Graves Works to Improve Government Efficiency, Save Taxpayer Dollars

Introduces bill to consolidate unnecessary duplicative programs

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Congressman Sam Graves (MO-06) has introduced the Improving All Government Efficiency (IMAGE) Act, which eliminates duplicative and inefficient Federal programs identified in a series of recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) reports.

The IMAGE Act (H.R. 2514) requires the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to coordinate with the heads of federal agencies to implement GAO's suggested actions. At the end of the fiscal year, if the suggested actions are not taken, the budget of each Federal agency that does not comply will be subject to a 1% cut to incentivize action.

"Rather than looking to cut areas that will cause a public uproar, we should stop playing politics and reduce the real waste in government," said Congressman Graves. "For the last three years, the GAO has outlined areas of waste in the Federal government. It's time for Federal agencies to step up."

In 2011, the GAO began issuing an annual report identifying areas of fragmentation, overlap, and duplication in Federal programs. The three annual reports in this series presented 162 areas and approximately 380 actions where opportunities existed for executive branch agencies to achieve cost savings. At this time, only 65 actions have been fully addressed.

"The bottom line is the Federal government has a serious spending problem which has led to an unsustainable level of debt. Our government must search across all areas of the budget in an effort to find and eliminate waste. My legislation is a step in that direction," concluded Graves.

The GAO reports may be found by visiting http://www.gao.gov/duplication/.

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