[House Hearing, 115 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
AGRICULTURE, RURAL DEVELOPMENT, FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION, AND
RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2018
_______________________________________________________________________
HEARING
BEFORE A
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
_________
SUBCOMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE, RURAL DEVELOPMENT, FOOD AND DRUG
ADMINISTRATION, AND RELATED AGENCIES
ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama, Chairman
KEVIN YODER, Kansas SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia
THOMAS J. ROONEY, Florida ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut
DAVID G. VALADAO, California CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland MARK POCAN, Wisconsin
DAVID YOUNG, Iowa
STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi
NOTE: Under committee rules, Mr. Frelinghuysen, as chairman of the
full committee, and Mrs. Lowey, as ranking minority member of the full
committee, are authorized to sit as members of all subcommittees.
Tom O'Brien, Pam Miller, Andrew Cooper,
Justin Masucci, and Elizabeth King
Subcommittee Staff
________
PART 4
USDA OFFICE OF THE INSPECTOR GENERAL
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
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Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
28-273 WASHINGTON : 2018
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
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RODNEY P. FRELINGHUYSEN, New Jersey, Chairman
HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky \1\ NITA M. LOWEY, New York
ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio
KAY GRANGER, Texas PETER J. VISCLOSKY, Indiana
MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho JOSE E. SERRANO, New York
JOHN ABNEY CULBERSON, Texas ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut
JOHN R. CARTER, Texas DAVID E. PRICE, North Carolina
KEN CALVERT, California LUCILLE ROYBAL-ALLARD, California
TOM COLE, Oklahoma SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia
MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida BARBARA LEE, California
CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota
TOM GRAVES, Georgia TIM RYAN, Ohio
KEVIN YODER, Kansas C. A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland
STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida
JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
THOMAS J. ROONEY, Florida CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
CHARLES J. FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington DEREK KILMER, Washington
DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania
DAVID G. VALADAO, California GRACE MENG, New York
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland MARK POCAN, Wisconsin
MARTHA ROBY, Alabama KATHERINE M. CLARK, Massachusetts
MARK E. AMODEI, Nevada PETE AGUILAR, California
CHRIS STEWART, Utah
DAVID YOUNG, Iowa
EVAN H. JENKINS, West Virginia
STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi
DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington
JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan
SCOTT TAYLOR, Virginia
----------
\1\}Chairman Emeritus
Nancy Fox, Clerk and Staff Director
(ii)
AGRICULTURE, RURAL DEVELOPMENT, FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION, AND
RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2018
----------
Wednesday, February 15, 2017.
OVERSIGHT HEARING--OFFICE OF THE INSPECTOR GENERAL, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF
AGRICULTURE
WITNESSES
PHYLLIS K. FONG, INSPECTOR GENERAL
GIL H. HARDEN, ASSISTANT INSPECTOR GENERAL FOR AUDIT
ANN COFFEY, ASSISTANT INSPECTOR GENERAL FOR INVESTIGATIONS
Mr. Aderholt. Well, good morning. The subcommittee will
come to order. We welcome everyone to the Agriculture
Subcommittee of Appropriations. And this is the first hearing
of 115th Congress, and today we have the U.S. Department of
Agriculture Inspector General.
Welcome. Glad to have you here.
First and foremost, before we get started, I want to
congratulate and welcome our new ranking member, Sanford Bishop
from Georgia. I have had the pleasure of working with
Congressman Bishop over the last several years, I think since
you first came on the Appropriations Committee in 2003. Is that
correct?
Mr. Bishop. That is correct.
Mr. Aderholt. And, of course, we both share a passion for
the great work that the Appropriations Committee does and, in
particular, what the Agriculture Subcommittee does. We both
represent a district where agriculture plays a big role, a very
crucial role in the livelihood of our constituents. And Mr.
Bishop is well respected as a principal member of this
committee, and he is not afraid to reach across the aisle--and
I appreciate that--to solve real issues that everyday people
have out in America, whether it be in Georgia, Alabama, or
whatever State it may be. I look forward to working with him.
And so, Mr. Bishop, welcome, and glad to have you in that
role in this new Congress.
I would also like to welcome back all the other members of
the subcommittee. We are, oddly enough--I say ``oddly enough,''
but I think it is ``fortunately''--we are one of two
subcommittees that membership did not change on the majority
side. Everybody was happy, wanted to stay where they were, and
that was great. On the minority side, we did welcome the
addition of our new member from the Second District of
Wisconsin, Mr. Pocan, and we look forward to working with you.
And I view the popularity of this subcommittee to be a very
positive sign of the interest in this subcommittee in dealing
with the real world changes, and so we want to welcome you
today for this first hearing of the 115th Congress.
opening statement--mr. aderholt
Due to the typical delays of any new administration, we may
not see the fiscal year 2018 budget request for another month
or so, but I would like to share in some detail some of the
themes that we would like to set as a guideline for the
subcommittee's work for fiscal year 2018.
Our first theme builds off on our oversight activities over
the past several years. It is about evaluating and accounting
for taxpayer dollars to ensure efficiency and accountability.
We will continue to work to eliminate and prevent burdensome
regulation, to improve agency accountability, eliminate
duplicative programs and initiatives, ensure proper staffing
levels, and make investments improving ineffective programs
with a demonstrated benefit to American families.
The second theme is investing in rural infrastructure as a
catalyst for growth. I want us to make smart investments in
critical utility infrastructure, such as broadband,
electricity, water systems, and housing for our vulnerable
populations; assist rural businesses to create unique economic
opportunities; and provide funding that helps to grow economic
development and jobs.
The third theme is about ensuring support for our farmers,
ranchers, and producers. This includes providing opportunities
for our constituents through access to domestic and
international trade; providing credit to producers; ensuring
free and fair markets; supporting science and research to
promote productivity and sustainability; and guaranteeing the
safety net is there for those who need it the most.
Our fourth and final theme is protecting the health and
safety of people, plants, and animals. We will work to protect
our safe and healthy food supply; control or eradicate plants
and animal pests and disease that threaten agricultural
industries; ensure safety and effectiveness of human and animal
drug and medical products; deliver nutrition assistance to
vulnerable populations; and provide for the efficient use of
funds for nutritional research and education.
As for today's hearing, Ms. Fong, we would like to thank
you for being here today and with your team. I believe this
marks your 15th straight year, if my information is correct,
that you have appeared before this subcommittee. That was
before I came on the subcommittee, but you certainly have had a
long time being here, and you should feel right at home this
morning. So, needless to say, we have a deeply experienced team
at the Office of the Inspector General as this new
administration fills its leadership positions.
I look forward to discussing the ongoing challenges that
are faced by the Department that have arisen over the last 8
years. I would also like to get your input on future problems
that may arise in programs, policies, and practices that may be
of concern to you and, of course, to your organization.
Based upon your written testimony, it appears that the last
administration failed to fix problems in a number of high-
priority areas, such as financial management, information
technology, security, and the integrity of benefits. The work
you do covers so many different aspects of American lives, from
housing, to electricity, business development, farm safety net,
food safety, and making sure people don't go hungry, things
that most citizens don't really realize that goes on on a day-
to-day basis. Your job is incredibly important to the integrity
and success of the Department.
The U.S. taxpayer should also be supportive of your work
due to the risk exposure of USDA's financial activities. Most
Americans would be surprised to know that USDA has over $200
billion in assets, $143 billion in annual spending, and more
than $100 billion in loans. The outstanding recommendations
offered by the Office of the Inspector General over the past 8
years could yield $700 million in savings. These are areas that
you have identified, and it appears that no final action was
taken during the previous administration.
One example of the success of your work is the recent drop
in improper payments for the crop insurance program. As a
result of the Office of Inspector General's annual reviews and
recommendations, this rate is at a record low of 2 percent and
has dropped for the past 2 consecutive years.
Among other things, we plan to discuss issues related to
your audits and investigations that range from the Farm Bill,
the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, information
technology, accounting deficiencies, and USDA's 3-year delay in
setting up the Under Secretary for Trade and Foreign
Agricultural Affairs. That was mandated in the 2014 Farm Bill.
The subcommittee would also like to highlight the fact that
you have once again received the outstanding recognition of
your excellent work among the IG community. You received five
awards and recognitions in 2016 from the Council of Inspectors
General on Integrity and Efficiency, which encompasses the
entirety of the IG community across the Federal Government. So
I extend my congratulations for those achievements, as I know
the subcommittee here does as well.
Before I recognize our ranking member from Georgia, Mr.
Sanford Bishop, for his opening statement, I want to remind
everyone that we will try to abide as closely as possible to
the 5-minute rule when we go to the Q&A, but make sure you do
hit the ``talk'' button on your microphone before and after you
speak. As some of you know, we got a refurbishing of the
Subcommittee hearing room, and so we have some new buttons and
gadgets up here.
So, at this time, I would like to recognize the ranking
member, Mr. Bishop.
opening statement--mr. bishop
Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
This is my first hearing in my capacity as the new ranking
member, and I want to just say thank you for your welcome and
for the friendship and collegiality that we have had over the
years. I look forward to working with you and the members of
the committee, as well as both of our staffs. I think we have
started off on a very good note, and I think we will get a lot
of things done for the American people.
Let me just say that I also would like to welcome my new
member on the minority side, Mr. Pocan. We are all excited
about the challenges that we are faced with. And I want you to
know that I think I can speak for all of us that the program
that you have outlined in terms of oversight activities,
infrastructure development, health and safety, and looking
after our communities, particularly the rural development, has
been well received on our side, and we look forward to working
together on that.
With that said, I would like to welcome Ms. Fong, Mr.
Harden, and Ms. Coffey to the committee once again. It is a
very distinguished panel. And judging by the many years that
you have collectively served in the USDA Office of Inspector
General, you have obviously found your work rewarding. And, of
course, as the Chairman indicated, the high quality of your
work has been repeatedly recognized, most recently with your
award, Ms. Fong, when your IG colleagues gave you an
outstanding award there for your investigation into food safety
issues. It led to the recall of 8.7 million pounds of meat, but
it was ultimately in protection of the consuming public, and
congratulations on that, and we appreciate your diligence.
We are sort of in an odd situation budget-wise at the
moment, as the Chairman alluded to, with the 2017 bills not
finished and no clear path forward in 2018, but I assure you
that we always find a way to get the job done, and I hope that
this year will be no exception. I have an abiding interest in
your work. We have got to do everything that we can to root out
fraud, abuse, mismanagement, and, of course, we have got to
improve efficiency and effectiveness. And, of course, you are
charged with investigating criminal activity in USDA programs.
In a number of cases, State and local governments actually
administer programs on behalf of the Federal Government, but
like their Federal partners, their budgets are very tight and
they struggle with staffing and training. And I fear that
further restraints on our spending will make it harder and
harder to administer the programs properly, and so I look
forward to discussing that challenge with you as well as the
other important issues that we will face.
So I thank you, Mr. Chairman. We look forward to going
forward with our responsibilities.
Mr. Aderholt. Thank you, Mr. Bishop.
Ms. Fong, again, welcome, and you may proceed with your
testimony.
opening statement--ms. fong
Ms. Fong. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member
Bishop, and members of the subcommittee. We are very happy to
be here today to talk about our work, and we appreciate the
very warm welcome from all of you.
On behalf of all of our staff, our auditors, investigators,
attorneys, and everyone around the country, we thank you for
your support and interest and your recognition of the tough job
that we do every day.
Today I am hoping that we can build on our ongoing, very
positive, and constructive dialogue on a number of issues. As
you mentioned, we have Gil Harden, who is head of our audit
operation, and Ann Coffey, who is head of our investigations
operation. They are very experienced and knowledgeable, and I
know that they will add a lot to the conversation.
As many of you know, our job within OIG is to help USDA
deliver its programs as effectively as possible with integrity.
We do that through audits and investigations, and we make
recommendations, but ultimately it is up to the Department to
take the corrective actions that are necessary.
You have my written statement for the record, which
summarizes much of our work and our ongoing activities, and I
am just going to hit very quickly on some of the high points
here, and we can, after that, get into the question-and-answer
session.
Of particular note, I want to thank the chairman and Mr.
Farr, who was the ranking member at the time, for the request
that you all made to us with respect to U.S. MARC and the
research activities that were going on at that center. We
finished a review of that this year and recommended that USDA
improve its oversight of animal welfare at that site. Even
though we found that many of the published media statements
were without basis, we did feel that ARS could do a better job.
