Geospatial Information: Better Coordination and Oversight Could  
Help Reduce Duplicative Investments (23-JUN-04, GAO-04-824T).	 
                                                                 
The collection, maintenance, and use of location-based		 
(geospatial) information are essential to federal agencies	 
carrying out their missions. Geographic information systems (GIS)
are critical elements used in the areas of homeland security,	 
healthcare, natural resources conservation, and countless other  
applications. GAO was asked to review the extent to which the	 
federal government is coordinating the efficient sharing of	 
geospatial assets, including through Office of Management and	 
Budget (OMB) oversight. GAO's report on this matter, Geospatial  
Information: Better Coordination Needed to Identify and Reduce	 
Duplicative Investments (GAO-04-703), is being released today.	 
GAO's testimony focuses on the extent to which the federal	 
government is coordinating the sharing of geospatial assets,	 
including through oversight measures in place at the Office of	 
Management and Budget (OMB), in order to identify and reduce	 
redundancies in geospatial data and systems.			 
-------------------------Indexing Terms------------------------- 
REPORTNUM:   GAO-04-824T					        
    ACCNO:   A10612						        
  TITLE:     Geospatial Information: Better Coordination and Oversight
Could Help Reduce Duplicative Investments			 
     DATE:   06/23/2004 
  SUBJECT:   Computer security					 
	     Computer software					 
	     Data collection					 
	     Federal agencies					 
	     Geographic information systems			 
	     Local governments					 
	     Physical security					 
	     National Spatial Data Infrastructure		 
	     Program						 
                                                                 
	     OMB Geospatial One-Stop Initiative 		 

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GAO-04-824T

United States General Accounting Office

GAO Testimony

Before the Subcommittee on Technology, Information Policy,
Intergovernmental Relations and the Census, House Committee on Government
Reform

For Release on Delivery

Expected at 2:00 p.m. EDT GEOSPATIAL

Wednesday, June 23, 2004

INFORMATION

  Better Coordination and Oversight Could Help Reduce Duplicative Investments

Statement of Linda D. Koontz
Director, Information Management Issues

GAO-04-824T

Highlights of GAO-04-824T, testimony before the Subcommittee on
Technology, Information Policy, Intergovernmental Relations and the
Census, House Committee on Government Reform

The collection, maintenance, and use of location-based (geospatial)
information are essential to federal agencies carrying out their missions.
Geographic information systems (GIS) are critical elements used in the
areas of homeland security, healthcare, natural resources conservation,
and countless other applications.

GAO was asked to review the extent to which the federal government is
coordinating the efficient sharing of geospatial assets, including through
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) oversight. GAO's report on this
matter, Geospatial Information: Better Coordination Needed to Identify and
Reduce Duplicative Investments (GAO-04-703), is being released today.
GAO's testimony focuses on the extent to which the federal government is
coordinating the sharing of geospatial assets, including through oversight
measures in place at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), in order
to identify and reduce redundancies in geospatial data and systems.

In its report, GAO recommends that the OMB Director and the Secretary of
the Interior develop a current, comprehensive strategic plan for
coordinating federal geospatial assets; and makes other recommendations to
OMB. In their comments on a draft of the report, OMB and Interior agreed
with GAO's recommendations.

www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-824T.

To view the full product, including the scope and methodology, click on
the link above. For more information, contact Linda D. Koontz at (202)
512-6240 or [email protected].

June 23, 2004

GEOSPATIAL INFORMATION

Better Coordination and Oversight Could Help Reduce Duplicative Investments

OMB, cross-government committees, and individual federal agencies have
taken actions to coordinate geospatial investments across agencies and
with state and local governments. However, these efforts have not been
fully successful for several reasons:

o  	A complete and up-to-date strategic plan is missing. The existing
strategic plan for coordinating national geospatial resources and
activities is out of date and lacks specific measures for identifying and
reducing redundancies.

o  	Federal agencies are not consistently complying with OMB direction to
coordinate their investments.

o  	OMB's oversight methods have not been effective in identifying or
eliminating instances of duplication. This has resulted from OMB not
collecting consistent, key investment information from all agencies.

Consequently, agencies continue to independently acquire and maintain
potentially duplicative systems. This costly practice is likely to
continue unless coordination is significantly improved.

Conceptual Diagram of Multiple Geospatial Data Collections and Processing
Associated with a Single Geographic Location

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:

I am pleased to participate in the Subcommittee's hearing on the federal
government's use and coordination of geospatial information. The federal
government collects, maintains, and uses geospatial information-
information linked to specific geographic locations-to help in decision
making and to support many essential functions, including national
security, law enforcement, health care, the environment, and natural
resources conservation. States, counties, cities, tribal governments, and
the private sector also use geospatial information to support critical
functions. Federal agencies, states, and local governments may each
provide services at the same geographic locations and may independently
collect similar geospatial information about those locations, thus raising
the question of how well the nation's geospatial assets1 are coordinated.

