[House Hearing, 109 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
PERFORMANCE-BASED BUDGETING
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, JULY 20, 2005
__________
Serial No. 109-10
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on the Budget
Available on the Internet:
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COMMITTEE ON THE BUDGET
JIM NUSSLE, Iowa, Chairman
JIM RYUN, Kansas JOHN M. SPRATT, Jr., South
ANDER CRENSHAW, Florida Carolina,
ADAM H. PUTNAM, Florida Ranking Minority Member
ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi DENNIS MOORE, Kansas
KENNY C. HULSHOF, Missouri RICHARD E. NEAL, Massachusetts
JO BONNER, Alabama ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut
SCOTT GARRETT, New Jersey CHET EDWARDS, Texas
J. GRESHAM BARRETT, South Carolina HAROLD E. FORD, Jr., Tennessee
THADDEUS G. McCOTTER, Michigan LOIS CAPPS, California
MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida BRIAN BAIRD, Washington
JEB HENSARLING, Texas JIM COOPER, Tennessee
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama
DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, Louisiana
PETE SESSIONS, Texas THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine
PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin ED CASE, Hawaii
MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho CYNTHIA McKINNEY, Georgia
JEB BRADLEY, New Hampshire HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
PATRICK T. McHENRY, North Carolina ALLYSON Y. SCHWARTZ, Pennsylvania
CONNIE MACK, Florida RON KIND, Wisconsin
K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas
CHRIS CHOCOLA, Indiana
Professional Staff
James T. Bates, Chief of Staff
Thomas S. Kahn, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel
C O N T E N T S
Page
Hearing held in Washington, DC, July 20, 2005.................... 1
Statement of:
Hon. Clay S. Johnson III, Deputy Directory for Management,
Office of Management and Budget............................ 4
Hon. Henry Cuellar, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Texas............................................. 7
Hon. K. Michael Conaway, a Representative in Congress from
the State of Texas......................................... 13
Prepared statement of:
Mr. Johnson.................................................. 5
Mr. Cuellar.................................................. 10
Mr. Conaway.................................................. 14
PERFORMANCE-BASED BUDGETING
----------
WEDNESDAY, JULY 20, 2005
House of Representatives,
Committee on the Budget,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10 a.m. in room
210, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Jim Nussle (chairman of
the committee), presiding.
Members present: Representatives Nussle, Sessions, Chocola,
Bonner, Ryun, Diaz-Balart, Putnam, Mack, Lungren, Crenshaw,
McHenry, Conaway, Spratt, Baird, Neal, and Cuellar.
Chairman Nussle. The Committee will come to order. The
subject of today's full Budget Committee hearing is
performance-based budgeting.
Good morning and welcome. Today, we are here to discuss
that concept and how it may be applied to our own congressional
budget process. I would imagine that performance budgeting is
not a concept that is necessarily well understood or even well
known by a majority of folks. So, as a first order of business
today, and I am sure our witnesses will explain this, but let
me try and give a quick, thumbnail overview of what
performance-based budgeting is about, and then I am sure our
experts will be a little bit more in depth in their
explanation.
In a nutshell, performance budgeting is an effort to tie
the funding levels for government programs to the programs'
actual performance. The intent is to ensure that performance is
routinely considered in funding and management decisions and
that programs achieve expected results and work toward
continual improvement. The practice has been utilized in
various forms and with a varying degree of effectiveness and
success by many of the 50 States, including my own State of
Iowa, as well as the Federal Government.
On the Federal level, over the past decade Congress, the
administration's Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and
other executive agencies have worked to implement a statutory
and management-reform framework to improve the performance and
accountability of the Federal Government. Through measures such
as the Government Performance and Results Act, the Chief
Financial Officers Act, the Government Management Reform Act,
and the administration's performance assessment rating tool
(PART); these are the measures that have been employed to try
and accomplish these ends.
According to GAO (Government Accountability Office), this
framework has helped. It has helped to establish a basic
infrastructure for creating high-performing Federal
organizations, with a possible next-step strategy for
restructuring budgeting practices with a much heavier focus on
performance and results during the budget deliberations. I will
note that in the report accompanying this year's budget, we
included language supporting the goals of performance
budgeting. I will also note that there have been a few concerns
raised over the years on this practice. Most notably that the
use of performance budgeting could allow the executive branch
to infringe on Congress's control over the purse; also that the
practice might be used as a means to kind of pick and choose
successful, or somebody's definition of ``unsuccessful,''
programs based on personal interest rather than actual
performance.
So today, we are here to take a good look at just what this
practice is all about, not only its concept and intent, but
also how performance criteria should be determined or are
determined. Also how these criteria are used to measure the
potential and actual success of programs and agencies and what
measures in performance budgeting are already in use at the
Federal level and what further implementation is needed or
should be encouraged. Finally, what are some of the challenges
of implementing performance budgeting at both the State and the
Federal level?
To help us in this discussion we will review the experience
of State governments, what they have had with this process,
particularly the State of Texas, a pioneer in performance
budgeting. We will explore its impact on agency performance and
funding in Texas, as well as implications of adapting such
practices to the Federal Government. And that is a perfect
segue to introducing our witnesses, all of whom are Texans and
all of whom have experience in performance budgeting in the
State prior to coming to Washington.
First, we will hear from Clay Johnson, who is the Deputy
Director for Management at OMB. Deputy Director Johnson, who
served then-Governor Bush back in Austin, is now largely
responsible for implementing the President's management agenda
and the administration's plan for improving management and
performance at the Federal Government level. In fact, it is his
job, as the President wanted to put M back in OMB, it is Clay
Johnson's job to try and accomplish that.
One of the primary components of the plan is the program
assessment rating tool, or PART, which uses the practice of
performance budgeting to improve both monitoring of a program's
performance and outcome measures.
We also have two distinguished members from this committee
from either side of the aisle: Mr. Cuellar from Texas, who has
requested that we hold this hearing in the first place. We
appreciate his leadership, he brought this to the attention of
this committee during the markup process of the budget. He is a
former State legislator who has extensively analyzed the
various States' approaches to performance budgeting and really
has given us the ability to hold this discussion today, and I
appreciate that leadership. Also, Mr. Conaway from Texas, who,
prior to serving in Congress, was a CPA, it is nice to have a
CPA on the Budget Committee. He was chairman of the State board
of public accountancy, a State agency that regulates the
practice of accountancy in Texas, who brings a strong business
perspective to this discussion. We appreciate your leadership
on this issue as well.
We welcome all of you, and we appreciate your willingness
to testify before your own committee. We are pleased to receive
your entire testimony, and we understand that you may have some
questions for each other, which will be kind of an interesting
roundtable today because you are members of the committee. It
is unusual that witnesses get to ask questions of one another,
but I know that we will learn more if we have a little bit more
freewheeling process here today, so we will see if we can
accommodate that.
With that, I will turn to Mr. Spratt for any opening
comments he would like to make.
Mr. Spratt. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much, and thank
you for calling this hearing on performance-based budgeting. It
is an important tool for public management. It is still a very
conceptual tool.
I want to welcome all three of our witnesses but
particularly give credit to Congressman Cuellar for initiating
this hearing and for his effective advocacy here in Congress
and back in Texas. Dr. Cuellar is an expert on performance-
based budgeting, having written his Ph.D. dissertation on the
topic at the University of Texas and having been a tireless
advocate of it, and this hearing is one example of that.
Having a Federal Government that does more and costs less
is a bipartisan objective. The Clinton administration began its
business by instituting the National Performance Review, which
made 380 recommendations for reinventing government after
reviewing the operations of each executive department and the
work of 11 reinvention teams and 22 agency redesign teams. The
National Performance Review issued its recommendations in
September 1993, and the President signed implementing
legislation in 1994.
President Clinton also signed into law the Government
Performance and Results Act shortly after taking office. The
GPRA required for the first time that every executive
department and all Government agencies create strategic plans
to support their missions and also to identify measures for
determining the success or progress of the performance of those
strategic plans and report annually on these measures.
In its report examining the first decade of the GPRA, the
General Accountability Office said, ``GPRA's requirements have
established a solid foundation for results-oriented performance
planning, measurement, and reporting in the Federal
Government.'' That is the foundation that we would to build
upon today, and that is the purpose of today's hearing.
I want to thank, as I said, Clay Johnson for coming, and we
look forward to working with you to put the M back in OMB--I
think that is critically important--and Mr. Conaway as well; it
is good to have your expertise at the Committee table today,
and we look forward to your testimony and the questions
afterwards. Thank you again for participating.
Chairman Nussle. Thank you, Mr. Spratt.
I ask unanimous consent that all members be allowed to put
opening statements in this part of the record. Without
objection, so ordered.
To our witnesses, your prepared statements will be made
part of the record, and you may summarize as you see fit.
Let me first turn to the Honorable Clay S. Johnson, who is
the Deputy Director for Management at OMB, and we welcome you
to the Committee, and we are pleased to receive your testimony.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE CLAY S. JOHNSON III, DEPUTY DIRECTOR
FOR MANAGEMENT, OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET
Mr. Johnson. Mr. Chairman, thank you, and Ranking Member
Spratt thank you very much for having me up here. As you
stated, we all are very interested in spending the taxpayers'
money more wisely every year. We have to be more effective
every year at spending the taxpayers' money, particularly in
this tight budget environment that we find ourselves in.
Let me comment about a couple of things that I think are
important to remember and to make sure we have as we try to get
more for the taxpayers' money and then to raise a couple of
caveats, things that are important to remember.
To get more for the taxpayers' money, we have to have
several things. We have to have a lot more information, a lot
better information than we have now. We have to have good
information about how programs are working; we have to have
good, defined outcome measures; we have to have good efficiency
measures; and we are in the process of providing that. We will
get better and better at it every year. We have to have lots
and lots and lots of transparency. We have to have all of this
information be very public not only with the Congress but also
with the American people. There has to be much more discussion
and it has to be much more what we pay attention to, i.e., how
programs are working and at what cost.
We also have to have lots and lots and lots of
accountability. The PART, the Program Assessment Rating Tool,
has an accountability element. Programs are held accountable
for the implementation of their recommended next steps for
program improvement each year, whether the program is
fantastic, medium, or not very good at all. The recent proposal
for a Sunset Commission and a Results Commission to provide
formal accountability for programs to come forward and explain,
in the case of the Sunset Commission, every 10 years why they
should continue to exist. There are various forms that
accountability can take. Those are just two: the Results and
Sunset Commissions.
We are in the process of developing a Web site for the
American people, to hear how all programs are working or not,
in English, for the lay people, not in OMB form of English, but
in English-English: Here is how programs are working, candid
assessments of how they are working, and what we are doing to
make them work better. There are many forms that accountability
can take, and we can never have enough accountability.
Two caveats I raise in the area of performance budgeting.
It should not be true that performance is the only thing that
drives budgeting. There are other considerations: priorities of
the administration and the priorities of Congress. Maybe you
have a program that works great, but it is dealing with the
entire issue that needs to be dealt with, and more money is not
called for. Alternatively, there could be a program that is
working well, but it has served its purpose, and there is no
more reason to fund that program. Occasionally, politics enters
into it and we all understand that. There should be no slavish,
automatic tie between performance and funding.
The second caveat here is the approach to performance
budgeting, the first approach, the first mind-set, and the
first objective should be that we want programs to work. The
reason to pay attention to programs is not to look for programs
to get rid of. The first goal should be to ask does this
program work or not? If it does not work, is there a reason why
we should make it work? In other words, is it a proper Federal
role? Is it an important priority for the country? And in most
cases, the answers will be yes and yes, and the primary
objective of determining, first and foremost, that it does not
work is to figure out how to make it work better.
At some point, we will decide we cannot make it work
better, or there is somebody else that can do it better, that
the role is better served by somebody else, and the decision
will be made to reduce funding or eliminate the program. But
the primary, going-in mind-set, our recommendation for using
performance information is that it should be used primarily to
make programs work better. Thank you for having me up here
today.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Johnson follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Clay S. Johnson III, Deputy Directory for
Management, Office of Management and Budget
I contend that agencies are better managed and achieving greater
results today with the help of the President's Management Agenda, but
the opportunities for improvement are great. We want programs to work.
We want to spend taxpayers' money better every year. We want to make
sure that the taxpayer's get what they expect.
