National Park Service: Status of Agency Efforts to Address Its	 
Maintenance Backlog (08-JUL-03, GAO-03-992T).			 
                                                                 
GAO, the Department of the Interior, and others have reported on 
the National Park Service's efforts to develop an effective	 
maintenance management process that would, among other things,	 
enable the agency to accurately and reliably estimate the amount 
of deferred maintenance on its assets. Over the years, the	 
agency's estimates of the amount of its deferred maintenance have
varied widely--sometimes by billions of dollars. Currently, the  
agency estimates that its deferred maintenance backlog is over $5
billion. In April 2002, GAO reported on the status of efforts to 
develop better deferred maintenance data. (National Park Service:
Status of Efforts to Develop Better Deferred Maintenance	 
Data)[Apr. 12, 2002, GAO-02-568R] This testimony presents the	 
results of GAO's April report and updates the progress the Park  
Service is making in implementing its new asset management	 
process.							 
-------------------------Indexing Terms------------------------- 
REPORTNUM:   GAO-03-992T					        
    ACCNO:   A07480						        
  TITLE:     National Park Service: Status of Agency Efforts to       
Address Its Maintenance Backlog 				 
     DATE:   07/08/2003 
  SUBJECT:   Data collection					 
	     Facility management				 
	     National parks					 
	     Maintenance costs					 
	     Inventories					 
	     Management information systems			 
	     Federal property management			 

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GAO-03-992T

Testimony Before the Subcommittee on National Parks, Historic
Preservation, and Recreation, Committee on Energy and Natural Resources,
U. S. Senate

United States General Accounting Office

GAO For Release on Delivery Expected at 10: 00 a. m. EDT Tuesday, July 8,
2003 NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

Status of Agency Efforts to Address Its Maintenance Backlog

Statement of Barry T. Hill, Director Natural Resources and Environment

GAO- 03- 992T

In 2002, GAO reported that the design of the National Park Service*s new
asset management process was complete but implementation was just
beginning. The new process will address deferred maintenance, commonly
referred to as the maintenance backlog, as part of a much broader approach
to its asset management. When fully developed and implemented, the new
process will, for

the first time, enable the agency to have a (1) reliable inventory of its
assets; (2) process for reporting on the condition of the assets in its
inventory; and (3) consistent, systemwide methodology for estimating the
deferred maintenance costs for its assets. As a result, agency managers
and the Congress should receive much more accurate and reliable
information on the amount of deferred

maintenance needs throughout the national park system. Nonetheless, while
the Park Service*s current efforts are promising, GAO reported on a few
areas that the agency needed to address to improve the performance of the
process. These included the need to (1) develop costs and schedules for
completing the

implementation of the process, (2) better coordinate the tracking of the
process among Park Service headquarters units to avoid duplication of
effort within the agency; and, (3) better define its approach to determine
the condition of its assets, and how much the assessments will cost.

Since that report, the agency appears to have made progress. While the
complete implementation of the process will not occur until fiscal year
2006, the agency has completed, or is nearing completion of, a number of
substantial and important steps. According to the Park Service, the agency
has completed its asset inventory and trained staff on the use of the
required computer software. In addition, the Park Service provided
information indicating that it was

addressing each of the concerns identified in GAO*s 2002 report.
Specifically, the Park Service has developed cost and schedule estimates
for the complete implementation of the process, is developing a plan to
eliminate any duplication

or inconsistencies between organizational components, and has completed
annual condition assessments* visual inspections* on all but nine of the
larger parks in the system. According to the Park Service, the work done
so far are necessary steps and reflect some of the best practices of the
private sector in developing and implementing an effective facility
management process. GAO, the Department of the Interior, and others have
reported on the National Park Service*s

efforts to develop an effective maintenance management process that would,
among other things,

enable the agency to accurately and reliably estimate the amount of
deferred maintenance on its assets. Over the years, the agency*s estimates
of the amount of its deferred maintenance have varied widely* sometimes by
billions of

dollars. Currently, the agency estimates that its deferred maintenance
backlog is over $5 billion. In April 2002, GAO reported on the status of
efforts to develop better deferred maintenance data. (National Park
Service: Status of Efforts to Develop Better Deferred Maintenance Data)[
Apr. 12, 2002, GAO- 02- 568R]

This testimony presents the results of GAO*s April report and updates the
progress the Park Service is making in implementing its new asset
management process.

www. gao. gov/ cgi- bin/ getrpt? GAO- 03- 992T. To view the full product,
including the scope and methodology, click on the link above. For more
information, contact Barry T. Hill at (202) 512- 3841 or hillbt@ gao. gov.
Highlights of GAO- 03- 992T, a report to the Subcommittee on National
Parks,

