Federal geographic and
climatological information helps farmers to
[[Page 122]]
plan efficiently, local
governments to formulate environmental policy, and public safety
officials to prepare for natural disasters.
To expand access to the information, the Government is increasingly
using the Internet. For instance, those who rely on economic and social
data will soon find it in the Economic and Social Statistics Briefing
Room on the White House home page (http://www.whitehouse.gov/WH/html/
briefroom.html). Other examples include:
U.S. Business Advisor Web Site (http://www.business.gov). In
February 1996, the Vice President dedicated the opening of
this new form of virtual Government agency, which gives
businesses one-stop access to all Federal agencies that assist
or regulate business.
Expand Deployment of Technology in Schools (http://www.ed.gov/
prog--info/ERIC/index. html). This Education Department on-line
information service gives teachers, parents, and students a
personal touch through trained specialists available to help
them search for information.
Modernize Tax Systems (http://www.irs.ustreas. gov). This
Internal Revenue Service web site offers electronic versions
of the 500 most frequently used tax forms and instruction
booklets. In the first half of April 1995, Americans
downloaded over 200,000 tax forms and booklets; the day that
taxes were due, they downloaded nearly 20,000 forms.
Also to improve customer service, the Administration is encouraging a
wider use of electronic payments between citizens and government.
The Federal Government is making more and more payments
electronically. In 1996, taxpayers will be able to receive their tax
refunds electronically. And as part of the Federal-State Electronic
Benefit Transfer (EBT), more beneficiaries of Social Security, Food
Stamps, and other programs soon will be able to receive electronic
payments.
The Government makes payments to over 90 percent of Federal employees
and retirees through direct deposit, and pays vendors through the
Government-wide small purchase card and Government travel card. The
Administration and Congress are developing legislation to mandate that,
by 1999, the Government make all Federal payments electronically. Chart
13-1 shows the trend for paper checks and electronic payments and,
assuming enactment of the bill, projections to 2002.
These efforts to improve customer service and Government performance
are beginning to pay off. In 1995, six Federal organizations each
received one of the 15 prestigious Innovations in American Government
Award, sponsored by the Ford Foundation and Harvard University's John F.
Kennedy School of Government. Winners received $100,000 grants to foster
innovation.
The winners included:
The Interior Department's Bureau of Reclamation, which
transformed itself from a ``dam-building agency'' into a
leading water resource management bureau.
The Defense Logistics Agency's Defense Personnel Support
Center in Philadelphia, which connects consumers with
suppliers of food, clothing, and medicine. The center replaced
a cumbersome stockpile system with electronic ordering
technology.
INS' Operations Jobs Project in the Midwest, which formed
partnerships with businesses to help detect illegal alien
workers and replace them with unemployed citizens.
A GOVERNMENT THAT COSTS LESS
Streamlining the Government
Americans want a smaller Government, and the Administration is
creating one. Starting with the NPR's report of September 1993, From Red
Tape to Results, and continuing a year later in the Federal Workforce
Restructuring Act, the President and Congress agreed to cut 272,900
full-time equivalent (FTE) personnel by the end of this decade--that is,
12 percent in six years. (An FTE is not necessarily synonymous with an
employee. Put simply, one full-time employee counts as one FTE, or two
employees who each work half-time count as one FTE.)
[[Page 123]]
The Administration is ahead of schedule. It has cut the Federal
civilian workforce by 9.8 percent, or by over 200,000 employees, out of
2.2 million in January 1993.\1\ We now have the smallest Federal
workforce in 30 years (see Chart 13-2) and, as a share of the Nation's
total workforce, the smallest since 1931.
\1\The figure of over 200,000 refers to the latest count of actual
employees. It corresponds to a reduction of 185,000 FTEs, or 8.6
percent, from January 1993 to September 30, 1995.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Just as important, virtually all departments and major agencies are
streamlining their workforces (see Chart 13-3). Agencies with the
largest FTE cuts from 1993 to 1995, as a share of their workforce, are
the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), at 32 percent; the General
Services Administration (GSA), at 18 percent; and the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), at 13 percent.
Restructuring Agencies
A smaller Government is not an end in itself. The Government must
change the way it operates.
In place of the highly centralized, inflexible organizations of
yesterday that focused on process, the Administration is creating
decentralized management structures within agencies to focus on results.