One of our primary instruments for achieving this goal is the
Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART). We use the PART to assess the
performance of all Federal programs, to guide the action to improve
their performance, and to make sure our funding proposals get the
taxpayers the most for their money. With the PART, we are assessing
programs to find out what works and what doesn't. We ask of every
program:
Does it have a clear definition of success, and is it
designed to achieve it?
Are its goals sufficiently outcome-oriented and
aggressive?
Is it well managed?
Does it achieve its goals?
In order for a program to be effective, it must have a clear
definition of success and measures to determine whether it is achieving
it. Each program assessed with the PART is required to develop clear,
outcome-oriented goals and targets for improving both performance and
efficiency. PART analysis also helps identify a program's strengths and
weaknesses. In response to its PART assessment, a program identifies
the specific steps it will take to improve its performance or overcome
things that inhibit its performance. Under this model, all programs,
both high and low performers, commit to improving each year.
We have already begun to see success. As agencies have become
better at demonstrating and focusing on results, PART ratings have
improved. The percentage of programs rated Effective, Moderately
Effective or Adequate rose from 57 percent in 2003 to 67 percent in
2005. The percentage of programs rated Ineffective or Results Not
Demonstrated fell from 43 percent in 2003 to 33 percent in 2005.
The Administration is committed to holding ourselves--agencies and
programs--accountable to the American people for achieving results. One
way we do this is through the transparency of the PART process.
Currently, anyone can see the all completed PART questions and answers
online at OMB's website. We will also design a new website to more
clearly communicate to the American people what programs are working,
which ones are not, and what we are doing to make those programs
better.
We also need to enlist Congress more directly in holding agencies
and programs accountable for their performance through a Sunset
Commission, which provides regular scrutiny of Federal programs. This
bipartisan commission would review each Federal program on a schedule
established by the Congress to determine whether it is producing
results and should continue to exist. Programs would automatically
terminate according to the schedule unless the Congress took action to
continue them.
The Administration's efforts to get more results for the American
people are not only aimed at programs, they are behind the
Administration's effort to modernize the Federal Government's personnel
system. The Administration will soon propose legislation to, among
other things, ensure employees are recognized and rewarded for their
performance relative to mission-relevant goals, rather than longevity.
It will require managers to ensure everyone clearly understands what is
expected of them, how they are performing relative to those
expectations, and how they can grow professionally and become even more
effective each year. Continuous program performance improvement is
possible with such personnel reforms.
Many programs don't achieve their intended results because they are
hampered by uncoordinated programs designed to achieve the same or
similar goal. That is why the Administration proposes the enactment of
Results Commissions, which would review Administration plans to
consolidate or streamline programs that cross departmental or
congressional committee jurisdictional lines to improve performance and
increase efficiency. Ordinarily, programs that cross such boundaries
often are not subject to the usual performance review process,
resulting in inefficiencies, lost opportunities, or redundancies.
Results Commissions, made up of experts in relevant fields, would be
established as needed to review consolidation proposals. The Congress
would consider the Commission's recommendations through expedited
review authority.
The Administration has set a goal to reduce the deficit in half
over the next 5 years and is working to stop growth in non-defense,
non-homeland discretionary spending. In this context, it is even more
imperative that we invest our resources in those programs that are
performing well and those which hold the promise of performing well
with reform. When we find that tax dollars can be invested with better
result in another program, it is our responsibility to propose it. PART
ratings of ``Ineffective'' or
``Results Not Demonstrated'' were a major factor in the decision to
propose a number of reforms as well as the termination or reduction of
29 programs. For instance:
HOPE VI--The program was originally designed to address 100,000 of
the severely distressed public housing units in the Nation's urban
neighborhoods. Through 2004, 117,000 units have been demolished and HUD
has approved the future demolitions of almost 50,000 more. The PART
assessment found the program to be more costly than others and to take
too long to produce results. So the budget redirects the funds other
HUD programs.
Juvenile Accountability Block Grants--Other than anecdotal
information, there is little evidence the program reduces juvenile
crime. The Administration proposes to redirect the program's funds to
other higher priority law enforcement programs.
Migrant and Seasonal Farm Worker Training Program--The PART
assessment found that about 60 percent of participants receive no
training and instead receive only low-cost supportive services that
other Federal programs also finance. The Administration proposes to
terminate the program, as it duplicates existing programs, does not
focus sufficiently on job training, and has poor performance
accountability for grantees.
Just because we propose to terminate a program like the Safe and
Drug Free Schools State Grants program doesn't mean we don't want safe
and drug free schools. In fact, it is because we care so much about
having safe and drug free schools, and independent evaluations show
that the program doesn't help us achieve that, we propose to invest the
program's dollars instead in a program that will hold grantees
accountable for spending the money in areas with the greatest need on
activities that have proven successful. We want programs to work. The
PART helps us find out whether a program is working or not and, if not,
what to do about it. In some cases, it may be that a program is such a
low priority or performs so poorly that that program's funds should be
allocated elsewhere. It is our responsibility to convince Congress we
are right. If we are successful, the result will be more programs
achieving the intended results on behalf of the American people.
Chairman Nussle. Thank you for your testimony. We look
forward to having a chance to visit about this further.
Mr. Cuellar.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE HENRY CUELLAR, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS
Mr. Cuellar. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Spratt,
and members of the committee. Thank you for this opportunity
where we are, all of us working toward the goal of making
government more efficient, more effective, and more
accountable.
Before I get started, I certainly want to thank Clay
Johnson for the work that he has done for the OMB. Improving
the performance of our agency is a bipartisan issue that is a
hallmark of good government, and I would like to thank him for
furthering the work that got started back in 1993.
I would also like to thank my friend and my fellow
colleague, Mike Conaway, for all of his hard work that he has
done on this particular project and the work that he did back
in Texas.
What I would like to do, Mr. Chairman, is to go over a
couple of items. The first thing is, one of the basic premises
that we have, what gets measured gets done. I would like to
address today some of the items that I believe are important to
shed some further light on our responsibility as Congress
Members to provide a continuous level of government improvement
for our fellow citizens. The answer is not complicated. It is
not expensive. In fact, I believe very strongly that it does
streamline government, encourages efficiency, and does reward
effectiveness. The concept, of course, Mr. Chairman, like you
have in your State, is performance-based budgeting or
performance budgeting.
Performance budgeting is a results-oriented budget tool
that sets goals and performance targets for agencies and
measures the results. Performance budgeting not only increases
the capacity for legislative oversight, and I emphasize
legislative oversight, but it also helps to increase the
quality of services that our citizens receive. It is important
that our legislative body should remain representative and
responsive to the needs of the citizen.
David Osborne and Ted Gaebler talked about the need for
measurement in their book called ``Reinventing Government.''
Their basic premis is, if I can outline the basic premise, is
what gets measured gets done. If you do not measure results,
you cannot tell success from failure. If you cannot see
success, you cannot reward. If you cannot reward success, you
are probably rewarding failure. If you do not recognize
failure, you cannot correct it, and if you can demonstrate
results, then you can win public support for the work that you
are doing.
Their perspective is important because measuring the
performance of a government agency is a fundamental part of our
responsibility as a responsible Congress. Congress, in my
opinion, has four exercises, four fundamental functions, if I
can just outline the four functions of Government.
One is law making and public policy making. Congress makes
laws and sets public policy for the United States, No. 1.
No. 2, we raise revenues; that is, the authority to levy
taxes, fees, and the sale of bonds.
No. 3, budgeting. Congress determines the activities and
the purposes for which Government may spend money.
The fourth one is something that is very important, and
sometimes I believe we neglect it a little bit, and that is we
certainly know the Constitution prohibits Congress from
executing and enforcing the law, but Congress can independently
gather information from the executive and judicial branches and
provide this general oversight.
Now, what do we mean by ``congressional oversight?'' There
are four major purposes why we provide oversight. One is to
protect public health and welfare. Two is to protect citizens'
freedom and assure access to government. Three is to preserve
public property. The fourth is one that I emphasize, is that we
assure ourselves that public funds are properly spent and
controlled.
Performance management in State government is not a new
idea. In the States of Iowa, Idaho, and most of the 50 States,
most State governments have undertaken the challenge of
implementing performance-based budgeting, to different degrees,
I would say. Many of these are innovative programs that have
led to improved efficiency, transparency, which is what Clay
mentioned; and, of course, effectiveness. This push by the
State legislatures across the United States, in my opinion, has
made those legislatures more accountable in their oversight
activities.
States that have been experiencing budget oversight have
used performance-budgeting principles to increase their quality
of services that are given to citizens. Especially when you
have those deficits, it is important to make sure that we are
stretching out the dollars and providing the best quality
service to our taxpayers.
Of course, there are different States, and I do not want to
point out any particular one, but you can look at the State of
Delaware, and they are doing a good job of improving the
benchmarking process. You can look at the State of Utah. They
have excelled in information gathering, which is, again, what
Mr. Johnson said, it is very important, that we have the right
information. You can look at States like Virginia for their
dedication toward making the important information accessible
to the public. The Virginia Results Web site is an excellent
example of government transparency in action, and I believe the
OMB is also looking at creation of a similar Web site, which I
personally would encourage them to do, to provide that valuable
tool. And, of course, I would ask you to look at the State of
Texas.
In the State of Texas, what I am doing, Mr. Chairman, Mr.
Spratt, members, I am just providing some information. We have,
for example, strategic planning for agencies. We have the
amendments that we added that make up the performance-based
budgeting, which includes a provision on performance rewards
and penalties; performance benchmarking; customer satisfaction
assessment; activity-based costing, that is, what is the cost
of a unit that you provide; a review of agency rules also to
make sure that we get rid of any unnecessary rules and
regulations. Again, to make government more effective;
paperwork reduction also; and, of course, investment budgeting,
which is, again, what Mr. Johnson talked about, is that you can
have an agency that is efficient, but is it worthwhile having a
particular agency? Also, there are copies of some documents on
some of the priority goals, benchmarks, and performance
measures on higher education, public safety, economic
development--a series of items to give you a general idea of
what we have been looking at.
And then, finally, there is also a bill pattern from the
1970s, 1980s, and 1990s in the State of Texas that I want to
review in a few minutes, at least one of them, so you can get
an idea as to how the legislature can use that information and
how it leads to better oversight. If I can just talk about the
bill pattern, if I can have the next item on here.
The bill pattern is important. I think most States have
gone into different types of what I call ``bill patterns.'' The
first is in the 1970s, and I am looking at the department of
insurance as an example. Most States, in the seventies and
before that, had what we call ``line items.'' All they had was
a line item and amount of dollars, and if you look at this type
of information, you had money for travel, you had money for
personnel, you had money for staff, for fire prevention
coordinators; it was just a line item of information. Imagine
yourself looking at this type of budget and what sort of
questions would come up when an agency was coming in and asking
for more money.
If you look at the next slide also as an example, you will
see the bill pattern evolution. Most States went through the
same thing where they went from a line item to what they call a
``program budget''; that is, you had different types of
programs there, and it provided a little bit more information,
a little bit more dialogue between the agency and the
legislators.
If you look at the next one, in the 1990s in the State of
Texas and across the United States, you have what we call the
``performance-based budgeting,'' and if you look at this type
of budgeting, and this is what I want to emphasize, you can
have information that is provided to the legislators, sent over
to your office, but the question is, is it accessible? Is it in
a format that you can use? I think that little point is very
important because, otherwise, you will get the information, but
it is not set in an easy way to understand that will lead to
this.
If you look at this bill pattern just as an example, first
of all, you have a goal for the agency. After that, you have
also the objectives of the agencies. Then you start going into
performance measures also, and there, depending on what you
want to add there, you will ask what are we doing to encourage
fair competition in the insurance agency? What are the outcomes
that you are looking at there? How fast are we doing the work?
How are we providing that service? Who are we providing the
service to? I would highly encourage the Members to start
thinking about this evolution that I think we have seen across
the United States.
If I can go to the next part of it, you will see there that
the outputs, how much money, what are we looking at, and it
provides a different type of information that will lead to more
questions. So when an agency is coming in and asking for more
money, instead of just saying, ``Well, here is the line item.
We gave them a million dollars last year. This time they are
asking for $1.5 million,'' you can look at this information
there and ask them, ``Well, what results did you get out of the
$1 million? How are you going to do it better? Can we stretch
the dollar a little better?'' Especially if we are in a
deficit, this will help explain the work that we are doing and
get more out of the agency if it is in a format where it is
easy to be presented to the legislators.