To encourage greater coordination, in 1990, OMB established the Federal
Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) within the Department of the Interior to
be the lead federal executive body responsible for promoting and guiding
coordination among federal, state, tribal, and local government entities,
academia, and the private sector. One of the committee's responsibilities
is to establish a National Geospatial Data Clearinghouse to provide
Web-based access to descriptions of available geospatial data, allowing
governments at all levels, academia, and the private sector to make their
data widely available.2 In addition to the clearinghouse, more recently,
in 2002, OMB established the Geospatial One-Stop initiative to develop an
Internet portal to provide easier, faster, and less expensive access to
geospatial information for all levels of government and the public.3 Both
the clearinghouse and Geospatial One-Stop, along with many other
coordination activities, contribute to the development of the National
Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI).4

1Geospatial assets include geographic information systems (GIS), data,
technology, and standards.

2The National Geospatial Data Clearinghouse is a decentralized system of
Internet-based servers that contain descriptions of available geospatial
data. It allows individual agencies, consortia, or others to promote their
available geospatial data.

3Geospatial One-Stop is an e-Government initiative sponsored by OMB to
enhance government efficiency and improve citizen service.

4The NSDI includes the technologies, policies, and people necessary to
promote sharing of geospatial data throughout all levels of government,
the private and non profit sectors, and the academic community.

  Results in Brief

My testimony today follows up on testimony provided to the Subcommittee in
June 2003.5 In my previous testimony, I noted that realizing the vision of
a nationwide network of geospatial information systems is a formidable
challenge and achieving full participation across governments in its
development has been difficult. Today's testimony will highlight the
extent to which the federal government is coordinating the sharing of
geospatial assets, including through oversight measures in place at the
Office of Management and Budget (OMB), in order to identify and reduce
redundancies in geospatial data and systems.

My testimony today summarizes a report, prepared at your request, on
federal coordination of geospatial investments.6 This report is being
released to you today. Our work in preparing the report was conducted from
October 2003 through May 2004 in accordance with generally accepted
government auditing standards.

OMB, individual federal agencies, and cross-government committees have
each taken action to coordinate the government's geospatial investments
across agencies and with state and local governments. Such coordination
could result in reducing redundancies in geospatial activities and
investments, with concomitant reductions in the costs associated with
these activities. However, these efforts have not been fully successful in
reducing redundancies in geospatial investments for several reasons.

First, while the National Geospatial Data Clearinghouse and Geospatial
One-Stop have been established to support the development of the NSDI and
to address redundant and incompatible geospatial information, a complete
and up-to-date strategic plan is not in place to help guide and
effectively manage these activities. The government's existing strategic
plan for the NSDI is out of date and does not include specific measures
for identifying and reducing redundancies.

Second, while in certain cases federal agencies have taken steps to
coordinate their specific geospatial activities, federal agencies have not

5U.S. General Accounting Office, Geographic Information Systems:
Challenges to Effective Data Sharing, GAO-03-874T (Washington, D.C.: June
10, 2003).

6U.S. General Accounting Office, Geospatial Information: Better
Coordination Needed to Identify and Reduce Duplicative Investments,
GAO-04-703 (Washington, D.C.: June 23, 2004).

always fully complied with OMB direction to coordinate their investments.
Specifically, many agency geospatial data holdings are not compliant with
established standards or are not published through the clearinghouse,
although both are required by OMB in order to help coordinate national
geospatial activities and investments.

Finally, although OMB has processes in place that could help identify
potentially redundant geospatial investments, these oversight methods have
not identified or eliminated specific instances of duplication. The
processes used by OMB to identify potentially redundant geospatial
investments have not been effective because OMB has not been able to
collect key investment information from all agencies in a consistent way
so that it could be used to identify redundancies. As a result of these
shortcomings, federal agencies are independently acquiring and maintaining
potentially duplicative and costly data sets and systems. Without better
coordination, such duplication is likely to continue.

Our report includes recommendations to the Director of OMB and to the
Secretary of the Interior to direct the development of an improved
strategic plan for coordinating federal geospatial assets. It also makes
recommendations to the Director of OMB to encourage better agency
compliance with Circular A-16 by developing and implementing criteria for
assessing the extent of interagency coordination on planned geospatial
investments and to strengthen OMB's oversight actions to better ensure
that agencies do not invest in potentially redundant geospatial systems or
data gathering efforts. In their comments on a draft of the report,
representatives of OMB's Offices of Information and Regulatory Affairs and
Resource Management and the Assistant Secretary of the Interior- Policy,
Management, and Budget generally agreed with these recommendations.

Background 	Geospatial information describes entities or phenomena that
can be referenced to specific locations relative to the Earth's surface.
For example, entities such as houses, rivers, road intersections, power
plants, and national parks can all be identified by their locations. In
addition, phenomena such as wildfires, the spread of the West Nile virus,
and the thinning of trees due to acid rain can also be identified by their
geographic locations.

