- Report to Congress on the Benefits of the E-Government Initiatives
In February 2007, the Office of Management and Budget submitted to Congress the second annual “Report to Congress on the Benefits of the E-Government Initiatives”. The report outlines the purpose of the E-Government and Line of Business Initiatives and highlights the benefits agencies receive from the initiatives to which they provide funding contributions. Also included are details regarding initiative funding by agency/bureau.
Click here to view the full report. Selected examples of how citizens and Federal employees are benefiting through the use of the Presidential E-Government Initiatives include:
- GovBenefits.gov - Currently, GovBenefits.gov is receiving approximately 300,000 visits per month by citizens and, and to date has provided nearly 1 million citizen referrals to benefit programs. GovBenefits.gov provides a single point of access for citizens to locate information and determine potential eligibility for government benefits and services.
- IRS Free File - For the 2006 filing season to date, more than 3.9 million citizens have filed taxes online for free using the Free File E-Government solution.
- Grants.gov - Grants.gov has seen a substantial increase in the number of grant application packages posted on Grants.gov since the beginning of fiscal year 2005 (FY05). In the first quarter of FY05, 252 packages were posted on Grants.gov. By the last quarter of fiscal year 2006 (FY06), 4,523 packages were posted on Grants.gov, almost 17 times the number at the beginning of FY05.
- SAFECOM - In 2006 SAFECOM increased the number of urban areas that can establish interoperable communications at the command level within one hour of a major event from 10 to 75. Additionally 66% of public safety agencies report using interoperability to some degree in their operations.
- E-Travel - The Department of Labor, one of the first agencies to complete its migration to an E-Travel service provider, reported a decrease in travel voucher costs from approximately $60 per voucher to approximately $25 per voucher (a decrease of about 60%) and a reduction in voucher processing time from seven to three business days. Additionally, the Department of Transportation and the Department of the Interior are each realizing savings of over $1 million per year through the use of online booking.
- E-Training - To date, over 840,000 Federal employees have registered in the GoLearn.gov Learning Management System. Federal employees have completed more than 2.7 million courses provided through the E-Training initiative. E-Training is assisting the Federal government in maintaining a highly skilled workforce at a fraction of the cost of solely classroom training.
- E-Payroll - Through migration to one of the four payroll service providers, agencies are able to realize cost savings and improved efficiencies. Examples include: HHS has reduced the annual costs of payroll processing for its more than 65,000 employees from $259 to $90 per employee (an annual savings of almost $11 million) while EPA has reduced the cost from $270 to $90 per employee for its staff of 18,000 (an annual savings of approximately $3.2 million).
- Recruitment One-Stop - Each month, over 100,000 resumes are created on USAJobs.gov, the Federal online recruitment service. USAJobs.gov receives over 240,000 visits daily from job seekers looking for information regarding career opportunities with the Federal government.
The report consist of five sections:
- E-Government Report (Initiative Summaries and Agency Narratives) - Provides a summary of the purpose of each E-Government Initiative followed by individual agency reports describing the relevance of the initiatives to which the particular agency provides funds.
- Attachment A (E-Gov Web Screenshots) - Provides images of public interfacing E-Government websites.
- Attachment B (Funding for E-Government by Agency) - Provides, by agency, funding contributions to E-Government Initiatives in which the agency participates. Includes Fiscal Year 2007 (FY07) agency contributions.
- Attachment C (Funding for E-Government by Initiative) - Provides, by E-Government Initiative, agency funding contributions to the initiative. Includes FY07 agency contributions.
- Attachment D (Breakout of Funding by Agency/Bureau) - Provides a breakout for each agency, by bureau, of funding sources for the E-Government Initiatives in which the agency participates. Both the E-Government funding request and the amount to be provided by agency are reflected. Bureau listing is based on Appendix C of OMB Circular A-11 (“Preparation, Submission, and Execution of the Budget”).