Now, one of the things that also I am providing here, and
it is part of the handout also, is just a basic guide of
performance information questions that any legislator can ask
almost any agency, and as you can see, the question is, I asked
the members and the chairman, how many times have we asked
these types of questions to the agencies on a regular basis?
How many times are the agencies ready to come in with their
questions to be asked, not only the appropriations but in any
of the other substantive committees that we serve? I believe if
we look at these types of questions, and the agencies are ready
to answer these types of questions, and it does not matter what
committee you are in, I think this will lead to a results-
oriented type of government.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Spratt, and members of the
committee, performance-based budgeting is a results-driven
method which encourages not only better oversight by the
legislature but also managerial improvement because if the
agencies are able to use these results. They can go from the
headquarters in Washington all the way down to the field
offices to make sure that they are performing the work that
they are doing and, therefore, will get better program results.
We have a responsibility to our citizens, and the dialogue must
start with us.
The final point: What we want to have is a performance-
budgeting tool that is nonpartisan. It should not change when
one administration changes over to another, and performance
measures should not be under the influence of any partisan
trends. In other words, it does not matter what administration
is in office, it does not what majority or minority is running
the different committees; we should have nonpartisan tools so
we can provide the better results. We need to supply the
congressional committees with information that is accurate and
useful in the assessment of agencies.
We should also use some of the States as laboratories. Your
own State, Mr. Chairman, is a very, very good State that has
done a lot of good work, and I think that using them as
laboratories will help us do our job better and take the best
of the work that has been done in different States.
We need to encourage some sort of establishment of a
performance structure for this form of congressional budget
oversight. It is one of our constitutional duties and
responsibilities to provide oversight. Ensuring budget
oversight is a very important responsibility. And I think if we
stand together and work together, I think, by working together,
we will provide the results-oriented government that our
taxpayers and our consumers want from us. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Cuellar follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Henry Cuellar, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Texas
NEED FOR A RESULTS-ORIENTED PHILOSOPHY IN THE CONGRESSIONAL BUDGETING
PROCESS STRENGTHENING CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OVERSIGHT
Our constitutional obligations and legislative accountability have
made the purpose of effective legislative oversight imperative.
Chairman Nussle, the Honorable John Spratt and Members of the
Committee, we are here today in pursuit of making government more
efficient, effective, and accountable.
Before I start I would like to thank Clay Johnson and the
hardworking people at the OMB. Improving the performance of our
agencies is a bipartisan issue that is a hallmark of good government,
and I would like to thank them for furthering the work started back in
1993. I would also like to thank my friend and fellow representative
Mike Conaway for his dedicated work on this project.
WHAT GETS MEASURED, GETS DONE
I address you today in order to shed further light on our
responsibility to provide a continuous level of government improvement
for our fellow citizens. The answer is not complicated or expensive; in
fact it streamlines government, encourages efficiency, and rewards
effectiveness. The concept that I refer to is Performance Based
Budgeting. PBB is a results oriented budget tool that sets goals and
performance targets for agencies, and measures their results. PBB not
only increases the capacity for legislative oversight, but it also
helps to increase the quality of services that our citizens receive. It
is important for our legislative body to remain representative and
responsive to the needs of our citizens.
David Osborne and Ted Gaebler summarized the need for measurement
their book, Reinventing Government: How the Entrepreneurial Spirit is
Transforming the Public Sector (1992):
What gets measured, gets done
If you don't measure results, you can't tell success from
failure
If you can't see success, you can't reward it
If you can't reward success, you're probably rewarding
failure
If you can't recognize failure, you can't correct it
If you can demonstrate results, you can win public support
(Osborne and Gaebler 1992, 146-155)
This perspective is important, because measuring the performance of
government agencies is a fundamental part of our responsibility as a
responsible Congress.
A Congress Exercises Four Fundamental Functions:
Lawmaking and public policy making. Congress makes laws
and sets public policy for the United States. This function includes
fact-finding and analysis related to both governmental and non-
governmental activities.
Raising revenues. Congress has authority to levy taxes,
fees, and authorize the sale of bonds.
Budgeting. Congress determines the activities and purposes
for which government may spend money.
General oversight of government. The Constitution
prohibits Congress from executing or enforcing the law. But the
Congress independently gathers information about the executive and
judicial branches to aid it in its policy-making functions.
And Congress Exercises its Oversight Powers to:
Protect the public health and welfare,
Protect citizens' freedoms and assure access to the
government,
Preserve public property, and
Assure itself that public funds are properly spent and
controlled.
PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT IN STATE GOVERNMENTS
Performance Budgeting is not a new idea. Most state governments
have undertaken the challenge of implementing Performance Based
Budgeting in their own agency institutions. Many of these innovative
programs have led to improved efficiency, transparency and
effectiveness. This push has also allowed state legislatures to become
more accountable in their oversight activities. States experiencing
budget shortfalls have used PBB principals to increase the quality of
services given to the public. A lot of wisdom has been gained through
the trials in our states, and almost all of them are ahead of the
Federal Government in PBB implementation. We need to implement policy
examples from the best states, and we need to avoid our past mistakes.
The information is at our fingertips, we owe our citizens their due
diligence.
I urge all of you to look at what Delaware is doing to improve the
benchmarking process, or to take a serious look at how Utah has
excelled in information gathering. We can also look for guidance in
states like Virginia for their dedication toward making this important
information accessible to the public. The Virginia Results website is
an excellent example of government transparency in action. It is my
understanding that the OMB has proposed the creation of a similar
website, and I would like to personally stress the need for this
valuable tool.
Please refer to the companion materials for examples of the work
done in Texas.
BILL PATTERN EVOLUTION
One of the most important changes occurring through the performance
budgeting process is the inclusion of performance information in the
budget itself. Having performance information included in a manner that
is appropriately organized and easily understandable is an important
first step. When we have this type of information we have a useful tool
for formulating benchmarks. This information can also be valuable in
determining the true budgetary costs of each individual type of service
that we provide to our citizens.
Agencies can use this information to justify funding levels for any
specific amount of output. Appropriators will also have a better idea
of the connection between funding and the impact of their programs.
CONCLUSION
Performance-based budgeting is a results-driven method which
encourages managerial improvement and better program results. We have a
responsibility to our citizens, and the dialogue must start with us.
What we want to have is a performance budgeting tool that
is Non-Partisan. It should not change when one Administration changes
over to another and performance measures should not be under the
influence of partisan trends.
We need to supply Congressional Committees with
information that is Accurate and Useful in the assessment of agencies
and programs.
We should use the States as Laboratories. A lot of wisdom
has been gained through the trials in our States, and almost all of
them are ahead of the Federal Government in PBB implementation. We need
to implement policy examples from the best States, and we need to avoid
our past mistakes. The information is at our fingertips, we owe our
citizens their due diligence.
We need to encourage the establishment of a formal
structure for this form of Congressional Budget Oversight in the
Legislative Branch. It is our responsibility to meet this challenge.
We need to Stand Together and do what is best for our
citizens. It is for this reason that we need to bring all of Congress
together in the support of these necessary solutions.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify. I will look forward to
answering your questions.
Chairman Nussle. Thank you. Can I just ask real quick while
it is fresh in our minds, a question regarding your charts? For
instance, there was a benchmark that in 180 days all cases
would be settled. Who created that? Is that the governor, the
legislature, or the department itself?
Mr. Cuellar. What we did is we had the Governor's office,
the executive branch, work with a body we call the Legislative
Budget Board, and I have been thinking about who would be the
agency to do that here at the Federal Government. They were our
financial experts. They would work with the executive branch
and basically negotiate what performance measures they would
have. Then that information would be put in the bill pattern to
us. Then the legislature would have to write and say, You know
what? We think this is a little low, I think we ought to
improve the measures up, or we think we ought to add this
particular measure. So the legislature would come in and have
the final product.
Chairman Nussle. So it is statutory?
Mr. Cuellar. Yes, sir.
Chairman Nussle. The end result: It is statutory?
Mr. Cuellar. The overall scheme is we started this by
working on the appropriations bill, but it was part of the
statutory and part of the appropriation process also.
Chairman Nussle. All right.
Mr. Cuellar. But it was basically a two-step thing where,
finally, once you start talking to the Congress or to the
legislature, and you had the legislature saying, ``You know
what? We ought to change this. Why do you have these particular
results?'' the budget oversight and the dialogue between the
legislators and the agencies greatly improved.
Chairman Nussle. Thank you.
Mr. Conaway, welcome to your own Committee, and we are
pleased to receive your testimony.
STATEMENT OF K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS
Mr. Conaway. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member
Spratt. I am happy to report that the witness chairs are no
more comfortable than the Member chairs. For some reason, these
things all slant forward.
Chairman Nussle. Actually, they are very comfortable up
here.
Mr. Conaway. I suspect they are. At the eagle's nest, I
suspect they are. This is an unusual view for me. I rarely see
the folks behind me, so I am glad to be here.
I have worn both hats in the Texas scenario, in the sense
that I am a CPA. I have got 30-plus years' experience with
dealing with budgets and strategic plans and, for the most
part, watching them provide support for cobwebs and other
things as they accumulate in the corner. I chaired the State
Board of Accountancy, which is a regulatory agency that
oversees the practice of accountancy in Texas. There are 55,000
to 57,000 CPAs, 10,000 firms that this agency is responsible
for overseeing, and it worked with the Texas legislature
through three sessions in that process.
The manufacturer fulfillment of this piece is the toughest
part, and by that, I mean, do we really use this as a tool to
effect better government? I think the evidence is pretty scant
that we do, in fact, do that. Businesses maybe do a little bit
better job of it, but even they have a hard time making this
thing work.
As an example, something that the Committee prepared talked
about, as a result of the PART analysis, the President's budget
for 2006 proposed to consolidate the CDBG grants and the
economic development assistance grants. So the PART tool used
to affect change in the budget--we did not get that done in the
budgetary process. The political backlash, the whole ownership
of those particular programs overran that analysis piece of
what was going on.
This whole process in Texas; I saw it work, like I say,
pretty spotty, the fact that the very worst agencies were
sometimes affected by the overall review process, the analysis.
The best agencies were rarely rewarded, and the mediocre
agencies, the folks in the middle--that is a bad phrase--all of
the agencies in the middle just kind of kept pumping this stuff
in, and I am not sure that the decision making--in Texas, it is
much less partisan. The legislative budget board that my
colleague mentioned, the Sunset Commission, or both, Members
from both sides of the House, but when you are in front of them
testifying, as I did several occasions, and I took the agency
through the sunset process, which happens every 13 years as
well, it is really not partisan at all. That does not weigh
into it.
Unfortunately, at our level, in this town, that is a
reality we cannot ignore because we just simply will not make
good decisions separate and apart from the partisan nature of
how we conduct business up here.
So the one point I would make before I shut up and answer
questions is buy-in. In other words, it is easy to gloom onto
these programs and to say, yes, we are doing this, but are we
going to buy into it? Are we really going to run our business
in this manner using these tools? And when we get the results
from these tools that show us a direction, are we going to go
that direction, or are we just going to simply ignore it? There
will be occasions for ignoring it. Like Mr. Johnson said,
sometimes you do not run everything on a dollars-and-cents
basis, but that ought to be an informed ignore. It ought to
have a rationale for saying, OK, our tools tell us this, but
here are the reasons why we are not doing it, and those reasons
for not doing it ought to be something other than just partisan
politics and those kinds of things.
So I think we ought to be about this process, we ought to
be doing it, but unless we are actually going to use it. Back
home in my barn, I have got a tool chest full of tools
gathering dust. They are nice and pretty, and they look real
fine, but if I do not use those tools in trying to get
something done, then I am not doing it as efficiently as I
might since I do have those tools to do it.
So it is buy-in, and it is tough in this town to make that
happen, given the tension between the executive branch and the
legislative branch and then the further tension between the two
parties that periodically swap places as to who gets to sit in
the middle chair. So it is going to be a tough job to do, but
we ought to be about it, but it will be hard. So with that,
sir, I will yield back and be ready to answer questions.
[The prepared statement of K. Michael Conaway follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. K. Michael Conaway, a Representative in
Congress From the State of Texas
INTRODUCTION
First, I would like to thank Chairman Nussle and my colleagues for
arranging this hearing and inviting me to testify before the committee.