In the past three years, agencies themselves have cut the number of
their supervisory personnel by over 45,000, or 23 percent of the overall
cut in employees. The President's Management Council has led efforts to
restructure and eliminate unnecessary agency field offices. In many
instances, agencies are consolidating their operations, allowing them to
close small, inefficient field offices in some places while
strengthening the services they provide to customers.
NASA and OPM are two of the agencies that are restructuring.
[[Page 124]]
NASA: Nearly 40 years ago, Congress created NASA and gave it nearly
unlimited resources to win the ``space race.'' Today, NASA has launched
a major restructuring to do more with less. Without canceling major
programs, NASA is cutting its budget needs from 1995 through the year
2000 by 36 percent, and is boosting its productivity by 40 percent over
the same period. NASA also is cutting the cost of its spacecraft and
increasing the number of launches a year.
How? First, NASA is cutting its headquarters staff in half,
consolidating redundant field functions, and focusing the missions of
the respective field centers. From 1993-1995, NASA cut its workforce by
over 3,000 FTEs. By 2000, the agency will have 8,000 fewer civil
servants and 50,000 fewer contract employees.
Second, NASA has changed the nature of its relationship with private
industry. The agency and its contractors are engaged in a new
partnership, with contractors operating and commercializing more routine
space ventures while the Government focuses on high-reward, multi-decade
research and development. NASA is using performance-based contracting to
tell contractors what it needs from them, but is giving contractors more
freedom on how they meet these needs. (For more details on performance-
based contracting, see the discussion later in this chapter.)
OPM: OPM, the Government's central personnel management agency, also
is doing more with less. After cutting its workforce by 32 percent from
1993 to 1995; scrapping four layers of management and overhead in its
field structure; and refocusing its mission on ensuring the integrity of
the merit system, OPM redesigned its management structure and functions.
Despite furloughs and a 67 percent cut in appropriated funds in the
Employment
[[Page 125]]
Service Program in 1996, OPM worked to provide first-rate
service to its customer agencies. Among other things, it used technology
to work smarter and cheaper in human resources activities. OPM also
reversed a 10-year trend of higher deficits in its revolving fund by
imposing tough management decisions, tighter financial controls, and
increased accountability. And the agency successfully privatized its
training program and will complete privatization of its investigations
function in early 1996.
Reforming Procurement
Until recently, the Federal procurement process had been controlled by
a maze of rigid laws and regulations that caused delay, consumed
resources, hindered innovation, and made it hard for the Government to
choose suppliers committed to delivering good quality at competitive
prices.
Federal procurement, which accounts for about $200 billion in spending
a year, has been a top focus of Administration activity. The NPR called
for a redesigned procurement system that would rely less on bureaucracy
and more on streamlined, customer-oriented practices to deliver better
value to the taxpayer.
The Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act of 1994 (FASA), which the
Administration and Congress developed cooperatively, includes many
Administration proposals relating to purchases of commercial items and
purchases considered ``smaller-dollar''--that is, under $100,000. FASA
allows agencies to use simplified procedures for a larger class of
smaller-dollar purchases, promotes the acquisition of standard
commercial items, eliminates many record-keeping and reporting
requirements, focuses on past performance in choosing contractors, and
reinforces the President's
[[Page 126]]
directive that instructs agencies to use
electronic commerce to streamline procurement.
More recently, and at the Administration's urging, Congress reformed
the way Government makes larger-dollar purchases and acquires
information technology (IT) as part of the Federal Acquisition Reform
Act (FARA) and Information Technology Management Reform Act, which the
President signed into law earlier this year.
These laws:
allow the Government to reduce the number of suppliers with
whom it has negotiations after it receives initial proposals;
permit the Government to develop simplified procedures for
buying commercial items up to $5 million, up from $100,000
under previous law;
repeal the ``Brooks Act,'' which forced agencies that were
buying IT to adhere to special rules and obtain GSA approval;
establish criteria for agencies to evaluate IT investment
programs, modeled on the best practices of successful
companies; and
require agencies first to make the way they work as efficient
as possible, then to automate that efficient process, and,
finally, to measure the improvement.
Streamlined Negotiation Process: The Administration is working to
enable agencies to issue solicitations more easily and to reduce their
reliance on the detailed written proposals they receive from suppliers.