A geographic information system (GIS) is a system of computer software,
hardware, and data used to capture, store, manipulate, analyze, and
graphically present a potentially wide array of geospatial information.
The

primary function of a GIS is to link multiple sets of geospatial data and
display the combined information as maps with many different layers of
information.

Each layer of a GIS map represents a particular "theme" or feature, and
one layer could be derived from a data source completely different from
the others. Typical geospatial data layers (themes) include cadastral-
describing location, ownership, and other information about real property;
digital orthoimagery-containing images of the Earth's surface that have
the geometric characteristics of a map and image qualities of a
photograph; and hydrography-describing water features such as lakes,
ponds, streams and rivers, canals, oceans, and coastlines. As long as
standard processes and formats have been used to facilitate integration,
each of these themes could be based on data originally collected and
maintained by a separate organization. Analyzing this layered information
as an integrated whole can significantly aid decision makers in
considering complex choices, such as where to locate a new department of
motor vehicles building to best serve the greatest number of citizens.
Figure 1 portrays the concept of data themes in a GIS.

                         Figure 1: GIS Layers or Themes

Federal, state, and local governments and the private sector rely on
geographic information systems to provide vital services to their
customers. These various entities independently provide information and
services, including maintaining land records for federal and nonfederal
lands, property taxation, local planning, subdivision control and zoning,
and direct delivery of many other public services. These entities also use
geographic information and geographic information systems to facilitate
and support delivery of these services.

Many federal departments and agencies use GIS technology to help carry out
their primary missions. For example, the Department of Health and Human
Services uses GIS technology for a variety of public health functions,
such as reporting the results of national health surveys; the Census
Bureau maintains the Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and
Referencing (TIGER) database to support its mission to

Geographic Information Systems and Data Are Used and Produced by Federal,
State, and Local Governments, and the Private Sector

conduct the decennial census and other censuses and surveys; and the
Environmental Protection Agency maintains a variety of databases with
information about the quality of air, water, and land in the United
States.

State governments also rely on geospatial information to provide
information and services to their citizens. For example, the state of New
York hosts a Web site to provide citizens with a gateway to state
government services at http://www.nysegov.com/map-NY.cfm. Using this Web
site, citizens can access information about state agencies and their
services, locate county boundaries and services, and locate major state
highways. Many other states, such as Oregon (http://www.gis.state.or.us/),
Virginia (http://www.vgin.virginia.gov/index.html), and Alaska
(http://www.asgdc.state.ak.us/), provide similar Web sites and services.

Local governments use GISs for a variety of activities. For example, local
fire departments can use geographic information systems to determine the
quickest and most efficient route from a firehouse to a specific location,
taking into account changing traffic patterns that occur at various times
of day. Additionally, according to a March 2002 Gartner report,7 New York
City's GIS was pivotal in the rescue, response, and recovery efforts after
the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The city's GIS provided
real-time data on the area around the World Trade Center so that the
mayor, governor, federal officials, and emergency response agencies could
implement critical rescue, response, and recovery activities. Local
governments often possess more recent and higher resolution geospatial
data than the federal government, and in many cases private-sector
companies collect these data under contract to local government agencies.

The private sector plays an important role in support of government GIS
activities because it captures and maintains a wealth of geospatial data
and develops GIS software. Private companies provide services such as
aerial photography, digital topographic mapping, digital orthophotography,
and digital elevation modeling to produce geospatial data sets that are
designed to meet the needs of governmental organizations.

Figure 2 provides a conceptual summary of the many entities-including
federal, state, and local governments and the private sector-that may be
involved in geospatial data collection and processing relative to a single

7B. Keller and G. Kreizman, To The Rescue: GIS in New York City on Sept.
11 (Gartner Inc., March 2002), http://www.gartner.com (downloaded March
10, 2004).

geographic location or event. Figure 3 shows the multiple data sets that
have been collected by different agencies at federal, state, and local
levels to capture the location of a segment of roadway in Texas.

Figure 2: Conceptual Diagram of Multiple Geospatial Data Collections and
Processing Associated with a Single Geographic Location

  Figure 3: Multiple Street Centerline Data Sets Covering the Same Location in
                                     Texas

Coordination of Federal Geospatial Activities

As we testified last year, the federal government has for many years taken
steps to coordinate geospatial activities, both within and outside of the
federal government.8 These include the issuance of OMB Circular A-16 and
Executive Order 12906, and the E-Government Act of 2002. In addition to
its responsibilities for geospatial information under the E-Government
Act, OMB has specific oversight responsibilities regarding federal
information technology (IT) systems and acquisition activities-including
GIS-to help ensure their efficient and effective use. These
responsibilities are outlined in the Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996,9 the
Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995,10 and OMB Circular A-11. Table 1 provides
a brief summary of federal guidance related to information technology and
geospatial information.

8GAO-03-874T. 940 U.S.C. S: 11302(b). 1044 U.S.C. S: 3504(a)(1).