As my colleague Mr. Cuellar and the Honorable Clay Johnson will
testify, Congress, the Office of Management and Budget and other
agencies have worked to establish various forms of Performance Based
Budgeting and oversight to improve performance and accountability
within the Federal Government. Specifically, the implementation of the
Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 (GPRA) and Program
Assessment Rating Tool (PART) reflect efforts to advance this approach
to the Federal budgeting process. These programs represent a solid
first step in the evolving implementation of performance budgeting.
Many States, specifically in my experience, Texas, have
successfully implemented methods of Performance Based Budgeting and
oversight, such as the Legislative Budget Board (LBB).
My goal in testifying before the committee today is to bring to the
table a general discussion, from my perspective, on how facets of state
budgeting and ``business-like'' budgeting processes may be implemented
in our own Congressional budget process.
I have examined the budget process from a number of perspectives:
as a private business owner, as an accountant and member of the Texas
State Board of Public Accountancy, and as a Member of Congress.
BACKGROUND
By way of background, Texas works on a biennial budget and the
Texas Constitution contains provisions that limit total state
appropriations. Appropriations that exceed revenue may not be made
except by a four-fifths vote of each house. Basically, if an
appropriation exceeds the budget, it will not be implemented without
the legislature's intervention. By taking this approach, the Texas
Legislature has ensured that any piece of introduced legislation that
will exceed budget limitations must be effective and important enough
to garner votes.
The Legislative Budget Board (LBB) was created in 1949 and requires
all state agencies to submit their budget requests to the LBB for
review and recommendations. The board is comprised of two joint
Chairmen, the Lieutenant Governor and the Speaker of the House of
Representatives; the Chairmen of the House Committee on Appropriations,
House Committee on Ways and Means, and the Senate Finance Committee.
Appointed members also include two House members and three Senate
members appointed by the Speaker and the Lieutenant Governor
respectively.
Over the years, legislation has been enacted to expand the LBB's
duties to include evaluation of agency programs, to estimate the costs
of implementing legislation and to establish a system of state agency
performance audits and evaluations. Results of these evaluations are
then reported to the Texas Legislature. This report is also made
available to the public through the Texas Budget Source.
TEXAS STATE BOARD OF PUBLIC ACCOUNTANCY
My interaction with the State budgeting process began as a member
of the Texas State Board of Public Accountancy (TSBPA), a state agency
that regulates the practice of accountancy in Texas. In 1995, then-
Governor George W. Bush appointed me to TSBPA. I served on TSPBA for 7
years, including more than 5 years as Chairman. During my tenure, the
Texas Legislature signed into law a bill to address the need for
government to operate more efficiently. Under the Act, referred to as
the ``Self-Directed Semi-Independent Agency Project Act'', the TSBPA
became a self-directed semi-independent agency (SDSI). TSBPA and two
other similar agencies are the focus of this pilot program to test the
concept of deregulating regulatory agencies in order to enhance their
efficiency. The project is expected to expire September 1, 2009. Under
this transition, the TSBPA budget was effectively taken out of
appropriations process. TSBPA believes this shift allows them to take a
``business-like'' approach to budgeting. The SDSI structure is only
appropriate for self funding agencies that receive no general revenue.
Some points of this project are:
To make regulatory agencies accountable to their
stakeholders. The agencies are also charged with operating as a
business.
The regulatory agency establishes fees charged to cover
all of its operations.
Sovereign immunity remains intact for enforcement and
disciplinary functions.
Regulatory agencies in the project are removed from state
appropriations.
Applicable agencies continue to collect and remit the $200
annual professional fee for the General Revenue Fund.
Agencies continue to be audited by the Office of the State
Auditor and pay the associated costs
Oversight agencies, such as the LBB and the Governor's
Office of budget and planning are relieved of oversight
responsibilities and associated costs.
Licensees become directly involved in evaluating the cost
of operating the agency.
Reduce the state budget.
Reduce the number of state employees on the state payroll.
(Source: Texas State Board of Public Accountancy Strategic Plan, FY
2005-2009)
The Texas State Board of Public Accountancy continues to implement
its budgeting oversight measures. Most recently, under the ``Self-
Directed, Semi-Independent Agency Project Act'', the Board has begun to
implement a review program whereby sponsor's courses are systematically
examined for their quality. The first computerized examination was
offered in April of 2004 and will occur at regular intervals in the
future. In its Public Accountancy Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2005-
2009, TSBPA states that, ``It is the opinion of the Board that with the
implementation of Self-Directed, Semi-Independent Status, the Board now
has the flexibility to respond to the changing needs of a global
profession. This will allow the Board to function in a more business-
like manner to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century.''
(Source: Texas State Board of Public Accountancy Strategic Plan, FY
2005-2009)
The appropriations process, including the periodic reviews of each
state agency, treats all agencies the same. That process is essential
for all state agencies that accept any general revenues or tax funding.
The appropriations process is cumbersome and inflexible for certain
regulatory agencies. The SDSI pilot is intended to demonstrate a system
of operations which allows the pilot programs to function in a more
business-like way. By completing the missions as assigned to those
agencies by the state legislature, the legislative and executive
oversight functions are set at appropriate levels to determine that
agencies are run efficiently and that assigned missions are
accomplished. Burdensome and redundant oversight procedures are
eliminated by placing more trust in the governing board that is
appointed by the Governor.
IMPLICATIONS FOR THE CONGRESSIONAL BUDGETING PROCESS
A state form of oversight is not feasible to implement on a whole
at the Federal level; however, there are facets that we in Congress
would benefit from examining.
These components may include:
An objective, timely, collection of accurate data from
agencies
Accountability
Transparency to the public
A periodic review of the need of Federal agencies
There are obviously inherent differences between the budgeting
structures of states versus the budgeting structure of Congress. In a
business, you have one ``president,'' one goal. In the House, we have
435 different actors, 435 different goals, and we all have different
objectives for each State we represent. However, there is one goal that
I would like to think all of my colleagues can agree upon: ensuring
that Federal agencies are held accountable to the taxpayers. In the
current era of fiscal restraint, it would be beneficial for Congress to
continue to pursue these avenues.
Once again, I would like to thank my colleagues for the opportunity
to testify today. I would be happy to answer any further questions
regarding my work on the Texas State Board of Public Accountancy or
regarding my perspectives on performance budgeting in Congress.
Chairman Nussle. Thank you. Let me start by taking your
example and then offering it to Director Johnson, and that is
the CDBG block grant proposal that the President made, and it
is only by way of example because actually the one I was going
to use was Amtrak. You could use any, and no one should use
this forum as a way to pick on one particular program. We are
trying to learn, so it does not matter, but let us use the one
that was brought up. I heard, not only from my own constituents
but from a number of Members on both sides in developing the
budget, that there was just no way we were going to be doing
what the President suggested in his budget and what the PART
came up with with regard to CDBG as an example.
Is that a good example of where the process breaks down?
Where you can do all of the good work in providing the
information, judging its effectiveness, determining whether a
program works, determining whether there is a better way for a
program to be delivered or a policy to be implemented, and then
it breaks down at the political level? Are there other examples
of this?
This has probably got to be the biggest challenge because
you said, as an example, first determine whether it is the
Government role, and that is a political decision. Mike said it
is partisan, and it is often not. Take Amtrak and CDBG and farm
programs and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. That is more
parochial than it is political, I would suggest. So is that
where this process breaks down, is at that level?
Mr. Johnson. Well, there are several ways it can break
down. Taking CDBG, one of the reasons that broke down was a lot
of Congressmen used to be mayors, and a lot of mayors remember
getting that CBDG money with no strings attached, and the idea
of having strings attached to CBDG money is not popular with
mayors. If you had to come up with one simple reason why that
proposal failed, it is for that reason.
When the CBDG program was evaluated, there were four
different categories. One of them is design purpose. The score
for purpose of CDBG was zero. It was not a low number; it was
zero. There was a lot of discussion about what CDBG was
supposed to accomplish, and we have spent $110 billion in the
last 25 years with no defined purpose. This was pointed out by
the PART.
So the proposal would let us be more specific about what we
are trying to do with this CDBG money. Specifically, what the
program is theoretically supposed to do. Is it is supposed to
help create economic vitality in areas where it would otherwise
not exist: low-income, low-socioeconomic areas? At the same
time we were looking at that, there were a number of other
programs that deal with CDBG-like goals, 30-some-odd programs,
and they have different definitions of what success is, very
different definitions of what economic vitality is, so they
worked at cross-purposes; they were inconsistent with each
other.
So the idea was to let us take the opportunity not only to
more clearly define what CDBG is about, but let us look at
combining some things with CDBG, take it from 30 programs,--I
think we were combining 14 programs together--get it down to 3,
4, or 5 programs and rationalize them, be much more specific.
And hold local municipalities accountable for what they spend
their money on. If they can spend it on the very same things--
some cities spend it on building inspectors, which does not
sound like it is directly related to creating economic
vitality, but if that is what the city wants to spend it on.
But they have to show, on an annual basis or whenever they have
to come back for more money, how they spent the previous money
and how they went about creating economic vitality with the
money they got from the Federal Government.
Cities were not interested in that and let their
Congressmen know that, and the Congressmen who used to be
mayors knew that they would not like that, and so huge
disinterest in tightening up the specs and creating a more
specific purpose for how we spend $4 or $5 billion a year. So
that is one reason. People would rather have unfettered money,
free money, than not free money. They would rather be held not
accountable than accountable.
A lot of money we give and spend in the Federal Government
is given to other people to spend to do good things, and so a
lot of the way we make programs work in the Federal Government
is to hold local grant recipients, if you will, more
accountable for how they spend their money.
Adult literacy programs; we do not know what it costs to
teach an illiterate adult how to read. We spend $500 million a
year on adult literacy programs and cannot tell you what it
costs. We have done this for years. We cannot tell you what it
costs to teach an illiterate adult how to read. We do not hold
local adult literacy programs accountable for taking this
amount of money and producing a certain number of literate
adults with that money, that is nuts. We need to figure out how
we are spending this money, and if we are spending $500 million
to teach illiterate adults how to read, we need to figure out
how many people that should teach how to read and make sure it
happens.
So I think one overriding thing is recipients would rather
get money where there is no accountability than get money where
they have to be held accountable. So when you start trying to
tighten the specs, they are going to let their Congressmen and
their Senators know, and they are going to resist that, and it
requires discipline, what Mike talked about. It requires
discipline; it requires a commitment, and it requires it being
a priority to really make it happen.
This is a very long answer to your question. We PART'ed 20
percent of the Federal programs each of the last 4 years. By
the end of this year, we will have PART'ed 80 percent of the
programs. And we get some appropriations subcommittees that
have welcomed the use of performance information. Others have
not only resisted it, they have tried to write into law that we
are not allowed to send performance budgets to them.
So there is a wide range of receptivity up here on the Hill
to the use of performance information. One of the things I
hear--I just cannot believe it--as one of the reasons why
Members and Senators resist the use of performance information
is they do not like the hassle of having to explain why we are
funding programs that do not work. I refuse to believe that,
but that is what some people contend.
Chairman Nussle. It was a long answer, but it was a good
answer. This is where the rubber really hits the road. It is
great to have this conversation, but we have got to figure out
how to----
Mr. Johnson. It is what Mike talked about. There has to be
the will to follow through. Somebody made the comment that it
would take a generation to really fully realize this. This is
not a one- or 2-year deal. I do not know about a generation,
but we have been working at it for 4 years. We do not have
performance information for all of the programs yet, but we
will at the end of next year. But it takes an institutional
commitment to make this happen.
Chairman Nussle. Well, under the theory that every long
journey requires the first step, if CDBG, Amtrak, or whatever
one you want to use as an example is a poster child of where it
maybe is not working very well, what would you suggest as a
poster child of where it has worked well? Where you have been
able to put this up, and Congress has responded, and effective
change has been made, and you took it from a zero or a low
number to a very high number?
Mr. Johnson. The primary use and value of the PART to date
has been in getting programs to work better where it does not
require Congress----
Chairman Nussle. [Laughter.]
Mr. Johnson (continuing). Where we could change the focus
of the program, where we could change the management of the
program, where we could change what the definition of what
``success'' is. It was not meant to be a negative comment about
Congress.
Chairman Nussle. You are going to put Congress through a
performance review next.
Mr. Johnson. No, no. That was not meant to be a negative
comment.
Some examples of several reasons, for instance, why a
program might fail: The Even Start program is considered to be
ineffective, however, it is working the way it is designed to.
Things are happening the way it is designed to, but the belief
is that these programs working with low socioeconomic families
with children between the ages of three and seven, which has
been studied three different times nationally, has been proven
to be ineffective. It is a nice idea; it just does not work.
