Analysis of New Recovery Act Reporting Guidance

On June 22, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued new guidance to federal agencies [1] on implementing recipient reporting requirements under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, commonly called the Recovery Act. The guidance comes roughly four months after President Obama signed the Recovery Act into law and puts in place new requirements for the first quarterly reports that will start flowing in from grantees Oct. 10. According to the Coalition for an Accountable Recovery (CAR) [2], "While this guidance is a step in the right direction, there is still much room for improvement."

Responsibility for implementation of the Recovery Act is shared by two government bodies – the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board (RAT Board) and OMB. The RAT Board, chaired by Earl Devaney, oversees how funds are distributed in order to prevent fraud, waste, and abuse. The RAT Board also has responsibility for developing and maintaining Recovery.gov, the website that Obama said will serve as the vehicle for tracking "how we’re spending every dime." OMB has responsibility for instructing federal agencies on implementing the law, including what needs to be collected from those receiving Recovery Act funds, as well as what should be disclosed by federal agencies. OMB also has responsibility over the quality of the information that is disclosed.

The June 22 OMB guidance is the third from the office, all of which instruct agencies on implementing the law. The most recent guidance focuses solely on data reporting requirements under Section 1512 of the Recovery Act and only applies to recipients of grants, loans, tribal agreements, cooperative agreements, and other forms of financial assistance made available under the Recovery Act. OMB does not have authority to issue regulations or instructions on contracts that come directly from federal agencies. That authority rests with three federal agencies that comprise the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) council. The FAR is expected to release regulations to implement the data reporting requirements soon.

In essence, there are two types of reporting requirements under the Recovery Act. The first is what federal agencies are to provide in weekly reports given to the RAT Board. These weekly reports are to include information about grants, contracts, loans, and other forms of payments made under the Recovery Act. That information is to be made publicly available through agency websites and through Recovery.gov. While overall information on funds obligated and paid out are on the Recovery.gov website, no other detail, such as who has received the money, is provided. To some extent, USAspending.gov provides information about who is receiving the federal funds. Overall, this part of the reporting requirements has been widely criticized by Congress and public interest observers.

The second reporting requirement concerns those who receive the federal funds. The June 22 guidance clarifies that only the prime recipient and the first-tier recipient below the prime recipient (called the sub-recipient) will need to report. In other words, if a state receives a grant and sub-grants a portion to a city, and the city sub-contracts to five entities to carry out the work, only the state and the city will need to report information. There will be no requirement to collect information from the five entities doing the actual work.

OMB notes a new website, called FederalReporting.gov, will be created to allow prime recipients and sub-recipients to submit information. OMB allows the prime recipient to either report information to FederalReporting.gov for itself and its sub-recipients or to allow its sub-recipients to report directly themselves.

However, when it comes to reporting on information about jobs created or retained, OMB only allows the prime recipient to report to FederalReporting.gov for itself and its sub-recipients. OMB states that data on jobs can either be estimates or real numbers but should not include figures for indirect or induced jobs. Indirect or induced estimates will be developed by the White House Council of Economic Advisors based on statistical models. Additionally, OMB allows prime recipients to decide for themselves what constitutes a full-time equivalent (e.g., 30 hours or 40 hours per week).

Reporting to the FederalReporting.gov website is flexible, allowing users to report directly through the web or by sending Excel files or other files in XML formats. The website will incorporate a service developed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, called the Central Data Exchange, to handle data submitted in different formats and put it into a common format for the federal government. Once the data is parsed, checked for quality, and presumably standardized, it will be shared with Recovery.gov for public disclosure.

For more detailed information, see the Coalition for an Accountable Recovery website [2]. OMB Watch is a co-chair of CAR.