Historic Preservation, and Recreation, Committee on Energy and Natural
Resources, United States Senate July 8, 2003

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

Status of Agency Efforts to Address Its Maintenance Backlog

Page 1 GAO- 03- 992T

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee: I am pleased to be here
today to discuss the National Park Service*s maintenance backlog. GAO, the
Department of the Interior, and others have reported on the Park Service*s
efforts to develop an effective maintenance management process that would,
among other things, enable the agency to provide accurate and reliable
estimates of the amount of

deferred maintenance on its assets. Over the years, the agency*s estimates
of the amount of its deferred maintenance backlog have varied widely*
sometimes by billions of dollars. Currently, the agency estimates its
deferred maintenance backlog at over $5 billion. Although the Park Service
has spent almost two decades addressing its maintenance backlog, it
acknowledges that it still does not have the data it needs to properly
manage the broad array of historic, cultural, and natural assets placed in
its care* including accurate and reliable data on its deferred maintenance
needs. 1 In 1998, spurred by continuing congressional concerns and new
federal accounting standards, 2 the Park Service initiated the design of a
new asset management process that is intended to provide the agency with a
better overall approach to managing its asset inventory. A major goal of
this new process is to provide the Park Service with a reliable and

systematic method for estimating and documenting its deferred maintenance
needs and tracking progress in reducing the amount of deferred
maintenance.

As you requested, my testimony today will (1) summarize our prior work
regarding the potential of the Park Service*s new asset management process
to provide maintenance data that will permit agency managers and the
Congress to monitor progress in reducing deferred maintenance and (2)
update the progress the Park Service is making in implementing its new
asset management process and realizing its potential for improved
management.

1 This maintenance includes resources and activities needed to maintain
facilities and the infrastructure in the system, such as buildings,
trails, botanical gardens, bridges, and other structures. It does not
include maintenance or restoration of natural landscapes, such as removing
non- native plant species from a meadow. 2 The Statement of Federal
Financial Accounting Standards No. 6, Accounting for Plant, Property, and
Equipment, issued by the Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board in
1996, requires that deferred maintenance be disclosed in federal agencies*
annual financial statements beginning in fiscal year 1998.

Page 2 GAO- 03- 992T

For the most part, my testimony is based on a report we issued last year.
3 At that time, the design of the new process was complete but
implementation was just beginning. In preparing for today*s hearing, we
obtained updated information from the Park Service. However, we did not
have the opportunity to independently verify the information the Park
Service provided. To do so would have required work at regional offices
and parks. We conducted our work in accordance with generally accepted
government auditing standards.

As we previously reported, the Park Service*s new asset management process
is designed to address deferred maintenance, commonly referred to as the
maintenance backlog, as part of a much broader approach to asset
management. When fully and properly implemented, the new process is
expected, for the first time, to enable the agency to have a (1) reliable
inventory of its assets; (2) process for reporting on the condition of
each asset in its inventory; and (3) consistent, systemwide methodology
for estimating the deferred maintenance costs for each asset. As a result,
agency managers and the Congress should receive much more accurate and
reliable information on the extent of deferred maintenance needs
throughout the national park system. Nonetheless, while the Park Service*s
current efforts are promising, we reported on a few areas that the agency
needed to address to improve the performance of the process. These
included the need to (1) develop costs and schedules for completing the
implementation of the process so that the agency*s performance could be
monitored and assessed, (2) better coordinate the tracking of the process
among Park Service headquarters units to avoid duplication of effort
within the agency, and (3) better define its approach to assessing the
condition of its assets, and determining how much the assessments will
cost.

Since our report last year, I am pleased to say that the agency appears to
have made progress. While complete implementation of the process will not
occur until fiscal year 2006, the agency has completed, or nearly
completed, several substantial and important steps. According to the Park
Service, it has completed its asset inventory, trained staff on the use of
the required computer software, and completed most of the on- site
inspections necessary to determine the condition and maintenance needs 3
U. S. General Accounting Office, National Park Service: Status of Efforts
to Develop Better Deferred Maintenance Data, GAO- 02- 568R (Washington, D.
C.: Apr. 12, 2002). Results in Brief

Page 3 GAO- 03- 992T

of inventoried assets. In addition, the Park Service provided information
indicating that it was addressing each of the concerns identified in our
prior report.

The national park system contains 388 park units. These park units have a
diverse inventory of facilities and other assets, including over 18,000
permanent structures, 8,000 miles of roads, 1,800 bridges and tunnels,
4,400 housing units, about 700 water and wastewater systems, over 400
dams, and 200 solid waste operations. The Park Service values these assets
at over $35 billion. Needless to say, the proper care and maintenance of
the national parks and their supporting infrastructure is

essential to the continued use and enjoyment of our national treasures by
this and future generations. However, for years Park Service officials
have highlighted the agency*s inability to keep up with its maintenance
needs.