For example, agencies might ask potential suppliers to present their
proposals orally. The Treasury Department's Bureau of Engraving and
Printing (BEP) awarded a service contract this way for an international
public education campaign relating to the new version of the $100 bill.
BEP estimates that oral presentations saved from eight to 12 months in
negotiating time. Firms bidding on the BEP project reported significant
cuts in their proposal preparation costs.
Using a different streamlining practice, the Government renegotiated
the price of its long-distance telephone contract in 1995 by putting two
suppliers in direct competition with one another. The Government chose
two long-distance providers up-front and will periodically put them in
head-to-head competition in the future to ensure that the Government
continues to get the best value for its dollar. Due to the most recent
renegotiation, the Government will save $200 million a year for the next
three years, and will enjoy the lowest long-distance rates anywhere--
averaging 3.5 cents a minute.
Commercial Purchases: FASA and FARA also will simplify the procurement
process for commercial products and encourage agencies to adopt more
commercial practices. These laws are enabling the Government to enjoy
the same access to good prices and current technology that other
commercial market customers enjoy.
The Defense Department (DOD), Government's largest buyer, is
increasingly using commercial products and capabilities in place of
custom-designed products that were manufactured solely for the
Government market.
The Air Force, looking to meet DOD's airlift needs, was able
to consider a derivative of a commercial airliner as an
alternative to the C-17. The competitive pressure enabled the
Air Force to save an estimated $4 billion on C-17 purchases.
The Navy used commercial electronics in its new sonar systems,
instead of a military specifications system, thus reducing the
life-cycle costs for 13 systems by $100 million over 15 years.
In addition, commercial electronics have reduced maintenance
requirements, training, and downtime by 75 percent.
Performance-Based Service Contracting: The Government spends $110
billion a year for contracted services. To improve what the Government
gets for its dollar, the Administration is introducing performance-based
contracting; the Government will make contractors responsible for
meeting performance standards while giving them the freedom to decide
how.
This method can cut contract costs by an average of 15 percent,
according to results of a Government-wide pilot project. The Navy's
conversion to performance-based contracting for aircraft maintenance
saved an immediate $25 million, and the selection process took 30 fewer
days than the previous, non-performance-based
[[Page 127]]
competition. With this in
mind, OMB Director Alice Rivlin asked agencies to develop a structured
approach to performance-based contracting in order to boost savings and
productivity.
Past Performance in Picking Contractors: In an early initiative, the
Administration encouraged agencies to use the commercial practice of
comparing the past performance of competing contractors. Knowing their
ability to get work depends on how well they have performed, contractors
now have a strong incentive to strive for excellence.
The change was immediately apparent to GSA's Federal Supply Service
(FSS). After identifying 213 suppliers in its Stock and Special Order
Program with poor work histories, FSS stopped working with 163 of them.
According to FSS, the remaining 50 have significantly improved their
performance.
MEETING BOTH GOALS: WORKS BETTER AND COSTS LESS
Changing the Way Government Manages Its Work
The Administration is committed to empowering Federal workers, and
encouraging and recognizing their enterprising efforts. Managers and
workers are transforming Government from its preoccupation with
procedures, process, and penalties to a focus on customers,
partnerships, and delivering information and services rapidly. That is,
managers and workers are changing the way Government operates.
``Reinvention Labs'': In the past three years, the Administration has
created over 200 Reinvention Labs, in which groups of employees work
outside normal bureaucratic processes to achieve results.
Some Reinvention Labs focus on the work of entire agencies or bureaus.
Others concentrate on improving or redesigning specific processes.
Labs within the Agriculture, Commerce, Energy, Interior,
Justice, and Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Departments
are developing collaborative partnerships with State and
municipal governments and private entities to reach and serve
customers better, and to respond more effectively to local
priorities.
Labs within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS),
GSA, and OPM are streamlining internal systems, such as
travel, to save money and free up employees for other work.
Several DOD labs are employing new technologies to enhance
their battlefield support to fighting forces.
Vice President Gore has recognized the successes of reinvention with
over 280 ``Hammer Awards'' for teams of Federal, State, and local
employees, businesses, and citizens--praising their efforts to build a
Government that works better and costs less.