And so because PART has been used to drive us to that firm
conclusion that it just does not work, the Department of
Education is looking to take that same money and put it to
effective use somewhere else. The Department does believe that
focusing on reading skills at an early age is an important
thing to do, and they are taking those monies from Even Start
and putting them into early reading programs, or they would
make that budget recommendation.
The Juvenile Accountability Block Grant program is also
considered to be ineffective. The reason it is considered to be
ineffective is there is no defined goal. There is a lot of
language about how great it is to focus on juvenile problems,
but there is no definition of ``success,'' and so the money
goes out, and you do what you want to with it. The way to make
that work is to have the Congress be tighter about what it is
we expect to have happen, and once we have that in the
legislation or in the enabling legislation--I do not know if it
can be done by any other way--then you have measures with which
to hold grant recipients responsible for how they spend the
money.
So, in one case, stopping the program would be the response
to deal with ineffectiveness. The other case is let us tighten
up the specifications, and that would be the recommendation for
CDBG. Let us tighten up the specifications, and at the same
time, we have all of these related programs that do not make
any sense and are not clearly defined. Put all of those
together, and make it easier for people to come and get money
to use to accomplish their desired goal.
The thing that the PART does, or the program assessment
does, it causes not just Congress, not just the appropriators,
not just the budgeters, not just the people in the executive
branch; but it causes all of us to start off by saying, ``We
are spending money. Does this work?'' And if the answer is no,
or in a lot of cases, I do not know, then we are committed to
go do something about it, to not let that pace, that situation,
persist.
It is inexcusable for all of us to continue to allow money
to be spent if we know that it does not serve a purpose, or if
we do not know what purpose is served. In both of those cases,
we should be committed to do something about it, and the kind
of information that Henry talks about helps us do that.
I am glad you all could come to my testimony here. Some
appropriations subcommittees are very accepting of performance
information and like it and have made the transition. One way
to do it would be to try to take one that really wants to do
it, take one or two, or take some agencies, and have them be
the models. Encourage them, support them to go way ahead to get
to a really advanced state of this and to show the rest of the
agencies and the rest of the subcommittees how this can be
done. I bet that you could get some fantastic best practices
out there in a year or two because a couple of them have
already made the start. Some of them are still very resistant,
but I will bet we could find a couple to get out ahead of the
pack and report back, ``Come on in. The water is fine.''
Chairman Nussle. And then, for my friends from Texas, my
understanding is that one of the reasons why the Texas model
and other State models seem to be somewhat more effective in
accomplishing performance budgeting and using performance and
results measurements as a way of making decisions is because
there is an independent administrative board. There is a third
entity that is helping to broker the decision-making process
here that has power that is at least equal to or greater than
the legislature or the executive in helping to manage this
process, which we do not have. Unless you see a likelihood, I
do not see a likelihood, of us creating yet another super
agency, unless you do. Is that really the big difference
between success here, that there is another agency that is out
there?
Mr. Cuellar. Mr. Chairman, if I can respond to that.
Chairman Nussle. Please.
Mr. Cuellar. This agency does not have more power than the
legislature or the executive branch. They are part of the
legislature. They work for the legislature. What they do is
they work with the executive branch to work out the performance
measures. That is all they do. They do that. Then we also have
the State auditors office that comes in and verifies----
Chairman Nussle. Right.
Mr. Cuellar (continuing). That the information that has
been provided is accurate because you do not want to get trash
in and trash out. You want to make sure that the information is
accurate. But the ultimate decision-makers are going to be the
legislators. With all due respect to Clay, he is talking about
the executive branch making a decision on their own agencies
that are ineffective.
To me, I believe that should fall on the legislature, on
the Congress, because--if I can have one of the slides up
there--we can talk about CDBG, Amtrak, or Even Start, any of
the programs, and ask you if the legislature was ever asked any
of the questions, the questions on the performance, the basic
questions that should be asked by legislators, and I would ask
any of the Members here if anybody ever asked any of those
questions.
For example, if you are talking about CDBG or talking about
Amtrak or Even Start, did we ever ask, what is your program's
primary purpose or purposes? If you ask anybody here, Mr.
Chairman, and I might be wrong, but did anybody ever say, this
is the purpose, and if it is not the purpose, that we start
getting into the dialogue where we change the purpose. Which
citizens are affected? What are the key results that are
expected from this use of taxpayers' funds? What do we expect
our cities to do? I do not think we are ever asked this.
In Texas, we had contracts. Anybody that dealt with the
State of Texas, we put performance measures. Any grants that
went out to any of the local entities had performance measures.
So we had performance measures to anybody that got State
dollars, but I ask you, did anybody ask any of those questions?
What were the results in the most recent years? How do you
compare those results to your targets?
When somebody comes in and tells me, and I do not mean this
in a bad way, but says, ``CDBG is doing a bad job,'' or ``the
Amtrak is doing a bad job,'' or ``the Even Start is doing a bad
job,'' I appreciate their input, but I want to know that we, as
a legislative body, ask those questions instead of somebody
saying it is bad, it is ineffective, or it has out-used its
purpose. I want to know why, or do we have an opportunity to
change those goals or those primary objectives of that agency.
I do not think we have done that. I really, sincerely do not
think, and it is hard. I agree with Clay.
Chairman Nussle. Take CDBG as an example. Even though the
administration's score under the performance analysis is a
zero, you cannot tell me that you cannot find anywhere in the
country, and please do not misunderstand my point in saying
this--it is not necessarily to be argumentative, but you cannot
say that this has never worked anywhere at any time anywhere in
the country. That is not the case. It is not the case, even
though I can certainly, and I think a lot of Members, can say
Amtrak needs to be reformed and all sorts of things, but you
cannot say it is not serving at least somebody somewhere.
So even though under somebody's results standard, which is
subjective,--it is not ever objective, I do not think--it is
always subjective, whatever standard--it is always in the eye
of the beholder, whatever standard you put out there, but
according to somebody's subjective standard, these programs are
working, even Even Start. You cannot say that no child anywhere
did not get at least some benefit from throwing money at Even
Start or that no adult did not learn how to read under adult
literacy programs. It may not be working as well as somebody's
subjective standard, but you cannot say it has never worked for
anyone anywhere. I do not think that is possible.
Mr. Cuellar. Right. I understand, but the question is, you
are talking about somebody's standards; I am talking about our
standards, the Congress's standards. I think we ought to set
certain standards so we can have a healthy debate to ask those
questions. What are the standards that we are looking at? What
are the measures that we are looking at? What is the true
purpose of Even Start or CDBG? What results are we getting for
those billions of dollars that we sent down there?
I do not think it is right that we can say, ``Well, those
mayors or those governors, all they want is the money, and we
are just going to send it because they do not want any
strings.'' I think we should still, for the billions of dollars
we send out or millions of dollars that we send to a particular
area, I think we should know what we are getting out of those
billions of dollars. It is our oversight, and with all due
respect to anybody else, but it should be the Congress's
standards that we set here, and working with the executive
branch, of course. It is a negotiated process.
Mr. Johnson. No slight intended.
Mr. Conaway. A part, though, of gathering the information
and having the data is to understand what it costs. If it costs
$100,000 a year to teach somebody to read, is there an
alternative to that? Do we hire somebody for $20,000 for 5
years to read whatever that person needs read? That is a
ludicrous example, but if we do not know what things cost on a
per unit basis or a per example basis or a per outcome basis,
we do not make as informed decisions as we might.
The legislature also has to resist overriding the
situation. As an example, we did our budget there at the State
agency I helped with--it is an accountancy board, so you would
expect the budgets to be pretty precise--on our travel. We do
have meetings we are going to have next year. We knew who was
coming and where they were coming from and whether they were
spending the night or not. So we had this pretty detailed
analysis of what our budget number was, and we submitted that
as a part of our appropriations request. One of the agencies
somewhere in the system sent 15 board members to Alaska for a
national meeting, and it offended some in the legislature.
So after all of the work was done, all of the scrubbing by
the Legislative Budget Board, all of the scrubbing by the
Governor, all of the scrubbing by the Senate finance, all of
the scrubbing by the House Appropriations Committee, somebody
added a rider right at the last minute that said, no matter
what you spent last year, you can spend only 90 percent of that
number, not what you budgeted, not what you thought your costs
were going to be, but just a 10-percent haircut, not for the
agency that did the dirty deed, every agency. So I rarely
spanked all four of my kids at the same time. I would spank one
of them, and the other three would become angels. I will
probably get in trouble. Yes, I use corporal punishment.
Mr. Cuellar. Your wife is here.
Mr. Conaway. Spare the rod, spoil the child, and I do not
have spoiled children, exactly.
So the legislature has to be careful in that you set this
elaborate process that ought to get the results, and then, with
all due respect,--he was probably there--a knee-jerk reaction
to one agency run amok, let us go after them. So the
legislature has got to be careful about putting in overrides to
the system that are not informed overrides.
Chairman Nussle. Well, I want to thank you. My only point
in this--I like the concept--my only point in this is that we
are talking about the results, the results, the results, and
the results are based on measurement. I agree with--I think it
was Edward Demmings that said, ``If you can measure it, you can
improve it,'' and I agree with that concept. The issue,
however, is who gets to hold the ruler, and what is the unit of
measure? If that is up to me, it is going to be a perfect
system, to me, but it may not be to Mr. Spratt or to you or to
somebody else.
So I think how you hold the ruler and what the ruler unit
of measure is, is a huge stumbling block here, I would assume,
in getting this. I will give you the last word, Mr. Johnson,
and then we will move on.
Mr. Johnson. I do not want to dominate the last word, but I
do have a comment on a couple of things that were said.
Chairman Nussle. My last word, at least.
Mr. Johnson. OK.
Chairman Nussle. I will give you my last word.
Mr. Johnson. Thank you. There has to be a stated purpose.
On the CDBG, it was the purpose score that had a zero; it was
not that the program overall was zero. It was well managed and
so forth, but there has to be a stated purpose to begin with,
and a lot of our programs do not have clearly defined, stated
purposes. In those clearly defined, stated purposes, the
intended goal can be defined, and you can, from there, lay out
the appropriate metrics. It starts with the legislature. So it
is not some other entity that decides what the goals are; we
will decide. We, together, will decide.
The other point is we, in some businesses, do things that
are very hard to measure. How do you measure the success of the
Drug Enforcement Agency? It is not the number of interdictions.
Is it the quality of drugs? Is it the price? It is very hard to
measure. But shame on us if we are not always trying to find
better and better ways to measure how we are spending the
money, and we are going to come up with some measures on these
PART scores. Some of them are really good. Some of them are
good first steps, and next year we will find better measures
and next year.
That is why it is an ongoing process. It is a commitment to
a way to run the railroad. There will be some programs that are
more clearly defined where the metrics are better than other
programs, but it is a mind-set more so than it is a specific
series of acts that has to take place, and it takes that
commitment that this is the way we want to run this
``railroad,'' and it is a journey, not a destination and you
get better and better at it every year.
Chairman Nussle. Thank you. Mr. Spratt.
Mr. Spratt. Let me share with you a little experience I
have had with this topic that you are struggling with today or
grappling with. Years ago, I served in the Army as a young
officer in the Department of Defense working for the assistant
secretary of defense. Mr. Laird was the Secretary of Defense,
and he came up here to testify. This was near the end of the
Vietnam War, and there were huge overruns on a procurement,
major weapons systems, but there was not ability by which to
measure those overruns because there was no baseline to begin
with. Nobody had defined a baseline for scheduled performance
or cost.
Mr. Laird had seen something that had been done just
experimentally by Booz, Allen & Hamilton, and he told the
Senate when he was pressed that he felt sure that they could
implement an acquisition process whereby there would be
variance reporting: schedule, cost, performance. He did not
know what he had bitten off until he got back to the Pentagon
and found out what he had seen was just one small piece of a
much, much bigger problem, but he was committed to it, and he
stuck by it. I think Laird and Packwood were the best team that
ever managed the Defense Department.
I happened to work in the office where the SAR, selected
acquisition report, was developed. When I came here to Congress
about 12 years later, one of the first things I did when I got
on the Armed Services Committee was to go down and pull the SAR
to see how the SAR was doing. And of interest to me, it looked
exactly the same way it did 12 years before, and I eventually
found out that because we did not use it here, partly because
it was not useful, it did not become more useful. There is a
circularity to it, and when it is used, it becomes more useful
because we see what works and what does not work, which
information is useful and valuable and which information is
not, and it gets honed down to being an effective instrument.