Table 1: Federal Guidance Related to Information Technology and Geospatial
                                  Information

Guidance Description

OMB Circular A-11	The circular establishes policy for planning, budgeting,
acquisition, and management of federal capital assets. Specifically, it
requires agencies to submit business cases to OMB for planned or ongoing
major IT investments.a

OMB Circular A-16	Originally issued in 1953, and last revised in 2002,
this circular, among other things, establishes FGDC within the Department
of the Interior to promote the coordinated use, sharing, and dissemination
of geospatial data nationwide.

Executive Order 12906 	Issued in 1994, this order assigns to FGDC the
responsibility to coordinate the development of the National Spatial Data
Infrastructure (NSDI).

Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 	Includes a general requirement that the
Director of OMB oversee the use of information resources to improve the
efficiency and effectiveness of governmental operations to serve agency
missions.

Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996 	Requires the Director of OMB to promote and be
responsible for improving the acquisition, use, and disposal of
information technology by the federal government to improve the
productivity, efficiency, and effectiveness of federal programs.

E-Government Act of 2002 	Requires OMB to oversee coordination with state,
local, and tribal governments as well as public-private partnerships and
other interested persons on the development of standard protocols for
sharing geographic information to reduce redundant data collection and
promote collaboration and the use of standards.b

Source: GAO.

aAccording to OMB Circular A-11, a major IT investment means a system or
investment that requires special management attention because of its
importance to an agency's mission; the investment was a major investment
in the fiscal year 2004 submission and is continuing; the investment is
for financial management and spends more than $500,000; the investment is
directly tied to the top two layers of the Federal Enterprise
Architecture; the investment is an integral part of the agency's
modernization blueprint (EA); the investment has significant program or
policy implications; the investment has high executive visibility; or the
investment is defined as major by the agency's capital planning and
investment control process. Investments that are e-government in nature or
use e-business technologies must be identified as major investments
regardless of their costs.

bP.L. 107-347, Section 216.

In addition to activities associated with federal legislation and
guidance, OMB's Administrator, Office of Electronic Government and
Information Technology, testified before the Subcommittee last June that
the strategic management of geospatial assets would be accomplished, in
part, through development of a robust and mature federal enterprise
architecture. In 2001, the lack of a federal enterprise architecture was
cited by OMB's E-Government Task Force as a barrier to the success of the
administration's e-government initiatives.11 In response, OMB began
developing the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA), and over the last 2
years it has released

11OMB's E-Government Task Force identified 23 initiatives (two additional
initiatives were subsequently added) aimed at improving service to
individuals, service to businesses, intergovernmental affairs, and federal
agency-to-agency efficiency and effectiveness.

12

various versions of all but one of the five FEA reference models.
According to OMB, the purpose of the FEA, among other things, is to
provide a common frame of reference or taxonomy for agencies' individual
enterprise architecture efforts and their planned and ongoing

13

investment activities.

Costs Associated with Costs associated with collecting and maintaining
geographically Gathering, Maintaining, referenced data and systems for the
federal government are significant. and Using Geospatial Data Specific
examples14 of the costs of collecting and maintaining federal

                geospatial data and information systems include

                                Are Significant

o  	FEMA's Multi-Hazard Flood Map Modernization Program-estimated to cost
$1 billion over the next 5 years;

o  	Census's TIGER database-modernization is estimated to have cost over
$170 million between 2001 and 2004;

o  	Agriculture's Geospatial Database-acquisition and development
reportedly cost over $130 million;

o  	Interior's National Map-development is estimated to cost about $88
million through 2008;15

o  	The Department of the Navy's Primary Oceanographic Prediction, and
Oceanographic Information systems-development, modernization, and
operation were estimated to cost about $32 million in fiscal year 2003;
and

12These reference models include the Business Reference Model, the Service
Component Reference Model, the Technical Reference Model, the Performance
Reference Model, and the Data and Information Reference Model.

13An enterprise architecture is a blueprint, defined largely by
interrelated models, that describes (in both business and technology
terms) an entity's "as is" or current environment, its "to be" or future
environment, and its investment plan for transitioning from the current to
the future environment.

14The scope of these cost estimates varies and may include development,
operation, or both. The examples are for illustrative purposes and are not
intended to be compared.

15This figure does not include costs for data acquisition. Some National
Map data are acquired from Landsat satellites, which are estimated to cost
about $95 million to operate through 2008.

o

NOAA's Coastal Survey-expenditures for geospatial data are estimated to
cost about $30 million annually.

In addition to the costs for individual agency GISs and data, the
aggregated annual cost of collecting and maintaining geospatial data for
all NSDIrelated data themes and systems is estimated to be substantial.
According to a recent estimate by the National States Geographic
Information Council (NSGIC), the cost to collect detailed data for five
key data layers of the NSDI-parcel, critical infrastructure, orthoimagery,
elevation, and roads-is about $6.6 billion. The estimate assumes that the
data development will be coordinated among federal, state, and local
government agencies, and the council cautions that without effective
coordination, the costs could be far higher.