In this connection, Park Service officials and others have often cited a
continuing buildup of unmet maintenance needs as evidence of deteriorating
conditions throughout the national park system. The accumulation of these
unmet needs is commonly referred to as its *maintenance backlog.* Although
the Park Service has spent almost two decades and about $11 million
addressing this problem, it still does not have a reliable estimate of
deferred maintenance needs for its facilities and other assets.

In the past several years, concerns about the cost of operating and
maintaining federal recreation sites within the National Park Service, as
well as other federal land management agencies, led the Congress to
provide a significant new source of funds. This additional source of
funding* the Recreational Fee Demonstration Program 4 *was, in part, aimed
at helping the agencies address their backlogged repair and maintenance
problems. This new funding source is in addition to annual appropriations
the Park Service receives each year for maintenance activities. 5 4 Since
fiscal year 1996, the Park Service, as well as three other federal land
management

agencies, have been authorized to have a fee demonstration program. Under
this temporary program, the agencies are permitted to experiment with
increased and/ or new recreation fees. The revenue generated from this
program remains available for agency use to address a variety of needs,
including maintenance, without further appropriation. 5 The House
Committee on Appropriations has stressed that recreation fees should never
be used to replace appropriated funds; the fees should be used for direct
improvements on site that enhance the recreation experience. H. R. Rep.
No. 106- 646 (2000). Background

Page 4 GAO- 03- 992T

Despite the years of attention and funding and the well- intended efforts
of the agency and the Congress to resolve the maintenance backlog dilemma,
it has not gone away. While Congress continues to provide hundreds of
millions of dollars annually to deal with the maintenance backlog at the
national parks, the Park Service still has no reliable data on the size of
the problem, raising questions about what has been accomplished with the
provided funds.

As we reported in April 2002, the Park Service has made progress in
developing a new asset management process that, when fully and properly
implemented, should provide the agency with more accurate and reliable
estimates of the amount of deferred maintenance of its assets. As
currently planned, the new process will, for the first time, enable the
agency to have a (1) reliable inventory of its assets; (2) process for
reporting on the condition of assets in its inventory; and (3) systemwide
methodology for estimating deferred maintenance costs for assets.

The new asset management process is composed of both systemwide,
integrated software to track cost and maintenance data and regular
condition assessments of Park Service assets. The cornerstone of the new
asset management process is the Facility Management Software System. This
cradle- to- grave asset and work management process will allow park,
regional office, or Park Service headquarters managers to track when,

what, and how much maintenance and related costs has been directed at each
specific asset. In addition to using the software system, the Park Service
plans to assess the condition of its assets. These assessments will be
inspections to document the condition of an asset as measured against
applicable maintenance or condition standards. There are two types of
condition assessments* annual and comprehensive. Annual assessments are
essentially *eyeball inspections* of facilities to identify obvious and
apparent deficiencies. Comprehensive assessments are more in- depth
inspections to identify less obvious deficiencies, such as foundation or
structural problems. While the eye- ball assessments are annual, the
comprehensive assessments, which are much more expensive and
timeconsuming, occur in 5- year cycles. The Park Service is to use the
information obtained from these condition assessments to establish the
overall condition of a facility or asset, including the resources needed
to address its deferred maintenance needs and future facility needs. The
cost of identified deferred maintenance needs will be estimated using
another

computer software system that will provide a uniform method for When Fully
and

Properly Implemented, the Park Service*s New Asset Management Process
Should Provide Accurate and Reliable Deferred Maintenance Data

Page 5 GAO- 03- 992T

estimating repair and maintenance costs for each asset in the inventory.
Agency managers will use the condition assessment information in
combination with an asset priority ranking system to set priorities for
deferred maintenance projects.

While the design of the new process is complete, we reported in April 2002
that the Park Service had just begun implementing it. For example, at that
time, the agency was still inventorying its assets and training staff on
how to use the new process at about a third of the park units in the
national park system. We reported that because managers at each park will
be

required to implement this new process using a uniform systemwide
methodology, the resulting deferred maintenance estimates should permit
agency managers, as well as the Congress, to monitor progress in reducing
deferred maintenance both at the individual park and systemwide levels.
However, we noted that while the new process is promising, its success
cannot be determined until staff in each of the park units are trained and
the new asset management process is fully and properly implemented.

