Sequestration will impact private businesses and federal employees
According to Office of Management and Budget, the Small Business Administration is set to lose more than $92 million in funding, roughly $69 million of which goes to fund disaster loans and business loans, under the sequestration that came into force March 1.
NASA auditors find a third of women-owned small business certifications to be false
Agencies risk of giving women-owned small business awards to improperly labeled businesses because these businesses can self-certify under regulations from the Small Business Administration, says NASA's office of inspector general.
Sequestration cuts will impact readiness, not Afghanistan, says DoD
Sequestration cuts to the Defense Department can be managed in the near-term and will not risk U.S. military efforts in Afghanistan, but the loss of readiness could compromise response to future conflicts, says Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. Hagel said the cuts affect each of 2,500 individual investment programs, so adjustments will include reviews and delays to contracts.
Sequestration comes into effect
The Office of Management and Budget has outlined the budget cuts that must be applied to the federal government under sequestration, but there is no political consensus on their economic impact. "According to analysis by outside experts, sequestration would reduce real GDP growth for 2013 by 0.5 to 0.7 percentage points were it to continue for the rest of the calendar year," says the White House.
IRS risk assessment process is unreliable, says TIGTA
The Internal Revenue Service doesn't have a reliable process to assess its risk of making improper payments in revenue programs, says the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration. The audit found that the risk assessment process gave reasonable results for the 12 IRS administrative programs, but did not accurately reflect the risk of improper payments in the 16 revenue program funds.
Keeping underutilized space costs the government billions, says GAO
The federal government faces significant problems and costs in managing its real property, potentially losing more than $1.5 billion each year, according to testimony at a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing.
Performance reviews could improve with outside participation, says GAO
Quarterly data-driven performance reviews are effective tools for improving performance and decision making and could be further strengthened if relevant agencies participated in each other's reviews, says the Government Accountability Office.
Travel restrictions and cuts have saved $2B so far, says OMB
Efforts to reduce overall travel and increase oversight in travel and conference spending have saved the federal government roughly $2 billion from fiscal 2010 to fiscal 2012, says Daniel Werfel, controller at the Office of Management and Budget.
Hagel sworn in just in time for sequestration
Newly sworn-in Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel only briefly addressed looming sequestration cuts when he took to the Pentagon airways Wednesday to address Defense Department personnel. Hagel's press secretary, George Little, was more direct, calling the potential impact "devastating."
Sequestration has not already caused teaching job losses
The Obama administration's assertion that teachers have already lost jobs due to impending sequestration is false, according research from the Washington Post. The paper also disagrees with the total number of teaching job losses the administration claims because of the method the administration used to reach the figure.
Unpredictable budget threatens national security, say Joint Chiefs
The current fiscal uncertainty due to sequestration and the continuing resolution threatens present and future military readiness and strength, members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told the House Appropriations Committee.
GAO says staff will bear the brunt of sequestration
While there are no plans to furlough employees, the Government Accountability Office will be forced to reduce employee benefits and travel as well as cut new hires by 60 percent if sequestration occurs, said Comptroller General Gene Dodaro. The agency will cut benefits such as student loan repayments and performance-based compensation, as well as reducing travel.
GPO fears sequestration's ripple effect
The Government Printing Office may be forced to furlough employees if other agencies respond to sequestration by reducing their use of publishing and printing services, said GPO's Acting Public Printer Davita Vance-Cooks.
Continual errors make some USPS information unreliable, finds IG
Information the Postal Service collects to develop new rates, estimate stamp use and help prepare its budget is unreliable because of continued noncompliance with prescribed policies and procedures, says the service's inspector general.
Watchdog calls White House meeting records suspicious
The records of interactions between the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs and special-interest groups are suspiciously sparse, the Center for Effective Government said Feb. 26. The advocacy group analyzed OIRA records for three agencies and found what it said is an implausibly small number of written comments and records of phone conversations.
A bitter upside to sequestration
Air travel set to slow during sequestration
Expect air travel to slow down should the sequester occur as planned on March 1, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood warned during a Feb. 22 White House press conference. "Once airlines see the potential impact of these furloughs, we expect that they will change their schedules and cancel flights," he said, stating that nearly all 47,000 FAA employees would have to take one to two unpaid days off from work every two weeks.
White House set to expand oversight of potentially dangerous scientific research
Research institutions would have to implement internal oversight procedures, develop risk mitigation plans, establish review committees, educate and train researchers on threats, and report noncompliance.
Polls find public concerned about sequester and deficit, unsupportive of spending cuts
Even amid strong calls for deficit reduction, there exists little public support for cutting specific areas of government spending, according to Pew Research Center polls.
Military could cut deeply and prepare for war in Asia under Brookings proposal
The military wouldn't be able to intervene in problems that aren't clearly tied to U.S. interests and would be "deliberately less ready to undertake a long counterinsurgency war," says the proposal's author, Cindy Williams of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Security Studies Program. It would still, though, be fully able to win a major theater war and help an ally defend against an attack at the same time.