In the larger context of scientific integrity and research, we
have some ongoing work, which we will be happy to talk about
during the question session.
We also recently issued audits in the SNAP program with
respect to a number of aspects of the SNAP program. We have
done work on the administrative costs of managing that program
and delivering it through the State and local governments. We
have looked at the Able-Bodied Adults Without Dependents
provisions, and we have also looked at data analysis of
potential fraud. So we have got a number of reports there that
we can talk about, with recommendations for improvement. And,
as you know, we continue to do investigations in that area. We
continue to have high-dollar results and convictions.
In the area of farm programs, we reviewed how USDA agencies
should be sharing data for program eligibility purposes. We
have looked at NRCS wetland conservation activities, primarily
in the Prairie Pothole Region, and we had a number of
recommendations for improvement in those areas as well.
Finally, I want to note that financial management continues
to be a significant challenge for the Department. While USDA
has made some progress, we believe that much more needs to be
done, especially to attain an unmodified opinion on its
financial statements both at the consolidated level as well as
at the agency level. We also need to provide sustained
attention to the rising improper payment rates overall at USDA,
and this will require sustained attention from leadership at
the Department over the next year and beyond.
So, in closing, I want to thank the subcommittee for your
interest in our work, your continuing support over the years,
our very constructive dialogue with all of your members, and we
look forward to continuing that relationship. Thank you, and we
are ready to answer questions.
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
DEPARTMENTAL OVERSIGHT
Mr. Aderholt. Thank you, Ms. Fong.
Thank you for your testimony. This morning we want to
discuss a wide range of issues that affect USDA and get your
opinion on what the major challenges are as you move forward
and as we all move forward.
As I mentioned in my opening statement, over the last 8
years, Congress has played a large role in the oversight of the
Department. A lot of these challenges were never fully
addressed by the previous administration, and now we have to
hope you and the new administration fix some critical issues.
Examples: $700 million in unaddressed savings; $2.2 billion in
faulty accounting estimates at the Commodity Credit
Corporation; 5 consecutive years of violating the improper
payment laws; chronic flaws in IT security; hundreds of
millions of dollars wasted on farm program systems that have
failed our farmers and our ranchers; and consistently delayed
and deficient financial statements.
In a nutshell, I guess my question is, how can we help you?
As Chairman of this subcommittee for the past 4 years, many
times I have grown frustrated, and I know many Members and the
staff have grown frustrated, with the Department as they roll
out new initiatives that actually grabbed a lot of headlines at
the time, but they neglected several basic housekeeping items.
So can you tell us how you plan to raise the issues you
have identified with the new Secretary and the others on his
leadership team, and how you may offer solutions?
Ms. Fong. Well, that is a very wide-ranging and deep
question, and----
Mr. Aderholt. So you can take it the way you want to.
Ms. Fong. Thank you.
Well, we are looking forward to working with the new
administration, the new Secretary, and his subcabinet when they
are confirmed. And, as you note, leadership at the top is
critical, tone at the top is critical to bringing a sense of
urgency and priority to many of the issues that we have
identified. And so our intent and our plan is to start out
quickly out of the box with briefing the new team coming in on
the issues that we are reporting, in particular some of the key
challenges that you have raised: financial management at the
Department, unresolved audit recommendations, improper
payments, the full litany of challenges that we have
identified.
Now, in terms of how all of us go forward, you are
absolutely correct that many of these issues are longstanding
and have deep roots. Many of the other issues that we see may
be a little more ephemeral; they may be easier to address. And
I think we all have our roles to play. It is our job within the
IG's Office to identify these issues, to report them out to the
decisionmakers, to bring them to your attention, to track
resolution, and, if resolution doesn't occur, to point that
out.
What we have found very helpful in the past is to have
leadership at the Department who views management as a critical
responsibility and who is willing to work with us as we surface
issues.
What we have also found very helpful is, in our experience,
when you at this subcommittee level, or any of the oversight
committees, have a concern about a particular issue, you have
been very active in terms of raising it with us and with the
Secretary through hearings, letters, and questions. And we have
seen that, when there is that level of interest from the
oversight bodies, that tends to generate more activity in a
quicker timeframe. Similarly, if you ask us to do a review, we
take those requests very seriously. We engage in dialogue with
all of you to see what we can do to help bring some additional
information and perspective to the issue. So we stand ready to
do that.
IMPROPER PAYMENTS
Mr. Aderholt. OK. Let me just briefly, I have just got a
few seconds here left, but one of the issues that I think
boggles the mind is the four programs under the Food and
Nutrition Services that have not complied with the improper
payment laws for the past 4 years.
In just a nutshell, are there ways that we can assist you
in bringing attention, solutions to the mistakes that keep on
seem to be occurring over and over again?
Ms. Fong. The improper payment laws have a whole
architecture of how you approach these issues. And I think
where we are now with USDA is, with respect to SNAP, there
needs to be a way for FNS to move forward to identify an
improper payment rate. They did not report one for fiscal year
2015, and we can talk about that.
With respect to other programs, there are--and this is for
both the farm programs as well as FNS--there are requirements
that the Department move forward with corrective action plans,
and they must provide those plans to Congress and OMB. And I
believe the Department has developed plans and has sent them
forward. We can work with you to find those and provide them.
Mr. Aderholt. OK.
[The information follows:]
We have the corrective action plans for the 18 USDA
programs deemed to be high risk for improper payments. We will
deliver them to you and your staff under separate cover. These
programs are as follows:
Farm Service Agency (FSA):
Loan Deficiency Program (LDP)
Livestock Forage Disaster Program (LFP)
Livestock Indemnity Program (LIP)
Supplemental Revenue Assistance Payments Program (SURE)
Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP)
Hurricane Sandy--Emergency Conservation Program (ECP)
Hurricane Sandy--Emergency Forest Restoration Program
(EFRP)
Food and Nutrition Service (FNS):
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)
National School Lunch Program (NSLP)
School Breakfast Program (SBP)
Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants,
and Children (WIC)
Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP)
Forest Service (FS):
Hurricane Sandy--Emergency Forestry Restoration Program
(EFRP)
Hurricane Sandy Capital Improvement and Maintenance (CIM)
Natural Resources Conservation Service:
Farm Security and Rural Investment Act Programs (FSRIP)
Hurricane Sandy--Emergency Watershed Protection Program
(EWPP)
Risk Management Agency (RMA):
Federal Crop Insurance Corporation (FCIC) Program Fund
Rural House Service (RHS):
Rental Assistance Program (RAP)
All right. Mr. Bishop.
IG RECOMMENDATIONS
Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Let me just sort of look at big-picture issues, resources.
As we look over your reports, there are recurring
recommendations regarding the lack of management, oversight,
and adequate training and so forth. The recommendations are
critical to running programs properly and to safeguarding our
taxpayer dollars, but they also cost money. When Secretary
Vilsack testified before us last year, he said that USDA
employees had made significant advancement in achieving goals
and that they have done it essentially with the same
discretionary funding level in fiscal year 2015 as in fiscal
year 2009 and with 9,354 fewer total staff years in 2015 than
in 2009. During that same period, mandatory spending grew from
$88 billion to $125 billion. So, while the number of people at
USDA who have to implement and oversee programs has declined
significantly, discretionary spending is flat, and mandatory
spending has increased significantly.
In that environment, can you tell me briefly how agencies
can take on all the additional actions that you recommend in
your reports? And, of course, that is rhetorical since we know
that you don't control the budgets of other agencies or the
States or local governments, but it is something that we have
got to think about. So I would welcome your comments on ways in
which USDA and State and local governments can build capacity
to properly administer and oversee the programs.
Ms. Fong. That is a difficult question, and I think all of
us have seen in the Federal Government over the past 7 or 8
years the challenge of trying to deliver more programs and more
spending with fewer resources. Certainly we in the OIG's Office
have experienced the same challenges. And what I can offer--and
I will ask Gil to offer some comments as well--is that we are
very mindful of those challenges. We know that program
managers' first priority is to deliver the program.
What we try to do when we make our recommendations is to
point out that, in many ways, if we can figure out a more
effective and efficient way to deliver those programs, in the
end, it helps the program managers as well as the integrity of
the program. And we are very mindful of the fact that the State
and local governments do deliver many of the programs for USDA,
and their budgets are also constrained.
I think it became very clear to us as we did our work in
the SNAP program in particular that clarity from FNS at the
national level in a number of areas as to what the regulations,
policies, and laws mean would make it much easier for the
States and counties to do a better job of delivering programs
if that clarity were there.
Gil.
Mr. Harden. Yeah. I would just build on that a little bit.
It is stressing the oversight of things in going along with
program delivery and then prioritizing what is really important
and what people need to focus on.
SCIENTIFIC INTEGRITY
Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much. Let me switch gears
quickly. You mentioned in your testimony that you are looking
at the issue of scientific integrity as it affects USDA
scientists. The issue hits home for me because my State has
major ARS research locations, Athens, Barron, Dawson, Griffin
and Tifton, and hundreds of scientists and staff who work
there. I am kind of troubled by the implication of the topic.
Open and transparent scientific research investigations are one
of the hallmarks of a prosperous agricultural society. And
while I understand the investigation is in its early stages,
can you share with us what agencies are included; was it an
Employee Viewpoint Survey that prompted the assessment or the
result of an anonymous report on compromised scientific
integrity to USDA Office of the Chief Scientist; and, lastly,
when you would expect the report to be completed?
Ms. Fong. Let me just offer some introductory comments. We
started this review last year in response to a number of
concerns from the media, from complainants, and from Congress
that the integrity of scientific research was a significant
concern. And I think in the wake of the U.S. MARC situation,
people were very sensitive to these issues. So we have an audit
ongoing--we are nearing completion on it, actually--that is
looking at the whole situation of whether researchers feel that
they can carry out their research independently and surface
their findings in a way without inappropriate constraints.
As part of our review, we are conducting a survey of
scientists themselves to see what their perceptions are as well
as doing our own independent assessment of the policy and its
implementation.
Mr. Harden. And to follow on from that, we are expecting
that audit to come out later in the spring, probably in the May
or June timeframe. And the survey that Phyllis referred to, in
terms of the agencies involved, it is ARS, APHIS, NRCS, and I
am going to forget the last one off the top of my head----
Ms. Fong. Forest Service.
Mr. Harden [continuing]. Forest Service, but we put that
survey out to all of the scientists, and we had a very good
response rate. There was something like 60 percent of the
scientists responded. So we got a lot of good data in terms of
how they feel about how things are working.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much.
Mr. Aderholt. Mr. Yoder.
BROADBAND LOAN PROGRAM
Mr. Yoder. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Fong and Mr. Harden and Ms. Coffey, thank you. Welcome
back to the Committee. We appreciate your work to help us be
better stewards of taxpayer dollars. I think it is great the
chairman starts with this being our first hearing of the year
because it allows us get some context and some ideas as we then
have an opportunity to have hearings with other Cabinet
officials and administrators that can be responsive to some of
the concerns you have raised.
Ms. Fong, in the past, you have raised a number of concerns
regarding the Rural Utilities Service broadband loan program,
and I wondered if you might discuss that a little bit again
today for the Committee in terms of where we are, where we need
to go, what your recommendations would be. I think, by some
accounts, during the period after the stimulus, they spent
roughly $3 billion pledging to bring broadband to 7 million
homes, and only 240,000 actually got it. Where are we in terms
of current status? And what are your thoughts on redirecting
the funds into a grant program that ensures funds go to
underserved rural communities that are truly unserved?
Ms. Fong. Well, I think the broadband program has certainly
been a topic of interest to our office over the last 10 years,
I would say. We have done a series of audits, as you know, and
The Recovery Act provided some additional funding, and we
looked at that at that time.
We have not been back to that program in the last 2 or 3
years. So it may be time for us to factor that into our audit
planning process for fiscal year 2018 to see what the risk is.
As you point out, the issues that we were finding over the
last several audits were whether the funds were going to truly
underserved communities, and we saw some issues with that as
well as with the definition of ``rural'' and how that was
applied. I think what I would say to you at this point is that
we need to go back and factor that into our planning.
Mr. Yoder. OK. Well, I think the Committee probably shares
your interest in ensuring that the dollars are used most
effectively, but we do have, of course, many parts of our
districts and across the country that are underserved, and I
think it is a continuing concern that dollars spent did not get
to those people and may have been wasted in the process. And so
I think this Committee needs to direct the administration and
encourage them in the right direction. So we would appreciate
you taking another look at that and maybe making some
recommendations.