Both Executive Order 12906 and OMB Circular A-16 charge FGDC with
responsibilities that support coordination of federal GIS investments.
Specifically, the committee is designated the lead federal executive body
with responsibilities including (1) promoting and guiding coordination
among federal, state, tribal, and local government agencies, academia, and
the private sector in the collection, production, sharing, and use of
spatial information and the implementation of the NSDI; and (2) preparing
and maintaining a strategic plan for developing and implementing the NSDI.

Regarding coordination with federal and other entities and development of
the NSDI, FGDC has taken a variety of actions. It established a committee
structure with participation from federal agencies and key nonfederal
organizations such as NSGIC, and the National Association of Counties, and
established several programs to help ensure greater participation from
federal agencies as well as other government entities. In addition, key
actions taken by FGDC to develop the NSDI include implementing the
National Geospatial Data Clearinghouse and establishing a framework of
data themes.16 In addition to FGDC's programs, two other efforts are under
way that aim to coordinate and consolidate geospatial information and
resources across the federal government-the Geospatial One-Stop initiative
and The National Map project.

16The framework of data themes is a collaborative effort in which commonly
used data "layers" are developed, maintained, and integrated by public and
private organizations within a geographic area. Local, regional, state,
and federal organizations and private companies can use the framework as a
way to share resources, improve communications, and increase efficiency.

  FGDC and Others Have Taken Steps to Coordinate GIS Activities, but Lack a
  Complete and Up-to-Date Strategic Plan to Guide Them

o  	Geospatial One-Stop is intended to accelerate the development and
implementation of the NSDI to provide federal and state agencies with a
single point of access to map-related data, which in turn will enable
consolidation of redundant geospatial data. OMB selected Geospatial
One-Stop as one of its e-government initiatives, in part to support
development of an inventory of national geospatial assets, and also to
support reducing redundancies in federal geospatial assets. In addition,
the portal includes a "marketplace" that provides information on planned
and ongoing geospatial acquisitions for use by agencies that are
considering acquiring new data to facilitate coordination of existing and
planned acquisitions.

o  	The National Map is being developed and implemented by the U.S.
Geological Survey (USGS) as a database to provide core geospatial data
about the United States and its territories, similar to the data
traditionally provided on USGS paper topographic maps. USGS relies heavily
on partnerships with other federal agencies as well as states, localities,
and the private sector to maintain the accuracy and currency of the
national core geospatial data set as represented in The National Map.

According to Interior's Assistant Secretary-Policy, Management, and
Budget, FGDC, Geospatial One-Stop, and The National Map are coordinating
their activities in several areas, including developing standards and
framework data layers for the NSDI, increasing the effectiveness of the
clearinghouse, and making information about existing and planned data
acquisitions available through the Geospatial One-Stop Web site.

Regarding preparing and maintaining a strategic plan for developing and
implementing the NSDI, in 1994, FGDC issued a strategic plan that
described actions federal agencies and others could take to develop the
NSDI, such as establishing data themes and standards, training programs,
and partnerships to promote coordination and data sharing. In April 1997,
FGDC published an updated plan-with input from many organizations and
individuals having a stake in developing the NSDI-that defined strategic
goals and objectives to support the vision of the NSDI as defined in the
1994 plan. No further updates have been made.

As the current national geospatial strategy document, FGDC's 1997 plan is
out of date. First, it does not reflect the recent broadened use of
geospatial data and systems by many government agencies. Second, it does
not take into account the increased importance that has been placed on
homeland security in the wake of the September 11, 2001, attacks.
Geospatial data and systems have an essential role to play in supporting
decision makers

and emergency responders in protecting critical infrastructure and
responding to threats. Finally, significant governmentwide geospatial
efforts-including the Geospatial One-Stop and National Map projects- did
not exist in 1997, and are therefore not reflected in the strategic plan.

In addition to being out of date, the 1997 document lacks important
elements that should be included in an effective strategic plan. According
to the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993,17 such plans should
include a set of outcome-related strategic goals, a description of how
those goals are to be achieved, and an identification of risk factors that
could significantly affect their achievement. The plans should also
include performance goals and measures, with resources needed to achieve
them, as well as a description of the processes to be used to measure
progress.

While the 1997 NSDI plan contains a vision statement and goals and
objectives, it does not include other essential elements. These missing
elements include (1) a set of outcome-related goals, with actions to
achieve those goals, that would bring together the various actions being
taken to coordinate geospatial assets and achieve the vision of the NSDI;
(2) key risk factors that could significantly affect the achievement of
the goals and objectives; and (3) performance goals and measures to help
ensure that the steps being taken result in the development of the
National Spatial Data Infrastructure.

FGDC officials, in consultation with the executive director of Geospatial
One-Stop, USGS, and participating FGDC member agencies, have initiated a
"future directions" effort to begin the process of updating their existing
plan. However, this activity is just beginning, and there is no time frame
as to when a new strategy will be in place. Until a comprehensive national
strategy is in place, the current state of ineffective coordination is
likely to remain, and the vision of the NSDI will likely not be fully
realized.

