[Budget Supplement]
[Making Government Work]
[13. Improving Government Performance]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office, www.gpo.gov]


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  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                                                              
                                                                                                                

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  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.

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                  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 
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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.)
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  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.
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  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.
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  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 
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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 
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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 
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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.
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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, 
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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.