MARC
Another topic that we have discussed in previous years that
I know you had an audit regarding at the end of 2016 were the
incidents surrounding the January 2015 New York Times article
regarding the Meat Animal Research Center in Nebraska. And
there were some pretty salacious allegations in that article.
And in the world of fake news, now we have to really vet
everything that is being said because there were some
allegations there that were pretty shocking to the committee. I
know you took a number of years, or at least since 2015, to
identify and investigate 33 statements that were in that
article that you tried to determine whether they were accurate.
And I think your report found that 7 were materially accurate,
26 were inaccurate, lacked sufficient context, or were
uncorroborated, a 21 percent material accuracy rate.
This committee is fully supportive of important research
that is being done at ARS, but we also want to ensure that it
is being done ethically and appropriately and is consistent
with our American values.
In the statements that you tried to corroborate, a number
of them you noted that we have no observations on the status at
this time. There were also a number of statements that were
redacted.
I guess I would ask, is your work complete on this matter?
How are we able to complete our oversight in areas in which you
have no observations on the status of the statements or that
they were redacted? I think we still would like to get to the
facts and the truth of this matter, and it has been raised in
this committee before, and I think we have an obligation to do
so. And so your report helps us in that direction, but I feel
like there is some incomplete work and wondered if that is
something you are going to continue, or does this committee
need to continue to seek out the facts of that article and what
is truly happening? And I don't want to repeat the allegations,
but many on this Committee who have been on here a number of
years remember some of the disturbing statements that were
made.
Ms. Fong. Let me offer a few comments, and Gil might have
some more.
We have finished our audit of U.S. MARC. We issued two
reports. There was an interim report last year and then a final
report several months later. And so, at this time, we do not
have any ongoing work planned or in process.
Now, I think, with respect to the redactions, we had some
sensitive information in our report that impacted on
potentially personal privacy issues. They involved some
allegations, and there was a potential consequence for the
safety of individuals, which is why the public-facing version
of that report has some redactions. We would be happy to brief
you and your staff in a little more detail on that if you would
like that.
And, Gil, I will offer----
Mr. Harden. That was the main point I wanted to add. We
have come to conclusions on all 33 statements, but because of
some of the redactions, you can't see it in the public-facing
report, but we would be happy to set up a time to brief you on
that.
Mr. Yoder. OK. Well, I think I would be interested in that,
and I think maybe the committee might be interested in more
clarity on some of the statements.
In the areas in which you were unable to verify or
corroborate the statements, I think we still have an obligation
to find the truth. And so I would like to also probably know
why you couldn't get the information, why you couldn't
interview people; what was the blockade that allowed us to not
actually find out what happened in many of these situations?
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Harden. A lot of that is explained in the unredacted
version. So we can get that information to you.
Mr. Aderholt. OK.
[The information follows:]
We would be pleased to set up a time to brief you and your
staff to provide more clarity on the statements in our audit
report.
Ms. DeLauro.
ANIMAL WELFARE
Ms. DeLauro. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
And welcome. Good to see you again, and I am grateful for
your longevity and the accolades that you received because of
your great professional work.
A couple of quick things before I ask a couple of questions
and I get into it. I just want to be clear on this last ARS
animal welfare report. It is not a question of whether or not
the allegations, if you will, were unfounded; it is that there
was the inability or whatever the circumstances were around
corroboration versus whether or not the allegations, et cetera,
were unfounded.
Mr. Harden. No. I would say some of the allegations were
unfounded, based on the work that we were able to do.
Ms. DeLauro. But was it--and that was--did you--were you
able to corroborate that they were----
Mr. Harden. Yes. Some of them we were able to corroborate
that they were accurate. Others we weren't able to find
information to corroborate that they were true.
Ms. DeLauro. When you are dealing with context, what was
the context? What does ``lacking context mean?
Mr. Harden. That there was other information available,
say, in ARS' files at MARC or in discussions with people that
put different light around what was being said in the article.
Ms. DeLauro. But what I am just trying to get to, there
is--that doesn't necessarily make it wrong. It means that there
was other information. I think the point is, is to try to get
at the accuracy, to get at the information to let us know what
happened here and what we need to be mindful of so that it is
not putting needed to come to light didn't come to light, and
it may not be that the allegation was wrong. There was a
different set of circumstances, different information that
people brought to this issue.
I just think that this is particularly important, and I
think we have to be careful with language and how we describe,
in essence, what this is all about because it is a very
critically serious issue which we need to address in some way.
HIRING FREEZE
Also just very, very quickly, you talked about improper
payments. That includes, and I believe the Chairman talked
about the nutrition programs, but farm programs as well have
improper payments in terms of reporting. The crop insurance
program has an improper payment rate, which is about 2.2
percent. That is high enough for a program to be at high risk.
Conservation farm programs, as I understand it, have an
improper payment rate of about 22 percent.
What I would love to get from you, if I can, I want to see
all of the improper payment rates, the error rates of all of
the farm programs that you deal with so that we can have some
way to take a look at where the high priorities are.
[The information follows:]
Not all farm programs are considered high risk for improper
payments. Only those programs that are designated as being high
risk for improper payments must report improper payment error
rates. The following farm programs were considered high risk
for improper payment rates and reported the following improper
payment rates in USDA's FY 2016 annual financial report:\1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ https://www.ocfo.usda.gov/docs/
FY2016Agency_Financial_Report.pdf. See pp. 194-200.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Farm Service Agency (FSA):
Loan Deficiency Program--3.21%
Livestock Forage Disaster Program--4.74%
Livestock Indemnity Program--12.87%
Supplemental Revenue Assistance Payments Program--11.53%
Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program--5.47%
Hurricane Sandy--Emergency Conservation Program--0.18%
Hurricane Sandy--Emergency Forest Restoration Program--
1.43%
Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS):
Farm Security and Rural Investment Act Programs--2.38%
Hurricane Sandy--Emergency Watershed Protection Program--0%
Risk Management Agency (RMA):
Federal Crop Insurance Corporation (FCIC) Program Fund--
2.02%
Let me just get to this, really because this Committee has
tried to provide all of you with the resources that you need to
do your job. So I was struck that your testimony mentions that
you are again at the lowest staffing level since 1978 due to a
number of staff losses. There has recently been--the
administration has put a hiring freeze as of the 23rd of
January. The memorandum regarding the hiring freeze, how will
that impact the mission of your work, and do you feel that you
have the adequate resources and the staffing to pursue criminal
activity beyond just the SNAP program, by which you spend about
almost 60 percent of your resources?
Ms. Fong. Yes. The hiring----
Ms. DeLauro. I mean, 56 percent of your resources. I take
that back--59 percent. I need to get my numbers right: 59
percent almost of your resources go to the SNAP effort.
Ms. Fong. The hiring freeze does impact us, as it does
every part of the Federal Government.
Ms. DeLauro. How? What does that mean?
Ms. Fong. Well, we have about 40 vacancies right now, and
we need to figure out how we can move forward to identify the
critical vacancies involved with health and safety, which are
potentially exempt from the freeze, as well as other priority
vacancies, which would require approval.
Ms. DeLauro. What task--because I have 14 seconds left.
Tell me what you will not be able to do as a result of a hiring
freeze.
Ms. Fong. If we were able to fully fund all 40 of those
jobs, we would be able to do more investigations and more
audits. And we could provide you some additional concrete
information.
[The information follows:]
OIG provided information to Rep. DeLauro and the
Subcommittee's leadership on March 10, 2017.
Ms. DeLauro. Anything further?
Ms. Fong. Thank you for your support.
Mr. Aderholt. Mr. Young.
WETLANDS DETERMINATIONS
Mr. Young. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, my
colleagues.
Welcome, Inspector General, Mr. Harden and Ms. Coffey. I
want to reflect on something my counterpart here, Mr. Yoder,
said about the USDA's Rural Utilities Service broadband
program. Good intentions can really make a difference, but it
has been fraught with some real trouble. It sounds like the
last time you did an audit on the program was in 2013. It has
been a few years, and we may need to relook at this issue
because we want to make sure that taxpayer dollars are used
appropriately and they are not being used to compete against
services that already exist, that is, where people really had
skin in the game and are risking their own capital. We want to
make sure the priority is for unserved areas. So we may be back
asking further questions throughout this process.
You mentioned in your testimony about the Prairie Pothole
Region, and Iowa is one of those States in the Prairie Pothole
Region. The NRCS administers the wetlands provisions in the
Prairie Pothole Region. The NRCS has discretion and
responsibility in making those determinations, but recently,
they have changed their ways in making those determinations.
How did you find out that they were changing their ways? Was it
a whistleblower?
Mr. Harden, do you have an answer for that?
Mr. Harden. Yeah. We did receive a couple whistleblower
complaints----
Mr. Young. OK.
Mr. Harden [continuing]. That made the allegations, and
then we followed up from that and learned as we went through
the process basically how they were making determinations in
that region of the country contradicted how they have made
determinations for the last 20 years.
Mr. Young. So what were the pre-1996 determinations? How
were they different from before?
Mr. Harden. They weren't accepting them being wetland
determinations unless additional work was done with regard to
the pre-1996 determinations. They weren't accepting them on
their face.
Mr. Young. OK. So they totally changed their playbook on
this?
Mr. Harden. That was the way we understood it.
Mr. Young. When they did this, did they provide any written
guidance or notice to folks?
Mr. Harden. No. And that was also a part of our problem or
our concerns with it.
Mr. Young. Since then you have done your due diligence and
investigated this. Are you confident that the NRCS has heard
the message and the intent of the original law and rules? Are
they back to square one and being consistent? Are they
providing certainty?
Mr. Harden. I would have to wait and see how they actually
implement the recommendations. They agreed to the
recommendations we made in terms of providing additional
clarity as to how you were supposed to be using those pre-1996
determinations.
Mr. Young. How long should we wait for them to let us know
that?
Mr. Harden. I think that I would have to go back and get
the exact date of when they were going to have that
implemented. I think it is going to be later this spring. So,
maybe, you know, in the fall. You know, somewhere in the fall,
they should be able to explain what they are doing.
Mr. Young. OK. Will you relook at this issue to make sure
it is being done in a satisfactory manner?
Mr. Harden. We can take that on, yes.
Mr. Young. OK. I may be contacting you folks and asking you
for some help because we want to make sure that there is
consistency, there is transparency, and farmers know what the
rules are each and every year as we go along with this.
AUDIT RECOMMENDATIONS
I sit next to Mr. Palazzo here, an auditor, and he was
peeking at one of my questions, and he said, ``Hey, I am the
accountant; you stick to the wetlands questions.'' But I think
it may be something that is always on our minds about what you
do. You audit, and you have investigations, and you make
recommendations on corrective actions. How much monitoring do
you do to see if they carry out these recommendations? And is
it your job, or is that something we should all be looking at?
I know that is partly why we are here, but how much do you do
to make sure that they are following up on recommendations, or
at least reminding them of them.
Mr. Harden. We try to do a fair amount of it because
following up on audit recommendations is--to do that, you have
to follow audit standards, you have to follow up on prior work
that you have done and recommendations that you have made. So
it is just a standard course for a lot of it. Sometimes we do
specific areas, like conservation stewardship, to see that they
implemented what they said they were going to do; Prairie
Pothole, we do things like that; with food safety, we have had
stuff. This year, we also undertook an audit to look at what
the CFO's office does in terms of tracking final action.
Mr. Young. So you look at it, but you need some better
partners here--and that is Congress--in doing oversight and
ensuring that some of these recommendations are followed
through. How much enforcement do you have? What boundaries or
leeway do you really have? Or do you have any at all, aside
from the public shaming through your reports and working with
us to bring these things to light?
Ms. Fong. We don't have any operational authority.
Mr. Young. OK. I just wanted to verify that.
Ms. Fong. We have a soapbox to make recommendations.
Mr. Young. OK. Thank you for being here. Thanks for your
testimony.
Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Aderholt. Ms. Pingree.
ORGANICS
Ms. Pingree. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you very much to
all of you for being with us today and for your many years of
service and dedication to helping us with this, supporting this
Department, and making sure it works efficiently.
