Because of this, the department wasted millions of dollars each year paying for unnecessary or unused telecommunications services and equipment, and services billed but never provided. USDA agreed that it has to do a significantly better job managing its telecommunications investments. By implementing improvements such as reengineering telecommunications management, the department reported in November 1997 that its telecommunications costs could be reduced as much as $30 million annually. However, to date, USDA has not fully implemented the revised and improved management practices. In December 1997, the CIO issued a plan of action for resolving the department’s long-standing problems managing information technology. Further, USDA has not established an overall plan or strategy for directing and integrating these separate improvement efforts and for ensuring that critical corrective actions are cost-effectively and promptly implemented throughout the department. A major factor contributing to this situation is that no one at USDA has been given overall responsibility, authority, and accountability for doing so. USDA also stated that the department has made real progress in telecommunications management and has achieved significant savings, but did not disagree that USDA continues to miss savings opportunities and cannot ensure that telecommunications resources are cost-effectively managed across the department. To address our objective, we reviewed studies, reports, plans, and other documentation describing USDA’s actions to address our recommendations for (1) correcting telecommunications management weaknesses, (2) identifying and acting on opportunities to consolidate and optimize FTS 2000 telecommunications services, (3) planning networks in support of information and resource sharing needs, and (4) resolving telephone abuse and fraud. We also reviewed USDA’s information systems technology architecture and discussed it with CIO officials to determine the extent to which the architecture defines information sharing needs.
Why GAO Did This Study

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of Agriculture's (USDA) efforts to improve its management of telecommunications resources and act on opportunities to achieve savings.

What GAO Found

GAO noted that: (1) USDA has taken positive steps to begin correcting its telecommunications management weaknesses--improvements that the department says could reduce its $200 million-plus reported annual investment in telecommunications by as much as $70 million each year; (2) for example, USDA conducted a departmentwide reengineering study and is beginning to test a redesigned approach for managing telecommunications resources; (3) USDA has also taken action to eliminate some redundant services and reduce costs; (4) however, USDA has not achieved significant cost savings or management improvements because many of the department's corrective actions are incomplete or inadequate; (5) specifically, USDA has not: (a) established the sound management practices necessary for ensuring that telecommunications resources are cost-effectively managed and payments for unused, unnecessary, or uneconomical services are stopped; (b) consolidated and optimized telecommunications to achieve savings where opportunities exist to do so; (c) adequately planned integrated networks in support of information sharing needs; and (d) determined the extent to which the department is at risk for telephone abuse and fraud and acted to mitigate those risks nationwide; (6) further, it is unclear how and when these needed corrective actions will be implemented because the department has not established an effective action plan or strategy for addressing GAO's recommendations with timeframes, milestones, and resources for making improvements; and (7) a major factor contributing to this situation is that no one at USDA has been given overall responsibility, authority, and accountability for fixing USDA's long-standing telecommunications management problems.