Government Performance

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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'High Road' Contracting: Unprincipled Contractors Need Not Apply

Jul 16, 2010 by Gary Therkildsen*

For all those principled contractors out there

Last week in the Los Angeles Times, Berkeley Law School Dean Christopher Edley wrote a compelling op-ed on why President Obama should end the delay and sign an executive order enforcing a new "high road" contracting policy for the federal government. While it's not likely to have the same instant stimulative effects of the Recovery Act, a "high road" contracting policy could, as Edley argues, "do more for the economy than [a] second stimulus measure."

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Quigley Introduces Contracting Reform Bill in House, Action Needed

Jul 14, 2010 by Gary Therkildsen*

Yesterday, Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL) introduced in the House companion legislation to Sen. Russ Feingold's (D-WI) recent contracting reform bill. As companion legislation, the House version of the "Federal Contracting Oversight and Reform Act of 2010" is a mirror image of the Feingold bill. The measure has several strong provisions, and, "if enacted, will lay the foundation for future [contracting] reforms." More members of Congress need to support this legislation.

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Commission Examines Wartime Contracting and Inherently Governmental Functions

On June 18, the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan (CWC) held the first of two hearings to examine the proper role and oversight of private security contractors (PSCs) in wartime contingency operations. The commission called six individuals from the private, academic, and nonprofit sectors to testify about the thorny issue of defining and enforcing what should and should not be outsourced to PSCs. While disagreement abounded on the issues, commissioners were able to pick out a few lines of consensus among the witnesses.

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MSHA Limited Number of Mines on Violations List

Earth Officials at the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) purposefully prevented a number of mines with serious safety violations from being placed on the list of mines with patterns of violations. Budget constraints, not safety concerns, led to some dangerous mines not being listed, according to the Department of Labor's Office of Inspector General (OIG).

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EPA Behind Schedule for Air Toxics Standards

Jun 28, 2010 by Matthew Madia

A U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) program to evaluate and regulate air toxics, especially in urban areas, is way behind schedule, according to an Inspector General report released last week. Under the Clean Air Act, EPA established a Integrated Urban Air Toxics Strategy in 1999, but has yet to implement much of the strategy. “For example, EPA has not established baseline risk data to measure progress in reducing air toxics risks,” according to the report.

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Administration Unveils New Fraud-Fighting Measures

Jun 18, 2010 by Gary Therkildsen*

This is presumably not what the 'do not pay' list will look like

Writing in his Federal Eye blog over at the Washington Post, Ed O'Keefe put up an interesting piece this morning about the Obama administration creating a government "do not pay" list to help prevent certain improper payments, and ordering the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to begin using a Recovery Act fraud-fighting tool.

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Obama Addresses Food Safety Concerns in the Gulf

Jun 15, 2010 by Matthew Madia

The Obama administration is attempting to reassure Americans that seafood from the Gulf of Mexico is safe to eat amid the BP-Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster. President Obama discussed food safety yesterday during a trip to the Gulf. "Let me be clear: Seafood from the Gulf today is safe to eat," Obama said.

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White House Issues Guidance on E-rulemaking and Paperwork Practices

On May 28, the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) issued two memoranda to federal agencies that impact key features of the regulatory process. The memos direct agencies to change practices related to electronic rulemaking dockets and to paperwork clearances that agencies request when collecting information from the public.

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OMB Watch and 29,000 Others Comment on Inherently Governmental Proposal

Jun 7, 2010 by Gary Therkildsen*

Last week, OMB Watch submitted comments to the Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP), the contracting regulatory authority within the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), regarding their proposed policy letter on reforming "inherently governmental" guidelines. Through our petition drive with CREDO Action, we spurred 29,402 people to write to OFPP to tell the agency what they thought about the proposed guidelines as well.

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Contracting Industry Verklempt Over Possibility of Contracts Going Public

Jun 2, 2010 by Gary Therkildsen*

The Federal Times had an interesting piece last week on the contracting industry's reaction to a recent notice in the Federal Register seeking input on "how best to amend the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to enable public posting of contract actions." Despite the FAR Councils' stated efforts to post contracts "without compromising contractors' proprietary and confidential commercial or financial information," industry executives are beside themselves over such a monumental change. Not surprisingly, their arguments against the idea don't hold much water.

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