First, I just want to thank the Ranking Member for asking
some of the questions around scientific integrity. I appreciate
the fact that your report is coming out soon. Thank you for
digging into that. There have been recent questions around
scientific integrity and if any information is being shut down
at executive branch departments. So it is very timely. But, as
you know, I also sent a letter in 2015 about allegations that
researchers at the USDA doing research around neonicotinoids
were being suppressed, and so I have had an interest in this,
and certainly my constituents and others have, for a while. So
we will really be looking forward to that report and will
probably have some questions when it comes out, but thank you
for doing that.
I just want to ask about a different topic. I think you
know there has been a huge growth in the organic market.
According to the USDA's 2014 survey, certified and exempt
organic farms in the United States sold a total of $5.5 billion
in organic products back in 2014. That is about a 72-percent
increase since 2008. So, from my perspective, that is a huge
opportunity for farmers in my district, but virtually every
district represented here has had farmers who have benefited
from being able to sell into this market, often with higher
prices and less competition. So it is a great area for economic
growth for our farmers. And it is not just specialty crops. It
is commodity crops. It is really in every area. There is no
question: we haven't been able to keep up with demand. From the
most giant of the food processors in this country to the
smallest farmers markets, the demand is bigger than we can
handle, especially for organic grains. So there is a lot of
product being imported into the United States. According to the
USDA, in 2013, the value of U.S. organic imports that are
tracked was $1.4 billion. That is 2013. There has been enormous
growth, and we are already in 2017. So that is a lot of money.
And consumers more than anything else want to know that the
products that they buy are everything that they are paying for.
And they want to know that imported products are grown to the
same high standards that we require here in the United States.
So I am wondering if you have looked into organic products
at all, but specifically this idea of organic imports, and are
there things you are doing to assure customers that all of the
organic products coming in from other countries are produced
with the same organic certification?
Ms. Fong. Let me just quickly offer a comment. We do have
some ongoing audit work on precisely that issue, which I will
ask Gil to comment on.
I also want to note that, on our investigation side, we
have had a few cases over the past few years alleging that
certificates or statements of organics have not been true, and
we have had some very successful convictions and prosecutions
there involving grains and fertilizers as well. So Ann might
want to comment on those.
Ms. Pingree. That is great.
Mr. Harden. Currently, we are finishing work on AMS'
oversight of international trade arrangements and agreements.
And the basic objective of that work is to understand how AMS
evaluates the equivalency of foreign countries' organic
processes so that we know what is being imported into the U.S.
meets our standards as well. We expect that report to be out
later this spring as well.
Ms. Coffey. Well, I was going to mention that we just
completed an investigation involving a fraud scheme where a
producer basically was claiming that his product, which was
alfalfa, was organic, but, in fact, it was not. It was grown
conventionally. And the profit margin that he obtained by being
able to claim that his product was organic was over $2 million.
So he was sentenced and convicted recently, and we got
restitution of $3 million. So we do pursue those investigations
when we become aware of them. Although we haven't had any
related to the import, but I anticipate probably that will be
something we will be looking at in the future.
Ms. Pingree. Well, I do appreciate that, and am aware of
some of the investigations you have done in the United States.
And I think those are critically important, because, as we
know, inputs, and the techniques that are used for organic
processing, can be much more expensive. It is devastating to
those farmers who play by the rules, and it is devastating to
consumers because this has been a very protected brand.
Anything that happens to lose that credibility of the brand, I
think, is a real loss to those farmers. Again, it is a great
market for the farmers who are able to participate in it. There
is still a lot of competition there. The prices are better.
So it has been my contention that the USDA--and this isn't
your side of it--but that the USDA should be doing more to
assist farmers with organic research, with organic transition,
making it easier for farmers to get into what is sometimes a
challenge to change to.
I think one of the critically important facts to have is,
because so much is being brought in from foreign markets, an
understanding of how much of that is actually fraudulent, how
much is being purchased today that really isn't up to the same
standards. It is something consumers want to know, but I think
it is also a fact that could help push the USDA to assist more
farmers in moving to the organic markets.
So I am way out of time, but thank you very much for the
work you are doing. And I will look forward to following up on
what you are seeing in foreign imports.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Aderholt. Thank you.
Mr. Palazzo.
CCC FINANCIAL STATEMENTS
Mr. Palazzo. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Fong and company, thank you all for being here today.
Last year, we discussed the Commodity Credit Corporation's
delayed financial statement. This year, you mentioned in your
testimony the CCC's weakness and deficiencies in its financial
statements for fiscal year 2016. Several deficiencies were
identified with the CCC's balance sheets and internal processes
that resulted in significant issues with the CCC's accounting
systems. This year is one of the highest funding levels for the
CCC on record at $21 billion, yet the Congressional Budget
Office is estimating the CCC alone will save $14 billion more
than it did compared to its original 2014 Farm Bill estimate.
Additionally, the difference between the estimates provided to
the Committee for the CCC in August of 2016 and the actual net
realized losses was about $3 billion.
With the upcoming Farm Bill negotiations, it is important
that we have accurate accounting estimates. For example, the
discrepancy of $3 billion provided to the Committee earlier
this year could have resulted in a $30 billion difference over
the 10-year window which the Congressional Budget Office uses
to score.
So I guess my question would be, can you tell me a little
bit how you see accounting estimates, how important it is to
try to make that amount--we know it is an estimate, but how
important it is to provide us with the best estimates possible
and that we get this right? And this is a huge concern of ours.
Mr. Harden. I mean, I would agree with you that we want
them to be as best as they can be. Some of the things that we
saw and that you have seen in their financial statements for
2016 was they had a significant problem getting the estimates
together, or they came late in the year. So I think some of
those will be better going forward because they have gotten a
better process down. One of them with ARC/PLC, they didn't
include all the crops that they were supposed to to begin with,
and so they had to go back and redo the estimate toward the end
of the year. So that amount was understated for financial
reporting purposes, but we continue to work with KPMG, who is
the main auditor for them, but also knowing how they are going
about developing those estimates and having them grounded in
the right accounting theories and things of that nature.
Mr. Palazzo. Was this the first time they audited the
financial statements?
Mr. Harden. No.
Mr. Palazzo. OK. So it is not a new auditor coming onboard?
Mr. Harden. No. This is the second year for KPMG, but KPMG
has also done it on a prior cycle as well.
Mr. Palazzo. Now, is our understanding that this review of
the CCC was one-time, like taking a snapshot of the financials?
Do you believe that we should do a deeper review? And if so, is
there something that is restricting you all from doing that,
such as funding or personnel?
Mr. Harden. I don't think there is something that is
keeping us from doing a deeper dive. They have had annual
financial statements for a number of years because they are
required to do so. In 2015, they got the disclaimer, and so
coming back off of that--and that also drove the disclaimer for
the Department. So, starting in 2016, they started with a
balance-sheet-only approach to get to final balances, and what
they are hoping to do is to go to full statements this year,
all five statements.
We are in discussions with them and KPMG right now as to
understanding their readiness to withstand an audit in going
forward, and we will be--I would like to probably get back with
you after we have had some other discussions as part of that
planning to have a more detailed answer.
Mr. Palazzo. Can you tell me what actions are being taken
to correct the deficiencies and the findings from the audit
report?
Mr. Harden. I would have to pull the corrective action
plans, but they have things they are doing to address the
weaknesses.
[The information follows:]
In CCC's FY 2016 Balance Sheet audit, KPMG made six
recommendations related to maintenance of accounting records
and accounting estimates. CCC has agreed to take corrective
actions on these six recommendations as follows:
Implement processes, procedures, and controls to ensure
data used in its accounting estimates are complete and
accurate.
Ensure that accounting estimates are prepared by qualified
personnel with a full understanding of the underlying
accounting requirements.
Document the review and approval process for accounting
estimates including the concurrence with the relevant factors,
assumptions, and reasonableness of the resulting estimates.
Implement independent review and reconciliations of Fund
Balance with Treasury for USAID, and monitor internal controls
regarding FBWT reconciliations in accordance with guidelines in
the ``Treasury Financial Manual.'' Management will have
sufficient documentation to support the balances reported by
the child and thoroughly document their evidence of review. In
addition, CCC will document their review and reconciliation
process in the form of a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) or
White Paper.
Reconcile accounts to ensure transactions are timely and
accurately recorded in the general ledger system and research
and resolve all existing differences.
Migrate database servers out of WebFarm.
For FY 2017, CCC's entire financial statements (which are
comprised of the balance sheet and statements of net cost,
changes in net position, and budgetary resources) will be
audited. However, the FY 2017 financial statements will not be
comparative to FY 2016 as only the balance sheet of CCC's
financial statements in FY 2016 was audited.
Mr. Palazzo. And how often do you all monitor that to see
that they are clearing the deficiencies and findings?
Mr. Harden. That is part of the standard audit process for
the financial statement auditors. And as the overseers of the
ones doing it for KPMG, we are on the calls with them weekly
and all the discussions that they have with CCC.
Mr. Palazzo. Are they clearing any of these deficiencies
and findings from year to year? So, I mean, are they improving
their internal controls? What would be your thoughts?
Mr. Harden. From 2015 to 2016, the wording of them changed,
but some of the same issues were there, and in 2016, because
they only did the balance sheet audit, we didn't look at the
ones that impacted the Statement of Budgetary Resources. So we
will have to be--as part of this year's review, that will get
to be part of what is looked at and what they have done.
Mr. Palazzo. Thank you.
Ms. Fong.
Ms. Fong. I would just like to offer some higher level
comment in response to your questions. As we have seen at USDA,
CCC had a disclaimer last year, and NRCS has had a disclaimer
for 6 or 7 years, and as a result, last year, the consolidated
for the whole Department was disclaimed.
This part year, the most recent year, because we moved to a
balance-sheet-only approach for NRCS and CCC and the
Department, they were able to make some forward progress. But
in order to really bring the whole Department to a full, clean
opinion, it is going to take some concerted effort. What we
have seen in the past with NRCS, and before that with Forest
Service, was when those agencies received their initial
disclaimed opinion, it took them, with NRCS and Forest Service
5, 6, 7 years of intense effort, high management priority,
resources at the agency level, and a commitment to really fix
the underlying issues in order to move those agencies to the
clean stage, and we are still working with NRCS on that.
So, with respect to CCC, we are cautiously optimistic. We
know that they want to get to the finish line. We will be
keeping a very close eye on this, and we will have to just keep
you all apprised of that progress.
Mr. Palazzo. OK. Well, thank you. And, of course, senior
leaders need to buy in to the importance of financial
statements and audits because the end users who use this
information, I mean, they make decisions, as well as Congress
does, on what is provided to us, and so it needs to be
accurate, and it needs to be complete. So thank you for your
testimony.
I yield back.
Mr. Aderholt. Mr. Pocan.
SNAP IN WISCONSIN
Mr. Pocan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I appreciate it. And thank you for being here today.
I have to say that I am really heartened to hear the
chairman and the ranking member, Mr. Yoder and Mr. Young, all
bring up rural broadband because, in my district, it is one of
the biggest issues. And I can get a little obsessive on it. My
office is probably glad I am talking to someone else about it
rather than them right now. I live in a rural town of 800
people. My district, with Madison, about a third of it, I would
argue 40, 50 percent, is very rural, and this is a huge issue.
So, when it comes to Rural Utilities Service loans, while they
are very important, we also would love to see you look at some
of the best practices and what States are doing effectively
with the dollars. Wisconsin gets some of the lowest speeds in
the country.
[The information follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
And as you know, 1 mbps, there is a lot of 1-mbps out
there, but 8 is about what is the minimum for satisfactory
level. So what we don't have is speed. We actually have a lot
of people who have lines, but they don't have any speed. And
the neighbors down my street, the kids can't do homework.
So I guess it is not so much a question, as I want to echo
that. And I hope that this arbitrary hiring freeze doesn't
affect the ability to do an important audit on something that
you are getting this bipartisan kind of chorus on, but you will
hear me talk about rural broadband a lot, and this is something
that I would like to encourage as well whatever we can do in
that area.
Two other areas I would like to get to on SNAP and
specifically in Wisconsin. So, when you look at programs,
Wisconsin, we have some problems with how we do it: one, how we
count job placements. If the first part of a month you have a
job and the second part of the month you have a different job,
they count that as two separate job placements, and some of the
numbers are kind of arbitrary. There have been complaints filed
with the Department of Labor on the companies that people are
told they have to work at in order to get the benefits are
actually putting people in jeopardy who are just trying to get
simple food assistance in the State. And we have had very
uneven results across the State in how it has been. So I guess
the question is, as we have a lot of resources going in to
ensure that SNAP works as intended, can you look at or have you
looked at States like Wisconsin to investigate how they are
potentially mismanaging these Federal resources and putting
people in jeopardy through the program.
