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GAO-07-409R 1 (2007-05-09)

handle is hein.gao/gaocrptauwx0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Sai Accountability * Integrity * Reliability United States Government Accountability Office Washington, DC 20548 May 9, 2007 Congressional Committees Subject: General Services Administration Could Better Manage Unexpended Construction Balances and Make Its Budget More Transparent The General Services Administration (GSA) is the federal government's principal real estate agent, with responsibilities including constructing, leasing, and maintaining a variety of facilities-such as office buildings, courthouses, border stations, and laboratories-that it rents to federal agencies. GSA's construction projects, which can span several years, are authorized to carry forward fund balances from year to year in its construction and facility accounts for these projects. GSA is responsible for keeping track of and managing these balances to ensure that any unexpended funds that remain after projects are completed are redirected to other construction project needs within the agency.' GSA is required to identify construction projects that are estimated to cost in excess of established thresholds and obtain congressional approval for them. Funding for these projects exists in two accounts: (1) Construction and Acquisition and (2) Repairs and Alterations. For the purposes of this report, we refer to them as GSA's construction accounts. Additionally, the studies required for construction projects are among the items funded in the Building Operations account and we decided to include this account in our review. For purposes of this report, we refer to this as GSA's facility account. Under the Comptroller General's authority to conduct evaluations on his own initiative, and as part of a continued effort to assist Congress in overseeing real property management issues, we examined GSA's management of unexpended construction balances in relation to issues raised in our high-risk series.2 Specifically, we addressed the following question: To what extent does GSA have readily available information about unexpended balances in its construction and facility accounts to effectively manage these funds? To do this work, we reviewed the President's fiscal years 2006 and 2007 budgets, GSA's fiscal year 2007 congressional budget justification, previous years' 'Unexpended funds are the cumulative total of past fiscal years unobligated and obligated-but-not-yet- outlayed balances. 2GAO, High-Risk Series: Federal Real Property, GAO403-122 (Washington, D.C.: January 2003); Federal Real Property: Progress Made Toward Addressing Problems, but Underlying Obstacles Continue to Hamper Reform, GAO-07-349 (Washington, D.C.: April 2007). GAO-07-409R General Services Administration

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