Over a dozen such awards have gone to multiagency teams, recognizing
interagency and intergovernmental cooperation. Atlanta's Government-
Owned Real Estate Team, comprising officials from GSA and nine other
agencies, received its Hammer Award for simplifying the sale of
government-owned real estate.
The President's Management Council (PMC): In his first year, the
President asked all executive departments and agencies to name a Chief
Operating Officer who would report directly to the agency head and be
responsible for the agency's overall management. At the same time, to
help him and the Vice President foster management reforms, the President
created the PMC, comprising the Chief Operating Officers of the Cabinet
departments and several other major agencies.
The PMC is a catalyst and implementer of management reforms. It has
contributed to the Administration's efforts to reform procurement and
personnel systems, improve customer service, rationalize field office
structures, and streamline the Federal workforce. It has worked closely
with employee representatives and associations of Government managers to
make labor-management partnerships a reality. PMC members also worked
closely with Members of Congress to craft buyout legislation to make the
necessary Government downsizing more humane.
[[Page 128]]
Improving Financial Management
An efficient, effective Government needs sound financial management,
including management and reporting systems that produce reliable
information. To develop these systems, the Administration is
establishing Government-wide accounting standards, producing audited
financial statements, streamlining management controls and reporting,
and modernizing debt collection.
Government-wide Accounting Standards: To make the Government's
financial information more consistent, the Administration set an
ambitious goal for the Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board to
recommend a comprehensive set of Government-wide financial accounting
and cost accounting standards by spring. Once the Administration and the
General Accounting Office adopt the standards, agencies will use them as
they prepare financial reports and cost information that, in turn, make
the agencies more accountable to taxpayers.
Audited Financial Statements: The Administration has worked to
increase the number of agencies with audited financial statements that
earned ``unqualified opinions'' (that is, a clean bill of health). Under
the 1990 Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) Act, several agencies and other
Government entities must prepare financial statements and have them
audited. In 1991, only 35 percent of these entities earned unqualified
opinions. By 1994, almost 60 percent did.
The 1994 Government Management Reform Act extended the requirement for
audited financial statements to all activities of agencies covered by
the CFOs Act, beginning in 1996. Many of the agencies, such as SSA, GSA,
NASA, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), already have complied
and issued department-wide audited financial statements with unqualified
opinions.
Management Controls and Reporting: The Administration has worked to
cut agency administrative burdens by streamlining management controls
and reporting. In June 1995, OMB gave agencies a framework for
integrating management control assessments that are now done by agency
managers, auditors, and evaluators.
SSA and GSA have produced reports that represent a first step toward
such integration. These pilot Accountability Reports, a proposal of the
Chief Financial Officers Council, will help these agencies track their
progress in meeting performance goals. Four other agencies--the Treasury
and Veterans Affairs Departments, NASA, and the NRC--will issue similar
Accountability Reports as they complete their 1995 audited financial
statements. The pilot effort will continue in 1996. These initiatives
also eliminate the need to separately identify and track ``high risk
areas''--the Government's serious management challenges. Of the 57 high
risk areas discussed in last year's budget, agencies have adequately
addressed 12 and are tracking the rest.
Debt Collection: The Administration and Congress have been developing
legislation to modernize debt collection, creating new incentives for
the Treasury Department and other agencies to support electronic payment
and the collection of debts owed to the Federal Government. Coordinated,
Government-wide debt-collection systems can have a substantial payoff.
Treasury's Tax Refund Offset Program, which intercepts tax
refund payments to individuals who owe money to the
Government, collected over $1.2 billion in 1995, including the
Education Department's recovery of over $1 billion for
defaulted student loans.
The Justice Department's Central Intake Facility, which gives
agencies a central administrative point to which they can
refer debt claims for litigation and enforcement, collected
over $1.2 billion in 1995.
HUD's Credit Alert system has helped agencies avoid making
over $8.1 billion in potentially bad loans since 1987 by
determining whether loan applicants have been late in paying
debts owed to the Government.
Changing the Face of Federal Regulation
Regulations have the potential to be good or bad. Good regulations
bring us safer cars and workplaces, cleaner air and water, and fairer
business practices. But bad regulations--those that are too costly, too
intrusive,
[[Page 129]]
and too inflexible--can impede businesses and other
institutions from doing their jobs.