Ms. Fong. Yeah. Let me just comment on that. We did an
audit this year of the Able-Bodied Adults Without Dependents
provisions, which I think discussed some of the very complex
issues with respect to work requirements and waivers and
eligibility. And our main conclusion from that audit was that
it is a very complex area. The States are administering it many
different ways. FNS could do a much better job of providing
some clarity and some consistency on interpretation from the
national level to enable the States to really get to providing
the assistance where it is deserved.
Gil, do you want to----
Mr. Harden. Just adding to that, as we learned doing that
work, that those provisions are some of the most complicated
ones that States have to deal with, and they really didn't have
the guidance they needed from FNS to do what they needed to do.
So a lot of them were just without direction and knowing what
to do. The recommendations we made are aimed at getting more
clarity to them, more communications, what are best practices,
what some States do that others don't that could be spread.
Mr. Pocan. And a quick followup on that report. I think,
you know, you talked about 55 percent or so of the research is
devoted to ensuring SNAP works as intended. Some of that is on
fraud, and some of it simply on payment arrears. Can you just
talk a--drop on that because I want to get to another subject
in my minute and a half, if I can?
Mr. Harden. A couple years ago, we did a report on the QC
error rate, and, yes, we found that, you know, States were, I
don't want to say gaming the system, but there were many ways
that they were going out and determining their rates and
working to make their rates lower as opposed to knowing what
the actual rate was, but it wasn't necessarily fraud. It was
overpayments and underpayments.
POULTRY INSPECTIONS
Mr. Pocan. And then I guess the last area I can get into is
on meat inspectors. There has been a new chemical, PAA, I
think, that has been used pretty widely, sprayed on people in
poultry packing processing plants. And it is a highly corrosive
agent, and the workers are being exposed to it. And I think
there are some questions about how this got approved and
whether or not it is impacting workers. A number of us did a
letter to a couple Secretaries on this issue, but I was just
kind of wondering, you know, no one seems to really exactly
understand the process and how this was approved, and if you
have looked at that, if there is a way to look at that so we
can get more clarity on something that people are concerned for
the health of the workers in these facilities.
Mr. Harden. We haven't done specific work, but I can go
back and ask some questions to find out.
[The information follows:]
Peracetic acid (PAA) is approved by the Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) and regulated by the Food Safety and
Inspection Service (FSIS).
Although we have not done any work regarding PAA, we are
aware that the Government Accountability Office (GAO) is
currently conducting an audit of Meat and Poultry Worker
Safety. As part of its work, we understand that GAO has
examined FSIS' coordination with OSHA as it relates to control
and use of PAA. Per our discussion with GAO, their work is
still ongoing. Further, we have initiated an audit to review
FSIS' implementation of New Poultry Inspection System (NPIS).
Through a phased approach, we plan to examine the policies and
procedures HIS used to implement and guide the program and
review FSIS' oversight to determine whether improvements can be
made. Also, we plan to examine NPIS implementation at the
plant-level to determine whether FSIS could make further
improvements to NPIS. To avoid duplication of our audit effort
with GAO, we will not look at PAA in our NPIS work.
Mr. Pocan. If you could, it would be much appreciated. And,
again, anything on rural broadband would be awesome because we
formed a Rural Broadband Caucus, bipartisan caucus. We have a
lot of Members. There are six of us, three Democrats and six
Republicans, who are co-chairing it. Just a real, real big
priority for businesses and for education in my district.
And I will yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Aderholt. Mr. Valadao.
MULTI-FAMILY HOUSING PROGRAM
Mr. Valadao. Thank you, Chairman.
Good morning. In prior reports, USDA's Office of Inspector
General has identified cases of fraud, waste, and abuse in
Multifamily Housing Program. In some instances, applicants had
not provided accurate household income information and
therefore were not eligible for all or part of the financial
assistance they received. OIG found the primary cause for
payment errors is tenants not accurately reporting incomes and
household circumstances on their certifications, and property
owners do not have the independent source, any wage-matching
mechanism to verify this information.
The report went on to recommend that USDA Rural Development
seek the same authorities that the Department of Housing and
Urban Development, HUD, has for family property managers to
access Federal income and benefits database and implement wage
matching of the tenants applying for rental subsidies.
This committee provided the legislative authority that
would enable USDA's Rural Housing Service access to databases
managed by the Department of Health and Human Services, Social
Security Administration, and the Internal Revenue Service,
similar to what HUD uses for income verification, in the fiscal
year 2016 funding law. The authority we provided should have
enabled USDA to access the data through the HUD systems.
The question is: HHS has stated the legislative authority
we provided does not enable USDA to access databases through
HUD systems. We agreed with your prior recommendation to
provide access to these databases, but continue to look for a
way to implement a means to access that does not require
reworking the Tax Code or other statutory authorities.
Could you provide any insight into making this
recommendation a reality?
Ms. Fong. I think this information is very interesting and
useful to us. We were not aware of that development. And we can
certainly go back and see what we can find out, see if we can
come up with any thoughts on that.
Mr. Valadao. All right.
[The information follows:]
The prior recommendation referenced above relates to audit
report 04099-339-AT, Rural Housing Service (RHS) Subsidy
Payment Accuracy in Multi-Family Housing Program, issued in
March 2005. (https://www.usda.gov/oig/webdocs/04099-339-
AT.pdf).
We recommended RHS request legislative authority to,
similar to HUD, access Federal and State income information
data files and provide the information to apartment managers to
assist them in certifying tenant households. As stated by
Representative Valadao above, the Committee granted this
authority in the FY 2016 funding bill, but Department of Health
and Human Services (HHS) explained to Congress that the
authority granted to RHS did not allow them to access HUD
systems for income information.
We discussed with RHS what actions are needed by Congress
to assist with fully implementing our recommendation and
gaining access to HUD's systems. RHS stated that, in 2016, an
attempt was made to do this indirectly as a general provision
and HHS told RHS that it was not sufficient. RHS stated that
HHS would only accept an amendment to the Social Security Act
that would allow RHS access to the New Hires Data Base
information for Rental Assistance. According to RHS, the Office
of Management and Budget put forward a government-wide proposal
in the 2017 President's budget to request the amendment. If
Congress approves the amendment to the Social Security Act, RHS
officials have stated that USDA would have the appropriate
access to fully implement OIG's recommendation.
Ms. Fong. Yeah. Thank you.
IMPROPER PAYMENTS
Mr. Valadao. I will go to my other question. In the
September audit report on reducing improper payments, OIG
states that in fiscal year 2015 USDA had a decrease of more
than 92 percent in high dollar overpayments from the previous
year. That sounds pretty impressive, but then the report notes
that OMB issued new higher overpayment thresholds from 5,000 to
25,000 for individuals, and from 25,000 to 100,000 for entities
for fiscal year 2015.
When these thresholds are raised, naturally, the number and
sum of overpayments is going to decrease. USDA had a total of
1,301 high dollar overpayments reported in fiscal year 2014,
and that dropped to 99 in fiscal year 2015 under the OMB's new
threshold.
When the previous administration raised these thresholds,
seems like they swept a lot of improper payments under the rug.
Do you believe having a higher threshold is a disservice to
taxpayers and serves to cover up the amount of improper
payments?
Ms. Fong. Well, I think we need to look at that development
in the overall context of all the improper payment rules,
regulations, and work that goes on. It is true that the high
dollar thresholds were raised, and so that had an impact, and
we give the Department credit for making progress, but I think
perhaps more important is looking at the work we are doing on
the overall improper payment rate for the Department, which we
found in fiscal year 2016 actually went up significantly from
fiscal year 2015. The fiscal year 2015 overall improper payment
rate for the high-risk programs was 5.7 percent. In fiscal year
2016, it went up to 8.86 percent, and that to me is perhaps a
more meaningful number for us to focus on in terms of what can
be done to address the overall portfolio of improper payments.
Mr. Valadao. All right. I understand that some States are
interested in doing more to combat fraud. This requires States
to have access to the same information FNS, OIG, and others use
at the Federal level. I believe your report says that the two
systems containing retailer information and transactions, STARS
and ALERT, are used by FNS program personnel, FNS
investigators, and OIG investigators.
Do States have access to this information? And if not, do
you see any harm in the States having access to this
information as well, if they want to detect and stop fraudulent
activities?
Ms. Fong. Yeah. We don't know if the States have access to
ALERT and STARS. I think there are other tools that the States
have that they can use to address potential fraud; eDRS, I
think, is one of the systems. They certainly can deal with
Social Security numbers and some other tools. So I think there
are opportunities out there for the States to do data matching
and address indicators of fraud, and those tools are available.
We are right now assessing how well the States are looking
at eligibility questions. We should have a number of reports
coming out this year on how well they are doing.
Mr. Valadao. All right. Well it would make sense: more
information for some of these States and some of my other
questions to help remove the waste, fraud, and abuse. So I
appreciate your time. Thank you.
Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Aderholt. Dr. Harris.
AUDIT REPORTS
Dr. Harris. Thank you very much.
I am going to just ask a couple questions about the two
reports here, the audit reports. The first one, the FNS
controls over SNAP benefits for Able-Bodied Adults Without
Dependents, you know, it is kind of striking. The report
indicates that it is a very difficult program to implement in
States and that States game the difficulty a little bit. You
know, I will quote from page 5. You know, the report says:
``Due to the burden of implementing the ABAWD provisions,
officials in three States told us they specifically requested
time-limit waivers in as many parts of the State as possible to
minimize the areas where they needed to track the time
limits''.
I guess the conclusion is that it is difficult to tell what
is what, and actually your conclusion in that paragraph on page
5 is: ``Therefore, the ABADWs may or may not be required to
work depending on the State they live in''.
I don't think that is the intent of Congress, that actually
this is implemented differently in different States depending
on whether they want to collect data or not.
Do the management recommendations you make, do you think
they can end this practice of this heterogeneity of how this
program is administered or managed?
Mr. Harden. I would say that we would hope that it should.
I mean, we will have to go back and look and see how they put
forth those best practices. You know, this is another time when
we didn't feel like FNS was playing the right oversight role
with the States in communicating with folks and really knowing
what is going on. This hopefully brings back to the table; they
can have some discussions and decide how they are going to move
forward. But then we would have to go back in and do followup
work to find out how well it took.
Dr. Harris. How many, if I might ask, because I didn't dig
through this, how many States did you investigate for this
audit report, for that audit report? Do you know?
Mr. Harden. Off the top of my head, I think it was three or
four. We went to three or four States.
Dr. Harris. Three or four.
Mr. Harden. I can get you the names if need be.
Dr. Harris. OK. And I guess, based on that, it was so
consistent in this--the heterogeneity was so consistent that I
guess you extrapolate that this existed across the country?
Mr. Harden. No, no. Let me back up. I had a better memory
as you were saying that. Because I think we contact--we went to
a handful of States, but then we also talked to a lot of other
States. So it wasn't just a handful that we would be
extrapolating from, but talking to them about their
difficulties with the program and how they operated it.
Dr. Harris. Thank you very much for doing that because, as
you know, a lot of us feel that people fall on tough times, but
able-bodied adults without dependents, you know, should be out
getting a job if they can and working and not necessarily
depending upon, you know, the Federal government.
Now, the other report, the SNAP administrative costs
report, I think what is striking to me is that--in this report,
my understanding is you did only look at three States, is that
right, for this.
Mr. Harden. [Nonverbal response.]
Dr. Harris. But in looking at those three States--one of
the States was California. I guess because it was an outlier in
what the administrative costs were, but the conclusion was that
there was a, I will call it a clawback, I guess, of $111
million where the obligation should be clawed back. Is that
right?
Ms. Fong. [Nonverbal response.]
Dr. Harris. Wow, that is a lot of money, you know, which I
think points to one of the problems with this program in and of
itself, that the States don't have a lot of skin in the game.
It is not their $111 million unless we go after it and claw it
back.
Given that you only looked at three States, do you think
the problem that you saw in California exists in other States
and that, in fact, we are not looking at only $111 million in
clawbacks but, in fact, that the number nationwide would be
quite larger if we looked at all the States?
Mr. Harden. I think it could if you looked at more States.