17P.L. 103-62, section 3.

  Individual Agencies Have Coordinated Specific Geospatial Investments, but Have
  Not Fully Complied with OMB Guidance

OMB Circular A-16 directs federal agencies to coordinate their investments
to facilitate building the NSDI. The circular lists 11 specific
responsibilities for federal agencies, including (1) preparing,
maintaining, publishing, and implementing a strategy for advancing
geographic information and related spatial data activities appropriate to
their mission, in support of the NSDI; (2) using FGDC standards, including
metadata18 and other appropriate standards, documenting spatial data with
relevant metadata; and (3) making metadata available online through a
registered NSDI-compatible clearinghouse site.

In certain cases, federal agencies have taken steps to coordinate their
specific geospatial activities. For example, the Forest Service and Bureau
of Land Management collaborated to develop the National Integrated Land
System (NILS), which is intended to provide land managers with software
tools for the collection, management, and sharing of survey data,
cadastral data, and land records information. At an estimated cost of
about $34 million, a single GIS-NILS-was developed that can accommodate
the shared geospatial needs of both agencies, eliminating the need for
each agency to develop a separate system.

However, despite specific examples of coordination such as this, agencies
have not consistently complied with OMB's broader geospatial coordination
requirements. For example, only 10 of 17 agencies that provided reports to
FGDC reported having published geospatial strategies as required by
Circular A-16. In addition, agencies' spatial data holdings are generally
not compliant with FGDC standards. Specifically, the annual report shows
that, of the 17 agencies that provided reports to FGDC, only 4 reported
that their spatial data holdings were compliant with FGDC standards. Ten
agencies reported being partially compliant, and 3 agencies provided
answers that were unclear as to whether they were compliant. Finally,
regarding the requirement for agencies to post their data to the National
Geospatial Data Clearinghouse,19 only 6 of the 17 agencies indicated that
their data or metadata were published through the clearinghouse, 10
indicated that their data were not published, 1 indicated that some data
were available through the clearinghouse.

18Metadata refers to data that contain or define other data. For
geospatial information, metadata provides information about, among other
things, sources used, collection methods, and the date the data were
collected.

19According to Circular A-16, agencies are required to publish only data
that they are able to share with the public.

According to comments provided by agencies to FGDC in the annual report
submissions, there are several reasons why agencies have not complied with
their responsibilities under Circular A-16, including the lack of
performance measures that link funding to coordination efforts. According
to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, few incentives exist for
cross-agency cooperation because budget allocations are linked to
individual agency performance rather than to cooperative efforts. In
addition, according to USGS, agencies' activities and funding are driven
primarily by individual agency missions and do not address interagency
geospatial coordination. In addition to the information provided in the
annual report, Department of Agriculture officials said that no clear
performance measures exist linking funding to interagency coordination.

OMB has recognized that potentially redundant geospatial assets need to be
identified and that federal geospatial systems and information activities
need to be coordinated. To help identify potential redundancies, OMB's
Administrator of E-Government and Information Technology testified in June
2003 that the agency uses three key sources of information: (1) business
cases for planned or ongoing IT investments, submitted by agencies as part
of the annual budget process; (2) comparisons of agency lines of business
with the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA); and (3) annual reports
compiled by FGDC and submitted to OMB. However, none of these major
oversight processes have been effective tools to help OMB identify major
redundancies in federal GIS investments.

  OMB's Oversight of Federal Geospatial Assets and Activities Has Not Yet
  Identified Redundancies

Agency IT Business Cases Do Not Completely Describe Geospatial Data Assets

In their IT business cases, agencies must report the types of data that
will be used, including geospatial data. According to OMB's branch chief
for information policy and technology, OMB reviews these business cases to
determine whether any redundant geospatial investments are being funded.
Specifically, the process for reviewing a business case includes comparing
proposed investments, IT management and strategic plans, and other
business cases, in an attempt to determine whether a proposed investment
duplicates another agency's existing or already-approved investment.

However, business cases submitted to OMB under Circular A-11 do not always
include enough information to effectively identify potential geospatial
data and systems redundancies because OMB does not require such
information in agency business cases. For example, OMB does not require
that agencies clearly link information about their proposed or existing
geospatial investments to the spatial data categories (themes)

established by Circular A-16. Geospatial systems and data are ubiquitous
throughout federal agencies and are frequently integrated into agencies'
mission-related systems and business processes. Business cases that focus
on mission-related aspects of agency systems and data may not provide the
information necessary to compare specific geospatial investments with
other, potentially similar investments unless the data identified in the
business cases are categorized to allow OMB to more readily compare data
sets and identify potential redundancies.