One of the problems I have with PART and, I think, with the
GPRA (Government Performance Results Act) system, too, is
Congress is not wired into it. So one of the principal users of
it does not use it. We do not resort to it frequently. If we
did, we would say, ``This is no good. This is not the goal we
set. This is not what we are trying to achieve. These numbers
are not credible,'' or ``This is useful. Hey, this is good
information. This is working. This is not working. This is
where we should allocate scarce resources.''
Let me ask you, Mr. Johnson, about DOD and OMB. Are you
working in any way to perfect their information reporting
systems and, in particular, that cost performance and schedule
variance report?
Mr. Johnson. Well, I do not know about that particular
report, but, for instance, a whole a lot of GAO's high-risk
items involve DOD, and one of the things we are doing is
working with DOD and GAO to take each one of those items, and
let us clearly define some of the things we have been talking
about today. What is success? Supply chain management? What is
the desired state of affairs for supplying chain management?
What do we want it to look like, be like, smell like, so forth?
What do we have to do to get there? What are the action steps
we have to take to get there, and who is accountable for each
one of those action steps?
So lots of clarity, lots of accountability, and then make
sure there is rigorous, every 6 months, every quarter,
whatever, oversight that we are, in fact, proceeding along that
action plan as designed. We have done that with supply chain
management, and GAO is pleased with the product, and OMB is
pleased with the product.
Mr. Spratt. How does it interface with GPRA? How does PART,
your assessment system, results oversight system, interface and
integrate with what was already in place?
Mr. Johnson. OK. I agree with David Walker that GPRA has
not lived up to its full potential, but it can. As you said, it
has laid a foundation. The PART, in my mind, is the tool that
helps us take this focus on accountability to the next level.
In general, I think that looking at the effectiveness of an
entire agency is not the proper unit of measure because of an
accumulation of programs, a wide diversity of programs. So I
think the real way to look at how an agency is doing is to look
at how its most relevant units of measure are doing, i.e., the
programs.
So, to me, the PART, which focuses on programs, provides
information that allows us to go into an agency and go down to
the relevant unit of measure and start looking at this piece
works, this piece does not work, we can do this to make this
work better, we can keep this the way it is, and so forth. So I
think it allows us to take GPRA, the focus on results, to a
more meaningful level of detail, as you said, build on the
foundation that has been laid in the last 10 years with the
development of strategic plans by agency.
Mr. Spratt. Don't you think somehow Congress should be
wired into it so, No. 1, we are encouraged at the outset of
inaugurating some new program or some new agency to define its
goals so that we can have a baseline to come back and measure
its performance against, and we sort of share that with you so
you would have your goals, we would have our goals.
Mr. Johnson. Yes, sir. I agree totally with that. We all
need to be looking at one set of goals. I agree totally with
that.
Four years ago, we assessed 20 percent of the programs, so
there was a little bit of performance information around, and
so you could not sit down with a committee or an appropriations
subcommittee and talk about HUD (U.S. Department of Housing and
Urban Development) or talk about Interior because you only had
a little bit of information. So what has happened is we are now
getting a critical mass of performance information to do
exactly what you have talked about where we can look at all of
the programs at an agency and start looking at the potential
use of this information, and one of our big stumbling blocks
initially which made it sort of not appropriate to start
dealing with Congress was we had resistance within the
agencies.
They were reluctant to focus on results because their
feeling was--there was a lot of skepticism, and the thinking
was all we want to do is to get rid of programs. They came to
understand, after about 2 years, that it was about getting
programs to work better, which is what they are for. So now
they have embraced the use of performance information. So now
that they are integrally involved and fully involved in
developing good performance measures; now it is the time to
work with Congress to get us to come together on agreement on
what these goals are, now that we have good goals to even talk
about or good performance measures to talk about.
So I agree totally with what you are calling for. I think 3
or 4 years ago, it would have been inappropriate to do that
because it would not have been a very long conversation.
Mr. Spratt. I notice, if our numbers are correct, that of
the 607 program assessments that PART has undertaken, only 23
apply to the Department of Defense. Are you sort of letting
Defense do its own internal management? Is there adequate
oversight?
Let me give you an example. We are building now the next-
generation carrier, and it will cost at least twice, probably
more than twice, what the previous carrier cost. To justify
that kind of hike in the expenditure, we need to get lots of
utility, lots of useful life, and lots of our cost savings out
of manning levels and things like that in the new carrier. Is
OMB looking over DOD's shoulder to see that, No. 1, a baseline
is established based upon what is being represented that the
new carrier will do, and somebody is holding those responsible
for pushing these expensive new systems accountable?
Mr. Johnson. I do not know specifically about the carrier,
but we do work with DOD to make sure they have defined goals,
defined purposes, and how the costs match up to the benefits. I
do know that we were helpful to get DOD to the point--I think
it was 2 years ago--where they actually canceled a weapons
system.
Mr. Spratt. Which one?
Mr. Johnson. It was the Comanche helicopter system. I do
not know when the last time a weapons system was canceled. It
does not happen very often, but the stated purpose for that
helicopter system no longer existed, and it was decided that it
could be met with other weapons systems, exactly the thing you
are talking about that is hard to do at DOD. But we are working
with them to do the kind of thing you are talking about, and
there are a lot of influences that go into whether a weapons
system is canceled or not, as you know, and performance and
stated purpose is one of them.
Mr. Spratt. Well, take a look at the selected acquisition
report. As I understand it, DOD, the Office of the Secretary of
Defense, really has its own system. It does not rely on the
SAR. They give us a SAR, which is sort of like giving us crumbs
from the table. See if you think there is an adequate cost
variance and schedule, information reporting system at DOD. I
would love to talk with you.
Mr. Johnson. Their whole acquisition process is one of the
high-risk items, and it is a lot of money. That is one of the
areas that we will lay out and work with them to define a
successful state of affairs that we want to get to and
determine an appropriate time frame to get there or a
reasonable or realistic or aggressive, or whatever it will be,
time frame for getting there because they want all of those
items to be low risk, not high risk. They are very complex, as
you know way better than I, and we need clarity about where we
are trying to go with each one of them and accountability, lots
of clarity, and lots of accountability.
Mr. Spratt. Mr. Cuellar, you showed some interesting
presentations when you put your display up about how
information was presented to the Texas State legislature. How
would you adapt that kind of experience to our experience here
so that we have a format--you would probably have to vary it
from program to program, but we have a format that would elicit
the kind of information that would be useful to us, the
appropriators, the authorizers, in deciding which should be
pulsed up, which should be eliminated, and so forth?
Mr. Cuellar. Well, I think that the basic premise that we
have got to look at is if we do not find a mechanism--I think
this is what the chairman was also alluding to a few minutes
ago--if we do not find a mechanism to get the legislature
involved and working on setting those goals and those measures,
then we are not going to know if those programs are being
effective or efficient, whether we are getting the best bang
for the dollar. The whole key is going to be how do we--I think
your terms were, how do we get wired in in this work that we
are doing? If we do not get wired in or connected in this
process, then it is not going to work. We can have all of the
will and all of the commitment, but if we cannot get connected
and make sure that we play a role in this, it is not going to
work.
Just by the list of the questions that I gave, just a show-
and-tell, the list of questions there, if we just asked every
single agency those questions, we would be amazed. I think that
probably the first one would probably bring a lot of debate.
What is your primary purpose? If you asked that question, the
agency might tell you something, and somebody at OMB might say
something else. We might feel that it is a different purpose.
If we cannot even get past that first question, it is going to
be hard to get the rest of the work done also in providing our
legislative oversight.
Mr. Spratt. Well, we have got Mr. Conaway and Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Conaway. Mr. Spratt, one of the things that works in
Texas, and I hate to keep bringing it up, but that is our
example today, is a Sunset Commission. Now, built into the
statute of every agency is a drop-dead date whereby, after 12
or 13 years, if the legislature does not renew that function,
that agency, or whatever, then it goes away. Two years before
that sunset date goes through, each agency is put through a
very rigorous review of everything they do, all of their
purposes, all of their standards that they are supposed to be
meeting, all of their regulations that they have written, all
of those kinds of things.
Kevin Brady has got a bill that would create a Federal
sunset commission or Federal sunset board that would help us
start. Part of the problem is we have got an awful lot of stuff
going on, $2.56 trillion worth of stuff going on. Where do we
start? Well, one way is to put every agency through a very
rigorous self-examination, as well as an examination by a
bipartisan group, that would force them to justify their
existence and allow the legislature, this Congress, to take a
look at each one of them and say they ought to stay alive or
should not. So it is a helpful program. It is not perfect, by
any stretch of the imagination. You run into all kinds of
problems with it, but at least it gives a chance.
The other thing it does is it allows that group to help
agencies share best practices--the chairman mentioned best
practices a while ago--across agencies because they become
little fiefdoms among themselves and have resistance to some of
the improvements that other agencies have made without
reinventing the wheel. So there are a lot of positives that
would help set the stage to go forward if we ran every agency
through this program.
Mr. Spratt. Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Johnson. Congressman, the questions that Henry talked
about; almost all of those questions are asked as a part of the
PART process. What is your purpose? How are you serving your
customer? How do you measure success? What are your results?
Almost all of those questions are asked as a part of the PART
process. All of that information is available to the public,
the answers to all of those questions. They are on an OMB Web
site. You have to be able to speak our version in English, but
it is all there.
Are there better ways to ask the 26 questions? There are
about 25 or 30 questions. Is there a 26th question? Certainly.
We will figure it out, and we will get better. The PART is a
good first step in the direction of trying to provide that
information for us to talk about, agree on, and go from.
Mr. Cuellar. And what I am saying, Mr. Chairman, if you
would allow me, is the work that they are doing is good. Clay
has been doing an excellent job. My whole point here today is--
--
Mr. Johnson (continuing). How to use it.
Mr. Cuellar (continuing). How do we get the legislature to
use that information and ask it? All of that information is
available somewhere, but the question is, when we are making
the decisions on those agencies, are we asking those questions
there? If we can somehow get connected with the OMB where we
can get that information from Clay in an easy format that is
easy to understand instead of, and I am sure you will not do
that to us, providing us 2 or 3 inches of information, but in
an easy format, that will go a long way for us to do the
constitutional duty that we have, the budget oversight.
Mr. Spratt. Thank you very much, all three of you, for your
testimony. I have got to go to another meeting, but I have
learned a great deal from this, and I hope this is a beginning.
We can talk about it further.
Chairman Nussle. Mr. Chocola.
Mr. Chocola. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate you
holding this meeting. I have not been in Congress long, but
this is the first time that the discussion has reminded me of
my previous life as a business owner, with performance
measurements and so forth. One of the things I learned--maybe
you just answered the question, but one of the things I learned
in my previous life was there are different elements to the
budget process. There is developing the budget, and there is
executing the budget, and you can only conduct those efforts
successfully if you have good information.
And so using Mr. Conaway's example, is there a barn with a
dusty toolbox around here somewhere that Members of Congress
can access? I mean, it is hard to get information on our MRA,
timely, accurate information as to how we can manage our own
office, let alone the entire U.S. Government. So is there
someplace that you can direct us, as a Member of Congress,
where we can get usable, timely information? Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Cuellar. Let me just say, that is the whole point I
have been making today, is that the information is out there,
and I am sure that Clay would say and Mr. Johnson would say
that information is out there. There is a way that we can get
it timely so when we are making the decisions, instead of
saying, ``Well, somebody go check a Web page somewhere,'' or
``Somebody send me the books over here,'' there is a way that
we can put this in an easy format for us to ask those questions
and get that information, good information, then I think that
would make our job easier because I think that is the problem.
And I am just in my first 6 months here, so, with all due
respect, my perspective is that I do not think we have that
information in an easy format where we can look and make those
decisions.
If you recall, the budget format, as an example, the 1970s,
1980s, and the 1990s, in the 1990s format that information is
there,--the purpose, the goals, the objectives, the performance
measures--and like Clay said, it is a continuous refinement of
those performance measures. They keep changing on it, but that
is where the dialogue comes in with the Congress and the
agencies.
Mr. Chocola. Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Johnson. There is no one place. It does not exist like
that, no one place. The answers to some of those general
questions like what is the purpose, and what are your results
versus your goals and so forth, that exists on a Web site for
ready access. We are creating a lay version of that to try to
bring public transparency to it all, again, to sort of help
drive the dialogue about it. But more specific customer
satisfaction numbers and turnaround time numbers; that exists
in various places.