Now, the ones that have county-administered programs, there are
only 10 States that do it county-administered, but the reason
we focused on those is they have half of the administrative
costs, like $1.8 billion of the $3.6 billion for 2014, which is
the number we started with.
And what we also found was that FNS wasn't consistent in
how they were doing their reviews. Using the California example
as a way of explaining it--they were a big State for the
western region. The western region only looked at California
itself once every 5 years. The western regional office for FNS
didn't even go down to the counties where they administer them.
Compare that to the northeast region--looking at New York and
New York City; they go to New York City every year and New York
every year because of the size. So different regions approach
it differently, and part of our message to FNS was there needs
to be some consistency, and if you have lots of money in the
game, you really probably ought to be out there more often.
Dr. Harris. And was your finding that they used estimates
instead of actual expenditures, that was one of the major
findings, do you think that is true whether or not it is
county-administered? I mean, was this done in the State-level-
administered programs as well, or hard to say?
Mr. Harden. That, I don't know, but, yeah, the western
region was very lax with California. And what it did was it fed
misinformation back to what you could look at the national
level in terms of what your actual costs were.
Dr. Harris. OK. Thank you very much.
I yield back.
RESTITUTION
Mr. Aderholt. Thank you.
Ms. Fong, you mentioned in your written testimony that
there are several different examples of monetary restitution,
to include almost $100 million under the SNAP program, $7.6
million in a case involving child nutrition programs, $3.3
million in a case involving FSA loans, and a total of $30.8
million in other farm programs.
Can you tell us how much of this money the Federal
Government will recoup and will actually go back to the U.S.
Treasury?
Ms. Fong. Let me offer some comments and invite Ann to
comment as well. The restitution orders are the end result of
the judicial process, and the court will order the restitution
based on the amount of loss to the government program.
You raise a very good question as to how much of that will
actually be recovered, and I think that that could range
depending on the situation. It may not be 100 percent. And I
don't believe we track that.
Ms. Coffey. We don't. Once we complete our judicial
process, the tracking for whatever restitution gets paid is
done by the Department of Justice. Any moneys that are ordered
for restitution should be returned to the U.S. Treasury, but we
do not track that information. Once the restitution amounts are
set by the court, the Department of Justice is the entity that
tracks that information as to what percentage actually goes
back to the Treasury.
Ms. Fong. And just to add on, the money goes to the general
fund, not to USDA.
Ms. Coffey. That is correct.
Mr. Aderholt. Yes, right. The U.S. Treasury.
Is there anything or any advice or suggestions that we
could do in Congress to help agencies to recover these funds
that were obtained illegally or fraudulently, or something more
than what we are doing now?
Ms. Fong. Well, I think with respect to restitution, actual
payment of an order of restitution will depend on the
defendant's assets and whether they have sufficient assets to
pay it back.
Now, there are other times when we make recommendations to
the Department that it go after money that is owed to the
Department. It may not be in the context of a criminal sentence
of restitution. It may be in the context of an audit
recommendation, for example, the one we were just discussing
with California and SNAP, $111 million, where we recommend to
FNS that FNS go back and recoup that money. And I think in
those situations, attention and oversight from the committee
would be very helpful to make sure that those recommendations
get implemented and resolved.
TRADE AGREEMENT
Mr. Aderholt. Okay. Let me move on to one other issue that
I think is pertinent here for us in this Subcommittee. In a
recent audit report that you did on effectiveness of the
Foreign Agricultural Services monitoring coordination of trade
agreements, you identified that there are four areas where USDA
was lacking, and these areas that were key to trade
negotiations involved a lack of internal control process, goal
setting, and overall coordination. Of course, we understand
that the U.S. Trade Representative is the lead agency for
negotiating trade agreements, but USDA plays an important role
in providing support for the agriculture sector in removing
nontariff trade barriers, such as phytosanitary obstacles. Just
yesterday, on the Senate side, it was made clear the stakes for
U.S. agricultural team and new market access were very
important. That was in the Finance Committee over on the Senate
side.
This subcommittee has been one of the main proponents on
the Hill for completing the farm bill mandate that USDA
establish an Under Secretary for Trade and Agricultural
Affairs. At my request, money was included in the fiscal year
2015 appropriations bill to do a study since the one mandated
by the farm bill is now almost 3 years late. In fiscal year
2016, at my request, money was also included to help with
implementation of this new Under Secretary. That money still
remains available for use.
Is it your opinion that having an Under Secretary in place
that focuses on trade issues would help with the coordination
and also complete your recommendation with the report?
Ms. Fong. Well, let me just mention that I recall we
discussed this issue last year, and at that time, there had not
been an Under Secretary appointed. And at that time, FAS was in
the middle of doing its study, at least that was our
understanding. We have not really been tracking that issue.
I think it is fair to say that, as with any other issue,
leadership is critical to making progress on our
recommendations, and that leadership from the policy level is
important, whether it is from the Secretary or the subcabinet,
whoever it may be at the time.
What we see in the trade arena is the need for FAS to
really focus on how it measures success? Is that measurement
objective? Is it based on data? Are there performance measures
that can be reported to Congress where you can say, `` Yes,
this is what we did, and this is how we did it,'' and it is
documented and measurable? That is what the gist of our
recommendations goes to. And to the extent that leadership from
the Department can bring focus to that, we would welcome that.
Mr. Aderholt. So it will be safe to say you have not
received any request from an active consultant setting up with
a new Secretary regarding this?
Ms. Fong. To the best of my knowledge, we have not been
consulted on this issue.
Mr. Aderholt. Okay. Well, I think now may be an opportune
time during this transition to set up this new under Secretary,
and so we would encourage that any way possible as you move
forward.
Mr. Harden. I would add that I was tracking how the last
administration was handling this, and I noticed when the prior
Secretary said that they were basically pushing it down the
road, because I was trying to find out when they were going to
say what they were going to say so we could figure out how we
were going to proceed with it to whether it would be a good job
or not. So it is something that is on our radar screen to look
at.
Mr. Aderholt. OK. Thank you.
Mr. Bishop.
BUY AMERICAN
Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much.
I want to go back to something Ms. Pingree started, but I
want to deal with some problems with AMS procurement inspection
of fruits and vegetables. The Agricultural Marketing Service
acts as the agent for the Food Nutrition Service and, at their
request, buys the food for the school nutrition programs and
other USDA feeding programs. In your audit last year, you found
a number of serious problems with the agency's work, including
the failure to properly close out accounts and failure to
ensure that products met the proper standards.
I would like to focus on another problem that you found,
the failure to ensure that all products were 100 percent U.S.
in origin. In fact, you found that in a sample of 97 purchase
orders, 29 of them did not have sufficient documentation to
prove that they were in compliance with the Buy American Act,
and you found that almost $35 million in purchases were not
proven to be of U.S. origin.
I was somewhat shocked at this finding because compliance
with Buy American is critically important to our farmers. They
count on the government to abide by this requirement, and so do
consumers. Would you discuss the problems and what AMS agreed
to do to remedy them?
And then I have another question regarding SNAP.
Mr. Harden. They did agree with our recommendations. And it
is kind of like I said with other matters, you know. They did
recognize there was a problem; they shouldn't have done it. We
will have to do some followup on that to see how it got
implemented in terms of corrective actions.
Ms. Fong. We can certainly look at that and get back to you
and your staff on whether the recommendations have been
implemented, and if not, what is the time frame for that.
[The information follows:]
In February 2016, we issued our report on AMS Procurement
and Inspection of Fruits and Vegetables.\2\ In our report we
noted that for FYs 2013 and 2014, AMS could not provide
assurance that commodities for 29 of 97 sampled purchase orders
were of domestic origin. This occurred because AMS had not
obtained sufficient documentation, such as growers' list and
scale tickets, to verify product origin. As a result, almost
$35 million of commodities purchased for USDA programs may not
have been obtained in accordance with the Buy American Act.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ Audit Report 01601-0001-41, AMS Procurement and Inspection of
Fruits and Vegetables, Feb. 2016.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
AMS agreed to strengthen enforcement of the Notice to the
Trade, Domestic Origin Requirement, dated September 16, 2010,
by assigning Specialty Crop Inspection (SCI)'s Inspection
Operations responsibility for ensuring that the contractors
provide complete documentation. Any incomplete trace-backs will
be returned to the contractor(s) by SCI for completion. If the
contractor does not comply, SCI immediately will notify
Commodity Procurement Staff, which will take action based on
the guidance outlined in the Federal Acquisition Regulation,
which could result in rejection of product.
AMS further agreed to develop and deliver to SCI employees
a Train-the-Tracer class that will cover: conducting thorough
trace-backs; ensuring contractor compliance with trace-back
responsibilities; reviewing trace-backs; and AMS' established
process for conducting headquarters reviews of field trace-
backs to support effective product traces. This will be
mandatory training for SCI staff involved with the activities
associated with commodity procurement. AMS advised that it
expects corrective action to be completed by August 2017.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you. I appreciate that very much.
SNAP RETAILERS
Let's talk about data analysis and SNAP retailers. About a
month ago, you issued a report that looked at SNAP retailer and
transaction data, and you used special software to check Social
Security numbers and ages of retailers. I fully support your
work on this and other government programs, but I wanted you to
go over your findings related to Social Security numbers and
birth dates so that we can all view them in the proper
perspective.
In looking at both Social Security numbers and ages, you
found very few discrepancies among the owners of the more than
200,000 authorized retailers. For each, that was 99 percent
accuracy. FNS deserves credit for that, I think, for issuing
guidance to their staff on these issues quite a few years
before your audit.
Am I correct that you accepted the FNS management decision
on all of your recommendations?
And on the Social Security matching issue, FNS says it does
not have the legal authority to access Social Security numbers
for this purpose, so they can't do a match. They need
legislative authority to do so. Do you agree that FNS doesn't
have the legal authority to match Social Security numbers?
Mr. Harden. Sir, I would have to go back and look, because
I thought we were using some of the Social Security information
that they already had in doing our analysis, but let me go back
and take a closer look on that question.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you.
[The information follows:]
OIG's audit report, Detecting Potential SNAP Trafficking
Using Data Analysis (27901-0002-13), recommended FNS design and
implement a control to identify SNAP retail owners whose
information matches that of deceased persons, and correct or
update this information as needed. In response to our
recommendation to identify deceased owners, FNS stated that it
does not currently have the authority to match SSNs on the
Death Master File (DMF) for this purpose. However, FNS stated
that it would attempt to perform a match with the other data it
has available, such as first, middle, and last name, and date
of birth. Further, FNS' response stated that there is value in
conducting a SSN match on an on-going basis and if FNS is
granted future legislative authority to use DMF for matching
purposes, it will perform matches on an on-going basis.
We believe that there are potentially different
interpretations regarding the relevant authorities. USDA's
Office of the General Counsel would be the appropriate USDA
office to interpret FNS' related authority.
2501 PROGRAM
I have got about a minute left, so let me ask you about the
2501 Program update. In keeping with my theme last year of
increasing diversity access across the Department, I would like
to inquire about the 2501 Program, which has been critical in
providing assistance or support to disadvantaged farmers, to
HBCUs, and to others. In your fiscal year 2017 budget
justification, OIG cited Section 2501 Program as its first
example of recent progress within the Department.
Can you provide us with an update on current operations and
management of the 2501 Program and whether it is meeting its
statutory mandate and mission?
Ms. Fong. OK. We have not done recent work on that issue.
When we issued our audit report, the agency agreed with our
recommendations. And I think at this point what we could do is
go back and find out the status of our recommendations to make
sure that they have actually implemented them.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you.
[The information follows:]
As of June 2017, the agency reported that they have
implemented all agreed to corrective actions for audit 91099-
0003-21, Section 2501 Grants Awarded FYs 2010-2011, March 2015.
Mr. Aderholt. Mr. Young.
IT SECURITY
Mr. Young. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Looking over your testimony and some of the programs that
you have been investigating and auditing, I am stuck on IT
security. And you have a relationship with the Office of Chief
Information Officer, probably a closer relationship because of
the Federal Information Security Modernization Act, which
became law in 2014. It says, ``in fiscal years 2009 through
2015, the OIG made 61 recommendations for improving the overall
security of the USDA systems, 18 of which are overdue for
completion.'' That was in 2015.
Do you know if those 18 overdue recommendations have been
addressed since 2015 when you did that last audit or
investigation?
