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GAO-05-149R 1 (2005-02-03)

handle is hein.gao/gaocrptardk0001 and id is 1 raw text is: SGAO Accountability * Integrity Reliability United States Government Accountability Office Washington, DC 20548 February 3, 2005 The Honorable James M. Inhofe Chairman, Committee on Environment and Public Works United States Senate Subject: Grants Management: EPA Needs to Strengthen Efforts to Provide the Public with Complete and Accurate Information on Grant Opportunities Dear Mr. Chairman: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has faced persistent challenges for many years in managing its grants, which constitute over one-half of the agency's budget, or about $4 billion annually. Among other things, EPA has been criticized for not always promoting competition in awarding grants, including not completely and accurately announcing grant opportunities to the public and potential applicants. Informing the public about grant opportunities provides greater assurance that EPA will receive proposals from a large and varied pool of eligible and highly qualified applicants who otherwise might not have known about grant opportunities. One avenue EPA uses to inform the public about grant opportunities is the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA), the federal government's listing of available grants and other federal funding opportunities (available at wwwQFDA.aov).' The CFDA provides the public and potential applicants with specific information about grant opportunities. The CFDA identifies grant programs by title and an identifying number, known as a CFDA program code. Furthermore, EPA uses the CFDA to describe funding priorities-that is, the specific major activities, projects, and/or programs that EPA will fund for certain grant programs; these priorities can change from year to year.2 EPA's segment of the CFDA provides information on both discretionary and nondiscretionary grant programs. Discretionary grants are those for which EPA has the legislative authority to independently determine the recipients 'The General Services Administration and Office of Management and Budget's CFDA is a governmentwide compendium of federal programs, projects, and activities that provide assistance or benefits to the American public. Assistance includes, but is not limited to, financial assistance such as grants and cooperative agreements. For simplicity, we are referring to grants and cooperative agreements as grants. EPA uses other tools for announcing some grant programs, such as the Federal Register, and all competitive funding opportunities are announced on www.GraAs,gov. 2EPA uses the CFDA to comply with an Office of Management and Budget requirement that federal agencies announce funding priorities for discretionary grants. GAO-05-149R EPA Grants in the CFDA

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