I was having breakfast yesterday with a Senator, and he was
complaining that on one of the agency Web site's most recent
performance information they have is from 2001, and it was just
driving him nuts. Now, the information is nice, but it is 4
years old. It is like there is almost a purposeful goal to not
give them anything that they could use to make a decision one
way or the other.
I think it would be fantastic if Congress said, ``We want
more information with which to make these decisions. Let us
figure out how we can establish recency standards, level-of-
detail standards, customer satisfaction, all of that and build
toward it.'' That would not be done overnight, but that would
be a huge statement by all of us that it is that important, and
we want to factor all of that into our decision-making process.
Mr. Chocola. When is the Web site going to be available
that you mentioned?
Mr. Johnson. Well, we hope to do it this fall. In fact, we
have focus groups next week to actually go talk to people to
see if people other than ourselves think it is a great idea. We
hope to do it this fall.
Mr. Chocola. Just one other thing.
Mr. Johnson. Excuse me. But the information, in OMB terms,
exists today and has for the last 4 years.
Mr. Chocola. Just one other thing. In my previous life, all
of our incentives were around identifying problems and getting
rid of the problem, solving a problem. In government, it seems
that the incentive is to perpetuate problems because God forbid
that we solve a problem because we will not fund that effort
anymore. Will performance-based budgeting, do you think,
effectively address that?
Mr. Johnson. It can be. Again, what would you like to stop
doing, and what would you like to start doing? These kinds of
questions you ask drive actions, and that can be structured any
way we want.
Mr. Chocola. Do you think a 2-year budget would assist in
this effort in spending a year going through the budget and at
least a year in oversight, which I agree that we do not focus
on enough around here?
Mr. Johnson. Yes. We support the notion of biannual
budgeting.
Mr. Chocola. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Nussle. What is the Web site that you have now?
You said it is on the Web site now?
Mr. Johnson. Right. It is OMB.
Chairman Nussle. Is it OMB?
Mr. Johnson. It is www.omb.gov.
Chairman Nussle. OK.
Mr. Johnson. We can send that to you, if you want.
Chairman Nussle. We are linked to it.
Mr. Johnson. Very good.
Chairman Nussle. Mr. Neal.
Mr. Neal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, very much. This has been
very helpful.
These are hardly new concepts, I think. Certainly,
President Carter embraced the notion of zero-based budgeting.
Secretary McNamara at the Defense Department during the
Kennedy-Johnson years, he embraced the notion of planned
program budgeting. I used it in my former life, my youth, as
the mayor of Springfield, MA. But I guess----
Mr. Johnson. I did not mean any negative comment about
mayors. I was just kidding, sir.
Mr. Neal. Believe me, if you are served in those jobs,
there is nothing anybody could say that would hurt your
feelings. [Laughter.]
But I guess I would dispute a couple of issues based upon
the notion of the way our system is supposed to work in the
constitutional galaxy.
I think of CDBG because I know that mayors and governors
tend to like CDBG, and one of the reasons it has worked so
well, and I would defend it arduously, is that President Nixon
had the right idea. The democratic majorities in the Congress
had the right idea. On the issue of housing, it is a national
problem, but it may well be different in Springfield, MA, than
it is in San Diego, CA. Therefore, the Federal Government would
acknowledge the national problem, but mayors, governors, and
neighborhood groups would help with the remedy.
Now, I think you can measure CDBG. If a community like
Springfield had, in 1973, 14,000 substandard units of housing,
and 15 years later had 3,000 substandard units of housing, I
think that is a very precise and exact measurement. If you can
drive down the cost of dental problems by using some of that
money to pay for a voluntary fluoride rinse program in the
public schools, I think, for poor children, that is the way to
do it. Since there is not a lot of support for putting fluorine
in the water supply, you can do it with a voluntary program and
use those dollars, and if you can determine that fewer children
end up in a Medicaid program with dental needs, I think that is
a success.
I think you can measure the COPS (Community Oriented
Policing Services) program that was wildly popular across the
country as a success, largely because crime rates did go down,
and even the smallest towns across the country were able to
purchase new technology for doing a better job of combating
street crime on a daily basis.
Now, having said that, I acknowledge that police visibility
is in dispute as to whether or not that does drive down crime,
and that is a very difficult measurement. But my point, I
think, here is that there are exact measurements. Community
development block grant money has worked very well, and it is
very popular with mayors and governors across the country. If
you had Democratic mayors sitting in this room, they would say
it is great. They would say save that. If you had Republican
mayors sitting in this room, they would say, if they only had
one program they could save, it would be community development
block grant money because it allows them some solutions.
Now, I also think it is important to point out that there
are other issues where there is difficulty in measuring it,
abstinence-only programs. The jury really is out, but the
Congress keeps pushing money in that direction, and we have not
seen the sort of success there based upon the investment, and I
think that there would be some agreement on that. But the
philosophy takes over, and instead of coming to an initiative
that might work, we insist on pushing money toward something
that does not work only to satisfy ourselves in a philosophic
vein.
So I think what you are talking about is very desirable,
and it should be the continued goal of all of us here in the
Congress, but I do want to defend performance initiatives as
they relate to community development block grant money. I think
you can measure it. There are some problems, sure, and I think
Mr. Conaway mentioned something that was interesting. He said,
those people who took off, some 15 people, to Alaska for a
conference; well, you can measure that because the press wrote
a very bad story about it, I assume. Congress reacted, perhaps
overreacting, as we typically do, as you know, but,
nonetheless, that builds in the accountability that we all
desire, and I am happy to hear from you on substandard units of
housing, abstinence only, COPS programs. I think you can
measure those things.
Yes, sir. Mr. Johnson.
Mr. Johnson. I think you can measure. The problem with CDBG
is it required no measurement. It did not require
municipalities to report back and say, ``Here is how I impacted
these low socioeconomic areas with my money. Here is how much I
spent, and here is the good I did with it.'' It was not that
kind of accountability. HUD has very much agreed with that, and
so they are tightening those specs, and what the CDBG proposal
was about was tightening those specs but also taking these
other programs and instead of having all of these disparate
programs, bringing them together where it could be managed
effectively. We agree totally that they are measurable, but the
program, as it was structured, did not call for reporting on
what was happening as a result of the money.
Mr. Neal. Well, I thought that there is, if you hang around
in political life long enough, a certain level of justice that
is reached because I used to point out to those HUD auditors
that used to regularly review the CDBG program during my time
as mayor that they used to audit me and ask me a lot of
questions, and I subsequently got elected to Congress, and then
I audited and investigated them. So, in that sense, the system
worked quite effectively, and there was a sense of justice as
it played out.
Mr. Cuellar. Mr. Chairman, I do not know if the gentleman
is here, John Mercer, who used to be the mayor of Sunnyvale.
Sunnyvale, CA, was probably one of the first cities that
started doing performance-based budgeting. They were able to do
the measurements as to the streets, how much work they did on
paving. There is a series of areas where you can get ideas as
to what sort of measurements you can get. I know that the
National Conference of State Legislators just came out with a
book called Legislating for Results that pretty much lays out
the steps as to what staff is supposed to be doing, what the
legislature is supposed to be doing, that could provide some
sort of framework for the work we are doing. There are ways of
doing this.
I remember when I added the performance measurements for
all of the agencies in the State of Texas--this was started
under Governor Ann Richards, and the big question was, when
Bush was going to come in, was he going to keep that system? He
kept, and, in fact, he improved the system with Albert Hawkins
and some of the other gentlemen, other folks, up there also.
When Rick Perry came in, the same thing: It got extended, and
it got improved.
So it really does not matter if it is the Democrats or the
Republicans, sir; it is a commitment that Mike talked about,
making sure that we keep focused on the measurements.
But the bottom line, just to give you an example, there are
ways to measure things. When I first added the first
measurements to all of the State agencies, the people who wore
robes were the ones who had complaints about this, the
academicians and the judges. Judges used to say, you cannot
measure justice. Well, there are things that you can measure in
the work that they do, the output that they do. Academicians
also said, well, you cannot measure us. Well, of course, you
can measure education. What are the retention rates? What are
the graduation rates? There are a lot of things that you can
look at.
So there are a lot of measurements that are being used out
there that we can use ourselves. Instead of reinventing the
wheel, there are measurements we can use out there. Of course,
it is up to us to decide what measurements and what goals and
what purposes should be out there for that. So I agree with
you, Mr. Neal. There are a lot of things we can measure out
there; it is just up to us to decide what to use.
Mr. Neal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Nussle. Mr. Ryun.
Mr. Ryun. Mr. Chairman, first of all, I want to thank you
for holding this hearing. I think we are all very interested in
a common goal, and that is how to get more bang for our buck
and to help those who watch programs develop.
My question relates to how do you keep from rewarding
failure? Now, most programs here are geared towards, you know,
something that we start with good intentions of helping people,
and ultimately the budget continues to grow, and then there
comes that moment of how do you then wean somebody off a
program that they have become accustomed to.
So my question relates to, and I guess I will start with
Mr. Johnson, how do you address the problem that somebody with,
again, good intentions to help someone, now that is no longer
necessary, but the program is there, and they are still
expecting that? How do you wean them off of it?
Mr. Johnson. I will bet the answer is different for every
program, but, in general, I think, the biggest issue is not
what are we trying to do but how do we go about doing it; it is
that tough transition period. My suggestion would be to leap
past the transition that you are going to have to figure out
how to do.
Go out 5 years and define the new state of affairs we want
to exist 5 years from now or 8 or 4 or something years from now
and get everybody sort of wrapped around and enamored with that
goal and excited about what the new state of affairs can be,
and then say, ``All right. That is where we want to go. Now,
how do we get from here to there?'' So all of a sudden you have
got a vision, a long-term vision, that gets people excited, and
all of a sudden the difficulty of getting from here to there
becomes a little less.
You get people a little bit more enamored with how to make
those tough calls and how to manage through that tough weaning
process. But in terms of specifically how you wean somebody, I
think, at some point, you can give him interim things to go to,
but, at some point, you just have to stop.
Mr. Ryun. It is a lot easier probably said than done,
though, because once you get dependent upon something, it is
pretty hard to let go of it.
Mr. Johnson. Right.
Mr. Ryun. Yes, sir?
Mr. Cuellar. Six points, Mr. Ryun. What gets measured gets
done. If you do not measure results, you cannot tell success
from failure. Right now, what we are doing in Congress--what
are we doing? We are putting money into the agencies, and we do
not know if the money that we are putting in really works. We
have some indicators that show that maybe it is, maybe it is
not.
The third point is if you cannot see success, you cannot
reward it.
The fourth point is if you cannot reward success, you are
probably rewarding failure, and if you cannot recognize
failure, you cannot correct it. You do not know if you are
doing the right thing if you cannot recognize failure.
And then the last point is if you can demonstrate results,
then you can get public support for the results that you are
doing.
The bottom line is the way I see this is we are pumping
billions of dollars. We have got what, a $2.7 trillion budget
or somewhere around there----
Mr. Johnson. Six.
Mr. Cuellar (continuing). A $2.6 trillion budget. How do we
know that the dollars that we are spending are for successful
programs or programs that are not working or programs that have
extended their lifetime already? We do not know unless we ask
those questions.
Mr. Conaway. Mr. Ryun, a couple of things. One, on the
front end, as we begin to develop new programs or new
initiatives, that ought to be a part of the development
process. What is the end game? In other words, is there a point
in time where we expect this program to have done its job, and
if it does not get that job done, then it is going to go away?
So help the recipients and the folks who are trying to get it
done understand that there is an end in sight.
But I would also harken back to the sunset issues for
programs that we think are going to be going on forever, that
they ought to get better every year and do a better job, but I
would try to help set the standards up front as to what the
drop-dead date of a particular program ought to be.
Mr. Ryun. I think we can all agree that, you know, that we
have programs that started with good intentions. They have
arrived at maybe somewhat of a destination, but there is not
the will within Congress to say it is time to bring closure. I
think that is a problem that we, as Members, need to deal with.
It is a hard reality, but, nevertheless, one that we need to
address.