Mr. Harden. We will have to--that will be something that we
will also follow up in this year's cycle. As we finished last
year's cycle last November, they were overdue. Some of them may
have gotten completed since then, but, you know, we are just
starting up this year's review.
Mr. Young. OK. And then it says: ``Moreover, our testing
identified that security weaknesses still exist in three of the
39 closed recommendations.''
With information technology security weaknesses and holes
that are--and it is through private industry; it is through our
personal computers; it is through public systems--at the USDA,
what is at risk? What information is at risk?
Ms. Fong. Well, I think, as you know, all of the Federal
agencies are dependent on IT to deliver their programs. And so,
at USDA, you are looking at a broad array of databases in the
farm program agencies, certainly the----
Mr. Young. So we are looking at data, but we are also
looking at the names of producers who receive payments,
individuals and families receiving benefits, whether it is
SNAP, WIC, and loan and grant recipient information. Could
their identifying information be subject to hacking and being
stolen because of some information that is attached to these
names, like Social Security numbers, USDA account information,
or bank information?
The reason I ask this is because I lead a bipartisan task
force with Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat from Arizona, and it is a
Congressional task force to prevent identity theft and fraud.
There are a lot of frauds and scams out there. But we also need
to make sure that, if we are being a caretaker of the taxpayers
and their personal information, we need to be doing a better
job.
Do you think the Social Security information, bank account
information, names, and addresses are subject to risk with the
holes that you found in the IT systems at the USDA?
Ms. Fong. I think you have really put your finger on the
risk to the Department. The risk to the Department is
significant. We believe it is a material risk, that the data
systems currently are not sufficiently secured at the
Department level and as they roll down through the agencies.
And, of course, there is all kinds of data in the Department
systems. And, you know, you mentioned the outstanding
recommendations that we have with respect to IT security. We
have seen the Department make some progress, but there is a
long way to go. And we all are very aware of some of the
breaches around the Federal government and other departments
and agencies, we are aware that that risk exists for USDA as
well.
Mr. Young. Would you know how many times the USDA tests its
systems, or would that be a question for the Office of the
Chief Information Officer?
Mr. Harden. OCIO would have a probably more ready answer,
but we will go back and look and see what we can find out.
[The information follows:]
The Department's Risk Management Framework Guide states
that the Department is to annually test its systems based upon
the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
Special Publication 800-53, Security and Privacy Controls for
Federal Information Systems and Organizations (April 2013). Key
controls are tested annually, while other controls are tested
on a cyclical basis; one third per year until all have been
tested at the end of the 3-year cycle. The extent of the
testing depends on the risk categorization (Low, Moderate, or
High). Low categorized systems have fewer controls to test
while High systems have more. The Office of Chief Information
Officer can better answer what other testing is done. Due to
the decentralized nature of USDA, additional testing may be
done at each individual agency. OIG's FY 2016 Federal
Information Security Modernization Act audit found that the
Department had implemented this framework and it was operating
as intended.\3\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ Audit Report 50501-0012-12, U.S. Department of Agriculture,
Office of the Chief Information Officer, Fiscal Year 2016 Federal
Information Security Modernization Act, Nov. 2016.
Mr. Young. We will be in touch. Thank you for being here
today.
I yield back.
Mr. Aderholt. Ms. DeLauro.
ETHICS INVESTIGATIONS
Ms. DeLauro. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Fong, I am just going to ask, but I will put it in
writing as well, I want to ask you to put in writing for this
Committee what the effect of the hiring freeze will mean for
your department. I want to know what the 40 slots are and what
areas that they cover.
[The information follows:]
OIG provided information to Rep. DeLauro and Subcommittee
leadership on March 10, 2017.
As I listened to my colleagues this morning, we have talked
about RUS, ARS, organics, housing, trade, recently IT security,
all areas of great interest to this Committee, and 58.5 percent
of your current resources are spent on the SNAP program. We
have an interest in the SNAP program. It has a big claim on
what we do. But there are a lot of issues here that truly are
going begging, and you now have a hiring freeze. So I want it
detailed, and I also want to know what those error reports,
error numbers, are on improper payments for all of the farm
programs under your jurisdiction.
Let me get to an ethics question. Everyone here is aware of
the issue involving the promotion of Ivanka Trump's clothing
line by the White House staffer, Kellyanne Conway. Chairman
Chaffetz, and in a bipartisan way, sent a letter which said
that the remarks were clearly over the line. He and Ranking
Member Cummings asked the Office of Government Ethics to
investigate, recommend appropriate disciplinary action. There
are other examples as well. Press Secretary Spicer talked about
``go to the Trump International Hotel; it is stunning,'' et
cetera.
Now, the White House does not have an inspector general.
There is no inspector general there. So the only option may be
to go to the Office of Government Ethics. Consistent with
legislation that passed the House by a landslide in the 104th
Congress, I have introduced a bill to provide for an IG at the
White House.
I am wondering, though, about your role at USDA on ethics
matters. First, I understand that many agencies have standard
penalties for employee misconduct, like what happened with Ms.
Conway. Example, employees at Customs and Border Protection
reportedly are subject to a 14-day suspension for a first
offense and removal from their position for a second offense.
Do you have at USDA standard penalties like what CBP has
for such misconduct? Can you tell us what they are? Can you
tell us approximately how many ethics issues you take up
annually?
Ms. Fong. Let me offer some comments, and then Ann will
have some additional comments. We do have jurisdiction over
allegations that the ethics rules, regulations and statutes
have been violated, and the Department requires in its
regulations that any concern or allegations about violations be
brought to our attention so that we can evaluate them and
handle them.
With respect to potential violations, if it is a violation
of a criminal ethics statute, which sometimes those violations
can exist, primarily conflict-of-interest or post-employment
issues, there are statutory penalties that could involve
imprisonment or monetary fines, and that would go through the
justice process.
Ms. DeLauro. But you, then, have established there are
fines and penalties that----
Ms. Fong. For potential criminal violations.
Ms. DeLauro. For--well, I am talking about civil issues as
well.
Ms. Fong. Right. And on the administrative or civil side,
if it doesn't rise to the level of a criminal violation but it
is an administrative violation, the Department has tables of
penalties, I believe we call them, which we can provide.
[The information follows:]
Please see link to the USDA Guide for Disciplinary
Penalties which includes various sections on ethics violations:
https://www.dm.usda.gov/employ/docs/
DisciplinaryPenaltyGuide.pdf.
Ms. DeLauro. OK. I would like to see that. Do you take up
these issues at all, the civil ethics issues?
Ms. Fong. It would depend on the situation. We would
evaluate any incoming allegation and determine whether it is
appropriate for us to move forward on that. We take these very
seriously.
Ms. DeLauro. How many do you do a year?
Ms. Coffey. Within fiscal year 2015 and fiscal year 2016,
we have about 10 cases that have come in relative to ethics
violations.
Ms. DeLauro. But you have a system in place to deal with
this?
Ms. Coffey. We do.
Ms. DeLauro. And all--most of the agencies have that system
in place, as I understand it. The only place that does not have
an IG is the White House. They don't have an inspector general?
You don't have to answer that question. I know the answer
to that question. They don't. There is no inspector general
there to deal with these civil kinds of efforts.
MARC
Let me get back on the ARS piece, if I can, for a moment.
My understanding is that, and this is the animal welfare issue,
that these were not unannounced inspections. They were
essentially designed to see how the facility stood in terms of
overall compliance so that, while ARS' policy for many years
has been that its facilities must comply with the AWA, it is
obvious that the policy was not enforced.
APHIS inspectors found more than 150 AWA issues at the 20
facilities. Almost half of the issues related to the
facilities' institutional review committees. That was just a
key issue that was raised in that New York Times story. Many
others related to basic care of animals.
The facility that was the subject of the New York Times
story had by far the most problems. Inspectors identified a
total of 33 AWA issues, problems, and MARC had to have three
inspections, as I understand it, before it came up, quote,
``clean.'' So, in essence, the Times was on target.
But can you give us your thoughts on how agencies fall
again and again into the trap of not making sure that their own
policies, that their own policies, are not effectively
implemented? Now, it was, I think, my colleague, our colleague,
Congressman Farr, who said, none of this would have happened
had it not been for The New York Times story.
How do agencies continue to fall into this trap? And let me
get your thoughts on that.
Mr. Harden. That is interesting. We had a very good
conversation with the agency administrator as we were closing
this one out. And what really caused----
Ms. DeLauro. It has been closed out?
Mr. Harden. In closing out the audit and coming to what was
being reported on and talking to them about what the cause was.
And from all of our work, we could tell that they had not made
a priority of following those policies or making sure that they
were followed. She was concerned that we worded it that way,
but in the end, she said, ``You know, you are right. We didn't
place the right priority on overseeing and implementing those
policies as we should, and we need to do better.'' So it was a
lack of priority.
Ms. DeLauro. But this continues to happen. So what is it
that we should do, if you have thoughts about what we should
do, in terms of addressing this issue, which continues to
happen? And, again, if there had not been a New York Times
story, this would never have reached the public; it would have
never gotten anyone's attention on this subcommittee.
So what is it that--and we need to think about what we
should do in order to prevent these kinds of efforts from
occurring again. It was 150 animal welfare issues at these 20
facilities. Can you give us your advice on what kind of
legislation would assist you in what you have to do?
Ms. Fong. Well, I think you are putting your finger on the
very basic challenge that faces program managers, and Mr.
Chairman identified that in his initial question as well: What
can Congress do? What role do we play in the IG's office in
terms of bringing some urgency to these issues?
And in our experience and our observation, what we have
found has been really effective is when you all, in the case of
U.S. MARC, the Chairman and the Ranking Member both asked us to
do a review of it based on The New York Times article, and that
was very effective. We were able to go in there and shine some
light on it. I think that is the role that Congress plays.
We have made some recommendations. Now it is time to
oversee the implementation.
Ms. DeLauro. And, Mr. Chairman, thank you for your
thoughtfulness in the time.
Final question, which goes back to my first question. You
don't have the resources today to dig into the corners that we
need to dig into in order to protect the public safety in terms
of food, in order to deal with broadband, in order to look at
international organics coming into this effort, in order to
deal with the housing issues that have been talked about here,
IT security, the whole 9 yards. You don't have the resources,
as far as I can tell, with 40 open slots, to be able to dig
into what you are charged with doing. And we keep asking you
questions about this, but at some point, just say flat out: we
don't have the resources and the staff to be able to go in the
direction that the Members of Congress would like us to go in
and----
Mr. Aderholt. Your time is up. Let me say, in closing,
regarding The New York Times article, approximately how many,
what percentage, of that article was either inaccurate, lacked
context, or uncorroborated?
Mr. Harden. I can't put a percentage on the article. We----
Mr. Aderholt. Over 50 percent?
Mr. Harden. I can't put a percentage on the whole article.
We had to look at statements in that article that we felt we
could objectively analyze and see if we could find evidence to
support it or not, and that is where we came up with the 33
statements that we picked. Those were judgmentally picked to
look at to see if we could corroborate what was being said.
Mr. Aderholt. Were those 33 statements a big portion of the
article, or was that just a very small portion of the article?
Mr. Harden. Let me go back and get a better percentage of
the article. I am trying to remember how many pages the article
was. I remember reading a multipage article. And so I will get
you an answer for that.
[The information follows:
After reviewing The New York Times article, we non-
statistically selected 33 specific statements from the article
to evaluate in an attempt to determine the accuracy of the
expressed concerns. These statements were selected based on
references to specified dates or timeframes, specific facts or
figures (for example, a specific number of animal deaths), and/
or sufficient details the audit team could examine.
Mr. Aderholt. OK. All right.
Ms. Fong. Let me also observe that, during the course of
our audit, we tried numerous times to interview and speak with
the writer, the author of the article, to gain his perspectives
on it. And we told him where we were going to end up with our
conclusions, and they did not want to engage.
Mr. Harden. Right.
Mr. Aderholt. The reporter didn't want to engage.
Ms. Fong. The reporter or the editor--or his editor. Yeah.
Both.
Mr. Aderholt. OK. Mr. Palazzo.
U.N. ORGANIZATIONS
Mr. Palazzo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Inspector General performs a number of audits and
investigations of third-party organizations receiving taxpayer
money each year. In a recent draft executive order leaked to
the press, the Trump Administration called for the audit of
funding to groups associated with the United Nations. One of
the largest U.N. organizations that this subcommittee gives
funding to is the World Food Programme. The U.S. Government has
given almost $8 billion to this organization over the past 5
years.