This Administration has sought to develop a more sensible regulatory
program, one that reduces the burdens of current and new regulations
while improving their effectiveness--in short, a regulatory system that
``works better and costs less.'' The President laid out his regulatory
principles in Executive Order 12866. They include:
collecting accurate data and using objective analysis to make
decisions;
considering the costs and benefits of alternative ways to
reach the goals; and
opening the decision-making process, with meaningful input
from affected entities.
In applying these principles to Government's day-to-day work, agencies
have made impressive progress toward reforming, and restoring confidence
in, the regulatory system. The following examples show how agencies have
applied these principles to new regulations.
Properly identify problems and risks to be addressed, and
tailor the regulatory approach narrowly to address them. After
reports of illness from people eating seafood, the Food and
Drug Administration (FDA) worked closely with the seafood
industry to adopt an approach that had proven effective in
improving seafood safety. The resulting regulation requires
seafood processors to continually monitor areas where health
hazards will most likely develop, employing sound science and
a sense of responsibility.
Develop Alternative Approaches to Traditional ``Command-and-
Control'' Regulation. Too frequently, the Government has told
regulated entities precisely what to do, when to do it, and
how to do it. Experience shows that, in many areas, there are
better ways to reach the same goal. As a result, the
Administration has decided to:
1. Tell people the goals to meet, not how to meet them. The
Transportation Department (DOT) had long required specific designs
for packages used to transport hazardous materials. Many of these
designs, however, became outdated--some were never tested to see
whether they actually protected the materials being moved and the
people moving them. In the past several years, however, DOT has
developed new rules that give shippers greater flexibility to
design packages, so long as they meet safety thresholds. DOT's
action has cut costs, in time as well as money.
2. Rely on Market Incentives. In such areas as fisheries, air
transportation, and the environment, the Government is creating
``tradeable permit'' systems. For example, in regions where
fishermen receive permits to catch a certain amount of fish,
tradeable permits let them catch more fish by buying the unused
portion of other fishermen's quotas. Similarly, airlines can buy
and sell landing rights at congested airports, and businesses can
buy and sell permits to discharge limited amounts of specific
pollutants.
Develop rules that, according to sound analysis, are cost-
effective and provide maximum benefits. When such analysis
suggested how to save more lives for less money, DOT
reassessed a proposal to increase protection for side impacts
in light trucks and, instead, chose a more cost-effective
proposal to increase protection for head impacts in passenger
cars and trucks.
Streamline, simplify, and reduce the burden of Federal
regulation. To reduce the burdens on small business, the Small
Business Administration (SBA) recently developed an easy, one-
page application for loans up to $100,000.
Consult with those affected by the regulation, especially
State, local, and Tribal governments. The law requires the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set emissions limits
for certain toxic materials from new and existing municipal
waste combusters. After consulting with local officials who
operate these facilities, EPA revised its regulation,
maintaining adequate protection without unduly burdening local
governments.
[[Page 130]]
Regulatory Reform: Improving new regulations is only half the
challenge; revising existing ones is equally important. In 1995, the
President directed agencies to review, page-by-page, their existing
regulations and eliminate those that were unduly burdensome, outdated,
or in need of revision. The Government is now eliminating 16,000 pages
of regulations and improving another 31,000. By the end of 1995,
agencies already had eliminated over a third of the 16,000 pages, and
improved nearly 5,000 others.
In 1995, the President announced specific regulatory reforms by major
agencies, including the EPA; FDA; the Departments of Agriculture, Labor,
and Treasury; the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation; and SBA. For
example, FDA will reform the process for developing drugs and medical
devices to bring safe and effective products to market quicker.
Recently, FDA also pledged to simplify and speed the development of
drugs created through biotechnology--an important growth industry. And
FDA has joined with the Agriculture Department to make major reforms in
the rules that govern food safety.
Waivers: The Administration has used waivers to cut Federal red tape
and give more flexibility to States and localities. HHS has given
welfare reform waivers to 37 States and Medicaid waivers to 12, allowing
them to experiment with new ways to provide services. The Administration
also has provided over 700 waivers to the Food Stamp Act.
The Education Department has used waivers extensively, approving 84
under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and Goals 2000 to give
States, school districts, and schools more flexibility to improve
academic achievement. It also has designated Kansas, Massachusetts,
Ohio, Oregon, and Texas as Ed-Flex States, allowing them to provide
waiver authority to their local districts without further approval.