For example, FEMA's fiscal year 2004 business case for its Multi-Hazard
Flood Map Modernization project indicates that topographic and base data
are used to perform engineering analyses for estimating flood discharge,
developing floodplain mapping, and locating areas of interest related to
hazards. However, FEMA does not categorize these data according to
standardized spatial data themes specified in Circular A-16, such as
elevation (bathymetric or terrestrial), transportation, and hydrography.
As a result, it is difficult to determine whether the data overlap with
other federal data sets. Without categorizing the data using the standard
data themes as an important step toward coordinating that data,
information about agencies' planned or ongoing use of geospatial data in
their business cases cannot be effectively assessed to determine whether
it could be integrated with other existing or planned federal geospatial
assets.

The Federal Enterprise Architecture Has Not Yet Effectively Identified
Potentially Redundant Geospatial Investments

An FEA is being constructed that, once it is further developed, may help
identify potentially redundant geospatial investments. According to OMB,
the FEA will comprise a collection of five interrelated reference models
designed to facilitate cross-agency analysis and the identification of
duplicative investments, gaps, and opportunities for collaboration within
and across federal agencies. According to recent GAO testimony on the
status of the FEA, although OMB has made progress on the FEA, it remains a
work in process and is still maturing.20

OMB has identified multiple purposes for the FEA. One purpose cited is to
inform agencies' individual enterprise architectures and to facilitate
their development by providing a common classification structure and
vocabulary. Another stated purpose is to provide a governmentwide

20U.S. General Accounting Office, Information Technology: The Federal
Enterprise Architecture and Agencies' Enterprise Architectures Are Still
Maturing, GAO-04-798T (Washington, D.C.: May 19, 2004).

framework that can increase agencies' awareness of IT capabilities that
other agencies have or plan to acquire, so that agencies can explore
opportunities for reuse. Still another stated purpose is to help OMB
decision makers identify opportunities for collaboration among agencies
through the implementation of common, reusable, and interoperable
solutions. We support the FEA as a framework for achieving these ends.

According to OMB's branch chief for information policy and technology, OMB
reviews all new investment proposals against the federal government's
lines of business in its Business Reference Model to identify those
investments that appear to have some commonality. Many of the model's
lines of business include areas in which geospatial information is of
critical importance, including disaster management (the cleanup and
restoration activities that take place after a disaster); environmental
management (functions required to monitor the environment and weather,
determine proper environmental standards, and address environmental
hazards and contamination); and transportation (federally supported
activities related to the safe passage, conveyance, or transportation of
goods and people).

The Service Component Reference Model includes specific references to
geospatial data and systems. It is intended to identify and classify IT
service components (i.e., applications) that support federal agencies and
promote the reuse of components across agencies. The model includes 29
types of services-including customer relationship management and the
visualization service, which defines capabilities that support the
conversion of data into graphical or picture form. One component of the
visualization service is associated with mapping, geospatial, elevation,
and global positioning system services. Identification of redundant
investments under the visualization service could provide OMB with
information that would be useful in identifying redundant geospatial
systems investments.

Finally, the Data and Information Reference Model would likely be the most
critical FEA element in identifying potentially redundant geospatial
investments. According to OMB, this model will categorize the government's
information along general content areas and describe data components that
are common to many business processes or activities.

Although the FEA includes elements that could be used to help identify
redundant investments, it is not yet sufficiently developed to be useful
in identifying redundant geospatial investments. While the Business and
Service Component reference models have aspects related to geospatial
investments, the Data and Information Reference Model may be the

critical element for identifying agency use of geospatial data because it
is planned to provide standard categories of data that could support
comparing data sets among federal agencies. However, this model has not
yet been completed and thus is not in use. Until the FEA is completed and
OMB develops effective analytical processes to use it, it will not be able
to contribute to identifying potentially redundant geospatial investments.

FGDC-Administered Agency Reports Are Not Sufficient for Identifying
Redundant Geospatial Investments

OMB Circular A-16 requires agencies to report annually to OMB on their
achievements in advancing geographic information and related spatial data
activities appropriate to their missions and in support of the NSDI. To
support this requirement, FGDC has developed a structure for agencies to
use to report such information in a consistent format and for aggregating
individual agencies' information. Using the agency reports, the committee
prepares an annual report to OMB purportedly identifying the scope and
depth of spatial data activities across agencies.

For the fiscal year 2003 report, agencies were asked to respond to several
specific questions about their geospatial activities, including (1)
whether a detailed strategy had been developed for integrating geographic
information and spatial data into their business processes, (2) how they
ensure that data are not already available prior to collecting new
geospatial data, and (3) whether geospatial data are a component of the
agency's enterprise architecture. However, additional information that is
critical to identifying redundancies was not required. For example,
agencies were not requested to provide information on their specific GIS
investments or the geospatial data sets they collected and maintained.
According to the FGDC staff director, the annual reports are not meant to
provide an inventory of federal geospatial assets. As a result, they
cannot provide OMB with sufficient information to identify redundancies in
federal geospatial investments.