In our last report, we also raised three concerns about the Park Service*s
implementation of the new asset management process. While these matters
were not significant enough to undermine the overall merit of the new
process, we believed that addressing them would improve the effectiveness
of the process. First, even though the Park Service had been developing
its new process for more than 3 years, it had not yet estimated its total
implementation costs or developed a schedule for completing
implementation. While the agency had made progress in developing schedules
and costs for some components of the process, it had not yet estimated
when it will complete all the required condition assessments or what they
will cost. We noted that monitoring and assessing performance against
budgets and time frames would be difficult without complete estimates and
schedules that include all components of the process, including the
completion of condition assessments.

Second, two different operating divisions within the Park Service*
Concessions Management and Facilities Management* were developing separate
processes for tracking and reporting deferred maintenance, even

though both units are responsible for managing the condition of
government- owned facilities. Because both of these units have similar
responsibilities, it seemed reasonable that they would work together in a
coordinated way to ensure that their efforts are not duplicative.

Finally, the Park Service reported that about one- third of the park units
were to complete annual condition assessments by the end of fiscal year

Page 6 GAO- 03- 992T

2002. We noted that this approach may be appropriate for meeting
programmatic and financial reporting needs in the short term; however,
without comprehensive assessments, this approach might result in
overlooking more complex and costly problems in the long term. As a
result, this approach could understate the extent of the deferred
maintenance problem. Park Service officials told us that the agency
eventually planned to conduct comprehensive assessments for all assets.

However, at the time they had not developed a plan detailing where, when,
and how the assessments will be done or what they will cost. Although full
implementation of the new asset management process is still

years from completion, the Park Service appears to have made progress
since our last report. Also, importantly, Park Service management has
demonstrated its commitment to implementing this process by withholding
some fiscal year 2003 funding from parks that are not complying with the
agency*s implementation goals.

The agency now reports that it has completed its inventory of assets for
all park units as well as the first round of staff training on the use of
the facilities management software. The agency also contracted with a
consulting firm to evaluate its training and implementation efforts to
help ensure that the training is effective and that the software system is
being consistently applied throughout the park system. The Park Service is
now analyzing the firm*s results and recommendations to determine what
changes it should make for the next training cycle and in the ongoing
implementation of the process.

The agency is also addressing each of the issues raised in our last
report. Specifically, the Park Service has now developed cost and schedule
estimates for the complete implementation of the process. According to the
schedule, the process is to be fully implemented by the end of fiscal year
2006, when all the comprehensive condition assessments are complete for
all park units and deferred maintenance and other needs can be estimated
on a reliable and consistent basis for assets throughout the national park
system. The Park Service estimates now that the cost of the complete
rollout and implementation, including performing condition assessments,
will be about $91 million from fiscal years 1999 through 2006. Thereafter,
it estimates that the annual costs of sustaining the process once it is
fully operational will be about $20 million.

In response to our concern that two different operating divisions within
the agency* Concessions Management and Facilities Management* were The
Park Service Has

Made Progress Implementing Its Asset Management Process Since Our Last
Report

Page 7 GAO- 03- 992T

developing separate processes for maintaining government- owned
facilities, the Park Service told us that they agreed and are committed to
implementing a single facilities management process. According to the

agency, it is now in the early stages of developing a plan to eliminate
any duplication or inconsistencies between these two components of the
organization. The Park Service has also made progress in performing its
servicewide

facility condition assessments. According to the Park Service, it has
completed annual condition assessments* visual inspections* on all but
nine of the larger parks in the system. 6 In addition, the Park Service is
concurrently performing the more detailed, comprehensive condition
assessments on other park units. According to the Park Service, the work
done so far are necessary steps and reflect some of the best practices of
the private sector in developing and implementing an effective facility
management process.

The Park Service has an awesome responsibility in taking care of the
nation*s natural, cultural and historic treasures. While it has
unfortunately taken decades to achieve the current level of focus on
maintaining these treasures, the Park Service apparently now has made
substantive progress

in developing and implementing a system it can use to determine the
conditions of the assets in its portfolio and develop accurate and
reliable estimates of its deferred maintenance needs. However, the agency
has not yet completed the task. Determining the assets* conditions and
their maintenance costs will require years of sustained commitment by the
agency and by the Congress to ensure that the full benefits of the
agency*s new facility management process are realized.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be happy to
respond to any questions that you or Members of the Subcommittee may have.

6 These parks include Appalachian Trail, Delaware Water Gap, Gateway,
Golden Gate, Grand Canyon, Great Smoky Mountains, Rocky Mountain,
Yellowstone, and Yosemite. Conclusion

Page 8 GAO- 03- 992T

For further information about this testimony, please contact me at (202)
512- 3841. Cliff Fowler, Roy Judy, and Patrick Sigl made key contributions
to this statement. GAO Contacts and

Staff Acknowledgments

(360371)

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