A final just kind of a broad question. We have all nibbled
around the edges on this. We, as Members, want to have good
information, and yet that becomes difficult. A moment ago, you
brought up the example of a Senator saying, ``Well, that is
good information, but it is 4 years' old.'' I think we are
accustomed to, as Members, kind of dealing in sound bites. We
are actually able to deal with more than just that, but my
point is we need real-time information when dealing with an
issue. Any suggestions as to how we can get that on a very
quick basis, and especially our staffs because they are the
ones that are going to help feed us with a lot of information?
Mr. Johnson. Well, I think it would be a wonderful
challenge to have to rise to. If a subcommittee or the full
Committee said, ``Let us do this. We cannot do it government-
wide all at one time, but let us take a subset of some agencies
and figure out what is a good set of performance information to
provide to the members of the relevant committee--it may be
Budget or Appropriations--and let us decide on what the
information is and how timely it ought to be, and figure out
what that is and come up with something, and then try to
demonstrate its usefulness or not.'' But go from there and try
to determine that it is worthwhile doing for the rest of the
Federal Government. That would be a really exciting thing for
us to work on.
Mr. Cuellar. And I agree. You cannot ask for all of the
information that is available. What we have got to do as a
legislature is we have got to selectively decide here is what
we want from the agencies, and this is the timing that we need
this information, and if we are able to selectively ask what
measures we want to look at and on a timely basis, then I would
tell you it should not be 4 years' old, and we should be able
to get that information on a more accurate and more timely
basis.
Mr. Ryun. Mr. Conaway.
Mr. Conaway. Again, just asking those questions and setting
those parameters up ahead of time; it would be helpful to get
that done for all new programs. For existing programs, it is
going to take a different level of activity, level of
intensity. But I like Mr. Johnson's idea about creating some
sort of a pilot project, a test, that would allow the
development of it so you could create somewhat of a template
for all of the agencies, although they would always have to be
modified for the specifics of any one agency.
Mr. Ryun. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Nussle. One idea, or just a thought. You said this
Web site will be available in 4 months?
Mr. Johnson. Well, the information exists now. What we are
doing is creating a Web site that assumes that the audience is
John Q. Citizen, John Q. Taxpayer. That is what will be
available in several months. We are trying to go through the
issue of how to structure it and how to phrase things and how
to simplify things. In the PART, for instance, there are 25 to
30 questions, depending on the nature of the program, that we
ask of the sort that Henry talked about. That information
exists on the Web now for every program that we have assessed,
which is 600 as of last year and 850 as of a month and a half
from now.
Chairman Nussle. It may actually be more beneficial,
because that is like drinking out of a fire hose when you are
600. It could be that when you roll this out, we may want to do
some kind of an informal demonstration up here at the committee
for Members and their staffs. It would be a good way to get
some information about this.
Mr. Johnson. On the PART information, there might be a
focus on two or three key performance measures, but the kind of
thing, I think, that you all and the appropriators would need
is the kind of information that Henry is showing up here, which
is much more detailed, quarterly updates. So it would start
with this, but then it would be much more extensive, I think.
The kind of information that exists now on OMB's Web site is
not the level of detail that you all would need to make even
more intelligent budget decisions. We would need to decide what
that is and then make it available.
Chairman Nussle. Mr. Diaz-Balart.
Mr. Diaz-Balart. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I
actually also want to thank you for having this hearing. I
think it is a very important hearing. I also want to thank you
particularly for this distinguished panel. The three gentlemen
that are speaking to us today--Mr. Johnson, Mr. Cuellar, and
Mr. Conaway--have not only a reputation of protecting
taxpayers' dollars, but I think, very clearly, they have a very
strong record of achievement in protecting taxpayers' dollars,
so what they have to say is very important for all of us to
listen to.
Mr. Chairman, you know, but I do not know if others know,
that my years in the State legislature could be defined as what
I did for performance-based budgeting and for priority-based
budgeting, and in order to try to get it done, because
obviously the bureaucracies do not want to do it, and it is
heavy lift for everybody, I came up with a rather dramatic, I
understand, way to do that.
I, basically, as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee,
which in the State senate in those days was appropriations,
budget, ways and means, and finance and tax together, I told
every agency that they had to come up with a plan to cut 25
percent of their budgets. I did not say that I was going to cut
25 percent of their budgets, but I wanted a list of priorities
and a list of their lowest priorities and look at ways to cut
administration, look at ways of cutting waste, and they did not
want to do it, and it was heavy lifting. I actually still have
one of the posters that was distributed throughout the capitol
when I was doing that. The only part that upset me was the
picture because it was not a very good picture. But, I mean,
ultimately, it was a heavy lift, but we succeeded in doing some
of the things, and I think, by the way, Florida is number one
in job creation and still continues to be number one in job
creation.
To give you an idea as to how we were able to do that,
spending increases in appropriations before those days were
close to 10 percent increases annually. After that, as a
result, I was able to decrease it to about 1 percent, an
increase of 1 percent, rather dramatic. And also, because we
did performance-based budgeting and priority-based budgeting,
we were also able to fund things that were never funded even
with 10-percent increases.
Mr. Chairman, I just want to add that I am really impressed
with what this administration is doing with PART. It is kind of
hard to read through sometimes. My staff has done a really good
job of doing it.
Chairman Nussle. It is not purposeful?
Mr. Diaz-Balart. No, I understand. It is complicated stuff,
but it is there, and I think we also need to commend, for
example, the chairman of the Appropriations Committee and the
appropriators. They have done a pretty good job of applying
some of the information that you, Mr. Johnson, and the
administration have provided.
In this appropriations cycle, the House has terminated 99
programs, and that is a savings of $4.6 billion. Where I am
from, $4.6 billion is real dough, and that is, I think, a huge
tribute to what this administration is doing and also the fact
that there is some coordination, obviously, with the
appropriators.
I think Mr. Spratt was right when he talked about that
there has got to be a tie-in with the legislature, and I think
Mr. Cuellar was talking about what some of those issues that we
have to look at are: Can we do a better job in tying in with
the appropriators of the Budget Committee to make sure that
also when those standards are being developed through the PART
process, that the legislature is involved in that process? From
what I hear from Mr. Cuellar, that is pretty much what happened
in Texas. There was a negotiative process as to what some of
those measures should be, and that is really where the tough
part comes. What can we do to do a better job there? How can we
improve on that, because I think the information is available?
You are right. It needs to be in a little bit more easy-to-
understand English. But what can we do to improve that
communication not only after you have done the PART reviews,
Mr. Johnson, but also maybe before that so that there can be
buy-in, so that there can be a better understanding? When you
buy in, you are more likely then to make the tough decisions,
and these are tough decisions.
Mr. Johnson. I think that if we had walked up 4 years ago
and said, ``Let us work together and come up with outcome goals
for each program and efficiency measures and so forth, and we
can use it to better budget, and we do not want to get rid of
programs; we want to work better,'' we would have been told to
skedaddle. I think we have information now that is a good
starting point. We can sit down and say, working with agencies,
``Here is a good first cut. Now, what do you, Members of
Congress, or this committee like about this? What is missing?
What needs to be added or subtracted?'' We have a good starting
point.
The fact that there is interest in getting buy-in in
Congress is a really positive sign. I do not think there would
have been any interest in ``let us agree on what this is'' 4
years ago, but I think the fact that there is a critical mass
of performance information is a good first step. In a couple of
months, 80 percent of all of the programs will have performance
information. We can have a really good conversation on the
programs, and we can get the kind of buy-in you are talking
about. We all have to agree on what the desired outcomes are
for each of our programs.
Mr. Diaz-Balart. Mr. Chairman, if I may also, to Mr.
Conaway, once the information is available, what we are really
talking about here is legislative will, are we not? That is
really where the rubber meets the road.
Mr. Conaway. Sure. That is exactly right. You know, Chris
was talking earlier about his business life. In the business
world, you have got a CEO that gets all of the input he wants
and then makes a decision that is made. That is not the model
we have here, and trying to be able to look your constituents
in the eye and say, ``I know you like that program, and I know
you think it is doing well because you are getting money out of
it,'' whether it is CDBG, or you are in love with Amtrak, or
whatever the thing is, it is having the will to say, ``I
disagree with you, and we are going to have to go a different
direction.'' It is much easier said than done, obviously.
Mr. Diaz-Balart. And, Mr. Chairman, if I may, last question
to Mr. Cuellar, I do not know if you found this, but one of the
things that I found in the State legislature is usually the
least-effective program, the one that can show less results, or
the lower-priority programs seem to have the loudest advocates
and the more aggressive advocates. Maybe that is why because
that is how they got there in the first place. Is that
something that you found as well?
Mr. Cuellar. Yes, you do. But, again, by having
measurements in place, you can certainly have a better dialogue
with those people. Instead of them just coming in, ``We need
this, and we need that,'' at least, if you have that
information, and you have that information available to you in
an easy format, then you certainly can have a better dialogue,
especially when you are making budgetary decisions.
The wonderful thing about the whole thing is, and, I think,
Clay just hit it, Mr. Chairman, members, we have got all of the
information available. I think we have got buy-in because, I
think, at the State legislature and different places, agencies
were usually afraid because they felt that the Congress or the
State legislature was going to use this information to cut
through programs, go after them to punish them. There is a
punishment-and-reward system that should be in place, but I
think, from what I am hearing, is we are having more agencies
that understand that this can be a good managerial tool for
them.
You have got more buy-in by the agencies, and if that
information is available, then I think it is up to us to figure
out how do we make that connection with the legislature, with
the Congress? What information do we use because it is out
there? And I think the buy-in, which is very important because
there is what I call an ``institutional resistance'' can be
very difficult, and I think that you all did the hard work to
get them to buy in, and now it is up to us to buy ourselves
into this process because it is important to do it.
But I think, whether it is a mayor or whether it is a State
legislature, I think all of us have done this in a previous
life. Now is how do we use that experience from the previous
lives that we have seen that has been successful? How do we do
it here in Congress?
Mr. Diaz-Balart. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Nussle. Thank you. I would not underestimate the
level of distraction. The mere fact that you have been on that
Web site and have traversed through does not mean that all or
most or even a majority of Members have done that or staff, and
I will be the first to admit, since maybe no one else will,
that I have not for a long time. I have been on the Web site,
but it has been a long time since I have done that, and that is
why I am wondering if some level of in-your-face is in order
here.
I think what you are suggesting here that is coming out in
4 months, because Members tend to fly at about 30,000 to 40,000
feet. I understand that all of the details to make intelligent
decisions are down in the weeds, but if you are not even
looking at the information at 30,000 or 40,000 feet it is even
worse. I do think your rollout of that key information to
citizens, all of us of course being citizens as well, and
understanding or reacquainting ourselves to that information,
would be a good thing to do.
Do you see an advantage to having a rollout in addition to
what you are doing at OMB and with the administration, but also
here on the Hill? I would be willing to offer, with Mr.
Spratt's acquiescence and participation and all of our Members'
and staffs' participation some type of rollout where you can
demonstrate this for Members and staff and for other key people
who want to be interested in taking a look at this.
Mr. Johnson. That is a fantastic idea and opportunity. As
we have thought about the potential use of this, the one
potential use of this site that we come back to is a
Congressman's town hall meeting or a Senator's town hall
meeting where they stand up and they say, ``I am interested in
how we are spending the money. It is not a game of perfect, but
we are working to get better, and here is a place to go to see
this.'' It is exactly that kind of thing, that little image
that we have had in our mind in our efforts to try to construct
this.
Chairman Nussle. Well, we have got the equipment here to do
something like that, so we will----
Mr. Johnson. That is a wonderful idea.
Chairman Nussle (continuing). Be in touch, and your
communication folks can be in touch, and we will try to do
that.
Mr. Johnson. That would be great.
Chairman Nussle. I do not have any other questions, and I
do not see any other members on the dais that have any
questions. Mr. Cuellar or Mr. Conaway, I understand you may
have had some questions you wanted to be able to pose for the
record, if you have done that during your--then that is fine.
I want to thank you very much for this opening salvo of
discussion. It was your leadership, Henry, as I stated during
the markup, that brought us to this point. It is, as Mr.
Johnson stated, a journey; it is not a destination. I think we
have learned that today, if we have learned anything. I do hope
that we have taken some of the first steps on that journey.
Even though it may not be with a very clear map of where
exactly we are going to end up, at least, I think it is a
worthwhile endeavor.
So thank you for your leadership on this. We look forward
to working with you, and we may be back here at some point in
time this fall to look at the next iteration of this. So if
there is nothing else to come before the Committee, without
objection, we will stand in recess.
[Whereupon, at 11:53 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.]