Further, because not all agencies provide reports to FGDC, the information
that OMB has available to identify redundancies is incomplete. According
to OMB's program examiner for the Department of the Interior, OMB does not
know how well agencies are complying with the reporting requirements in
Circular A-16. Until the information reported by agencies is consistent
and complete, OMB will not be able to effectively use it to identify
potential geospatial redundancies.

According to OMB officials responsible for oversight of geospatial
activities, the agency's methods have not yet led to the identification of
redundant investments that could be targeted for consolidation or

elimination. The OMB officials said they believe that, with further
refinement, these tools will be effective in the future in helping them
identify redundancies. In addition, OMB representatives told us that they
are planning to institute a new process to collect more complete
information on agencies' geospatial investments by requiring agencies to
report all such investments through the Geospatial One-Stop Web portal.
OMB representatives told us that reporting requirements for agencies would
be detailed in a new directive that OMB expects to issue by the end of
summer 2004.

Federal Agencies Continue to Collect and Maintain Duplicative Data and
Systems

Without a complete and up-to-date strategy for coordination or effective
investment oversight by OMB, federal agencies continue to acquire and
maintain duplicative data and systems. According to the initial business
case for the Geospatial One-Stop initiative, about 50 percent of the
federal government's geospatial data investment is duplicative. Such
duplication is widely recognized. Officials from federal and state
agencies and OMB have all stated that unnecessarily redundant geospatial
data and systems exist throughout the federal government. The Staff
Director of FGDC agreed that redundancies continue to exist throughout the
federal government and that more work needs to be done to specifically
identify them. DHS's Geospatial Information Officer also acknowledged
redundancies in geospatial data acquisitions at his agency, and said that
DHS is working to create an enterprisewide approach to managing geospatial
data in order to reduce redundancies. Similarly, state representatives to
the National States Geographic Information Council have identified cases
in which they have observed multiple federal agencies funding the
acquisition of similar data to meet individual agency needs.

For example, USGS, FEMA, and the Department of Defense (DOD) each maintain
separate elevation data sets: USGS's National Elevation Dataset, FEMA's
flood hazard mapping elevation data program, and DOD's elevation data
regarding Defense installations. FEMA officials indicated that they
obtained much of their data from state and local partners or purchased
them from the private sector because data from those sources better fit
their accuracy and resolution requirements than elevation data available
from USGS. Similarly, according to one Army official, available USGS
elevation data sets generally do not include military installations, and
even when such data are available for specific installations, they are
typically not accurate enough for DOD's purposes. As a result, DOD
collects its own elevation data for its installations. In this example, if
USGS elevation data-collection projects were coordinated with FEMA and DOD
to help ensure that the needs of as many federal agencies as possible

were met through the project, potentially costly and redundant
datacollection activities could be avoided. According to the USGS
Associate Director for Geography, USGS is currently working to develop
relationships with FEMA and DOD, along with other federal agencies, to
determine where these agencies' data-collection activities overlap.

In another example, officials at the Department of Agriculture and the
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) both said they have
purchased data sets containing street-centerline data from commercial
sources, even though the Census Bureau maintains such data in its TIGER
database. According to these officials, they purchased the data
commercially because they had concerns about the accuracy of the TIGER
data. The Census Bureau is currently working to enhance its TIGER data in
preparation for the 2010 census, and a major objective of the project is
to improve the accuracy of its street location data. However, despite
Agriculture and NGA's use of street location data, Census did not include
either agency in the TIGER enhancement project plan's list of agencies
that will be affected by the initiative. Without better coordination,
agencies such as Agriculture and NGA are likely to continue to need to
purchase redundant commercial data sets in the future.

In summary, although various cross-government committees and initiatives,
individual federal agencies, and OMB have each taken actions to coordinate
the government's geospatial investments across agencies and with state and
local governments, agencies continue to purchase and maintain
uncoordinated and duplicative geospatial investments. Without better
coordination, such duplication is likely to continue. In order to improve
the coordination of federal geospatial investments, our report recommends
that the Director of OMB and the Secretary of the Interior direct the
development of a national geospatial data strategy with outcome-related
goals and objectives; a plan for how the goals and objectives are to be
achieved; identification of key risk factors; and performance measures.
Our report also recommends that the Director of OMB develop criteria for
assessing the extent of interagency coordination on proposals for
potential geospatial investments. Based on these criteria, funding for
potential geospatial investments should be delayed or denied when
coordination is not adequately addressed in agencies' proposals. Finally,
our report provides specific recommendations to the Director of OMB in
order to strengthen the agency's oversight actions to more effectively
coordinate federal geospatial data and systems acquisitions and thereby
reduce potentially redundant investments.

  Contact and Acknowledgments

(310717)

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my testimony. I would be pleased to respond
to any questions that you or other Members of the Subcommittee may have at
this time.

For further information regarding this statement, please contact me at
(202) 512-6240 or by e-mail at [email protected]. Other key contributors to
this testimony included Neil Doherty, John de Ferrari, Michael P.
Fruitman, Michael Holland, Steven Law, and Elizabeth Roach.

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