The World Food Programme uses an external auditor that
rotates amongst various nations serving 6-year terms.
Currently, it is under the responsibility of the French
Government's auditing body.
In your experience as Inspector General, have you ever
performed an audit of the World Food Programme or another
international body?
Mr. Harden. No. And, actually, in researching this
question, the money that goes through CCC for the World Food
Programme actually is passed through USAID for delivery to the
World Food Programme. So it is kind of overseen by the IG's
Office at USAID. I would need to go back and talk to them about
what oversight they have done of that piece of the program.
Mr. Palazzo. So USAID is maybe doing their audit for----
Mr. Harden. Right. I would just have to see if they have
done any work on it.
Mr. Palazzo. OK. And that would have been good to know
before I asked the question. I have a whole bunch of followup
questions that really don't pertain to you all right now. So
that would be great if you could get that information to me.
[The information follows:]
See OIG response to Questions 55-64 in submitted questions
for the record.
Mr. Harden. We have looked at the USDA side of it, which is
the Food for Progress Program, on several occasions and found
weaknesses in how those programs are run as well.
Mr. Palazzo. Would you all like to audit the World Food
Programme?
Mr. Harden. I would have to look and see if we would have
jurisdiction and get----
Mr. Palazzo. You need more staff, right? All right.
Well, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Aderholt. Ms. Pingree.
ANIMAL WELFARE DOCUMENTS
Ms. Pingree. Great. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you again for your time with us today and your work.
I just want to reemphasize a few things that my colleagues have
said. Certainly I think there is a great understanding that
through the kind of audit and oversight facilities that you
provide, it really gives us the opportunity to understand where
money is well spent, where it isn't, where programs are
performing. I just want to emphasize the concerns that my
colleagues have brought up about making sure you have adequate
funding and making sure you let us know when some of these
things can't be performed because of that funding as we are
making those critical decisions.
I want to just reemphasize again on Buy American, organic.
I see two really critical roles that are performed by the USDA,
which the Chair mentioned earlier in his remarks. It is just
critically important to farmers that we are supporting them in
the markets that are available to them. To have 30 percent,
potentially, of the Buy American products not be procured from
the United States or not, that is just a huge lost opportunity
when we want to see growth in our farming sector and our
agriculture sector and strengthening those markets. The same
with organic, with increasing imports that are going on. So I
just can't say enough about following that.
Of course, I am very supportive of broadband. I think I
come from the most rural State in the Nation. I don't even want
to tell you the low rates of broadband in many communities in
my State and the challenges that we face not having the
resources. I think there will be just huge bipartisan interest
in that as we go forward, and we will really look forward to
the insights you can give us into that.
And a more recent issue that I am sure you haven't had time
to investigate, but I just want to throw it on your radar
screen. I know there was just a letter sent to the new
administration about some of the issues at APHIS around
scrubbing the website of animal welfare documents. You have
probably read about it if you are not aware of it, but
certainly that is a concern. It had 101 signatures on that
letter, very bipartisan in a time when it is not always easy to
get bipartisan concerns about this. Republicans and Democrats
alike have shown concerns about the importance of the public
having access to that information. As my colleague from
Connecticut was just mentioning we shouldn't have to turn to
the newspaper all the time to figure out where the problems
are. Some of the ways that the public can have access to this
kind of information is by being able to see it on the website.
So, understanding that information has been scrubbed and
the importance of putting it back and this bipartisan concern
about it and the importance of just being able to continue to
use sunshine as a disinfectant, as my Republican colleagues
have said in their comments around this letter. I hope that you
will make one of your priorities going forward to look into
that lack of access to information and I think, in the future,
any removal of useful information to consumers and to lawmakers
about what is going on. And, in this case, we can see that
there are high levels of concern about animal welfare. If you
have any comments about that, I would be interested to hear. I
just really think it fits into the theme of many things that we
are talking about today, and I think a lot of us were shocked
to see that information removed.
Any comments or--I doubt that you have already done the
thorough investigation yet, but----
Ms. Fong. We are very much aware of the situation. As you
mentioned, it has been in the news, the Congressional interest.
We have been watching as it unfolds. We understand it is a
complex issue. The Department is working with the Department of
Justice. There is some litigation involved, which adds another
layer of complexity, but we will be watching it. And if anyone
on the Committee has a particular aspect of it that you would
want to bring to our attention, we would appreciate that.
Ms. Pingree. Great. Well, we will send a followup letter
about that. And then we would be happy to hear back from you
about ways that we could work moving forward on it and other
insights you could bring to us.
So, again, thanks for your work.
And thank you, Mr. Chair. I yield back the balance of my
time.
Mr. Aderholt. Mr. Pocan.
FOOD AID PROGRAMS
Mr. Pocan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. On my previous
Committees, we usually don't get a second round, so I was
trying to rush everything in the first round with three, but I
do just have one additional question.
In the OIG 2017 annual plan that outlines the goals for
improvement initiatives for the FSA commodity purchases for the
international food assistance programs, can you elaborate on
some of those initiatives? We had a question from a
constituent.
Mr. Harden. Let me go back and look at that. That is
something that is in the plan that we haven't started yet, and
so I would need to go back and do a little research on what the
initiatives are.
[The information follows:]
We are currently conducting fieldwork for our Audit report
on FSA Commodity Purchases for International Food Assistance
Programs. We expect to issue the final report in Spring 2018.
OIG categorizes its audit work into one of three goals: safety
and security, integrity of benefits, and management improvement
initiatives. This report is categorized under ``management
improvement initiatives'' since the audit will focus on
strengthening management through more efficient program
operations and improving financial management. The objectives
of this audit are to evaluate whether FSA's commodity
procurement process for international food assistance programs
is: (1) conducting outreach to prospective vendors to meet its
goals of promoting competition, (2) adhering to applicable
Federal Acquisition Regulation vendor qualification
requirements and ensuring only qualified vendors are able to
submit bids, (3) performing contract closeout procedures
timely, and (4) monitoring unliquidated obligations from
commodity contracts to ensure these funds are de-obligated.
Mr. Pocan. All right. I appreciate it. Thank you.
I yield back.
Mr. Aderholt. Well, thank you. Mr. Young, just one comment,
I understand?
Mr. Young. I just have a comment, and echoing some of the
remarks of my colleague Ms. Pingree about transparency and the
information that has been taken down, whether it is this
administration, the last administration, or a future
administration, the more transparency the better. Whether you
agree with an issue or not, having that information out there
is important. As you said, sunshine is the best disinfectant.
It is up to putting that information out there and allowing the
public to see these things and make up their minds for
themselves. But I think it is our obligation to make sure that
we have transparency, not only within Congress, but across the
board of the Federal government in doing our oversight. And so
I thank you for bringing that up.
THIRD-PARTY REVIEWS
Mr. Aderholt. Let me just say, in closing, Congress has the
ability to ask for a third-party entity review of Federal
programs and actions to obtain an objective assessment of how a
process or program is being implemented. For example, under the
fiscal year 2016 Omnibus Appropriations Act, Congress directed
the National Academy of Medicine to review the process used to
establish Dietary Guidelines for Americans and ensure the
guidelines better address the health concerns facing Americans.
The concern is, and we have heard from constituents also
concerned, that this review is not being conducted according to
statute and report language.
Would it be in the OIG's purview to review how this study
is being conducted and to look into USDA's involvement with NAM
process to ensure that the statute is being followed?
Ms. Fong. I think we would want to give some thought to
that. Generally, our jurisdiction extends to any expenditure of
USDA funds or any USDA activity. If there is a contract
involved between a USDA agency and the National Academy, that
would give us a basis to think about work. So let's get in
touch with your staff on this and get some additional
information.
Mr. Aderholt. OK. We will follow up with you, but we will
be happy to try to discuss more and get your thoughts, then, on
the process.
Have you got one more question you want to ask?
Ms. DeLauro. Just a quick question.
Mr. Aderholt. We will do that. That will be fine if anybody
has got any burning questions. We want to try to----
Mr. Bishop. Mine is very short, but if you want to----
Ms. DeLauro. Why don't you go ahead, Ranking Member.
DIVERSITY
Mr. Bishop. Last year, I raised the issue of diversity
within USDA. And not to sound like a broken record, but I asked
for an update on OIG's overall accomplishments and related
activities in the area of diversity in USDA last year and your
goals for fiscal year 2017. And I recognize that you are
operating under a CR and now the hiring freeze was just
instituted, but I would like to know where we are now 1 year
later on diversity.
Ms. Fong. OK. Last year, we had an audit started to look at
the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights and
their operations in terms of processing complaints of
discrimination. During the course of that audit, we had some
investigative work that we needed to accomplish. And during the
investigative work, we found answers to the objectives that our
audit was looking at, and so we closed out the audit.
Now, that being said, we are very much aware of what is
going on within civil rights programs at USDA. We are keeping
an eye on all of the litigation in terms of Keepseagle, BFDL,
Garcia, Love to just make sure that things are rolling out and
to address any concerns that might happen.
If you have a specific issue you would like us to look at,
we would be very happy to talk to you about that.
Mr. Bishop. Well, and I appreciate that, and I have a
followup, but I would like to know statistically what the
breakdown is of the workforce within the respective agencies
and the level broken down by the demographics.
Ms. Fong. OK.
Mr. Bishop. And you can submit that for the record.
[The information follows:]
See OIG response to Question 70 in submitted questions for
the record.
Mr. Bishop. I think it is important that we be able to
monitor that progress, and hopefully there is progress.
Ms. Fong. We will do what we can to find that information
for you.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you.
Mr. Aderholt. Ms. DeLauro.
HOG HIMP
Ms. DeLauro. Thank you. I will move quickly. This is about
the Hog HACCP-based Inspection Model Project, HIMP program. In
May 2013, you issued a report, an audit, of the Food Safety and
Inspection Service, ``Inspection and Enforcement Activities at
Swine Slaughter Plants.'' Your report pointed out that, even
though the HIMP pilot had been in operation for nearly 15
years, the agency had never performed an evaluation of the
pilot to determine whether the pilot was achieving food safety
objectives.
In the last regulatory agenda published by the Obama
Administration, FSIS planned on publishing a proposed rule in
March of this year, 2017, to expand HIMP to all swine slaughter
facilities.
Has the OIG performed any followup with FSIS on the
inspection program in swine slaughter facilities since 2013? Do
you believe FSIS is ready to move ahead with expanding HIMP to
all swine slaughter facilities at this time, given that they
have yet to determine whether expanding HIMP will jeopardize
food safety?
Mr. Harden. We haven't done any followup work since 2013
because of our other food safety issues we have been tracking.
I would need to go and find out how they implemented this and
what they were planning to do to put in a reg to know, to be
able to come to some conclusion as to whether they are ready or
not.
Ms. DeLauro. OK. Then does that mean that this March 2017
date on a proposed rule, is that going to be held up?
Mr. Harden. That, I don't know. I would have to go to back
and ask FSIS.
Ms. DeLauro. Well, we need to know whether or not that is
going to be held up. OK. Thank you.
[The information follows:]
In May 2013, we issued our report on FSIS' inspection and
enforcement activities at swine slaughter plants. In our
report, we noted that the swine HIMP program has shown no
measurable improvement to the inspection process since the
program's inception. Overall, we issued a number of
recommendations for FSIS to determine what measurable
improvements the HIMP program achieved and its suit-ability as
a permanent program and to develop criteria to terminate plants
from HIMP that have a pattern of serious violations. FSIS has
since reached closure for each of the recommendations issued.
While we do not have any work planned in this area for the
near future, we are closely tracking the status of FSIS'
issuance of the proposed rule for hog HIMP. On June 10, 2017,
FSIS submitted a copy of the proposed rule to the Office of
Management and Budget (OMB) for review.
Mr. Aderholt. All right.
Ms. DeLauro. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Aderholt. Thank you.
Well, thank you all for being here, Ms. Coffey, Ms. Fong,
and Mr. Harden. Thank you for your testimony here this morning.
We have had a good hearing, some issues that I think you will
follow up with us on and we will follow up with you on. We will
look forward to working on those issues, but, again, we
congratulate your team and everybody over there at the Office
of Inspector General for all your hard work and the good work
that you all do and your accolades that you have been awarded
over the years. So, again, all the best to you and as you go
through this new transition, and we look forward to being in
touch.
The hearing is adjourned.
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