Federal Agencies Spent Over $1.6 Billion between Fiscal Years 2011 and 2015 to Purchase Approximately 64,500 Vehicles through GSA

From fiscal year 2011 through fiscal year 2015, federal agencies  purchased 64,522 passenger vehicles and light trucks through GSA at a  total cost of over $1.6 billion. Five departments (DHS, the Department of Justice, USDA, DOD, and the  Department of the Interior) purchased 90 percent of the vehicles  purchased through GSA during this 5-year time period, and spent a  comparable percentage of the associated funds. 2). 4). Specifically, CBP did not assess the utilization of vehicles that  fell below DHS’s mileage minimums, and NRCS did not use USDA’s  utilization criteria or annually assess vehicles’ utilization. Cumulatively, these two  agencies incurred an estimated $13.5 million in depreciation and  maintenance costs for these vehicles during fiscal year 2015 (see table  5). Based on our review of policies and  agency-provided data, we found that the Navy uses criteria and  justification processes to determine if a vehicle is utilized and was able to  determine that all of the 3,652 vehicles we selected for our review were  utilized. CBP Did Not Determine if 81 Percent of Selected Vehicles Were Utilized in Fiscal Year 2015

DHS’s fleet policy requires that agencies determine if their vehicles are  justified. While DHS policy  instructs agencies to individually justify vehicles that did not meet DHS’s  or agency-developed utilization criteria, CBP officials could not provide  justifications for these 1,862 vehicles, and one official stated that CBP  does not develop such justifications. Because CBP did not determine if these vehicles are  utilized, some of this cost may have been for vehicles that the agency did  not need. CBP officials explained that it would not be efficient or cost-effective to  manually collect the data needed to establish criteria appropriate for CBP,  such as “engine run time.” Furthermore, even if criteria were to be  established, the lack of readily available data would make it difficult to  measure vehicle performance against such criteria. However, officials  stated that CBP has begun to install “telematics” devices in many of its  vehicles. NRCS Did Not Determine If 9 Percent of Its Selected Vehicles Were Utilized in Fiscal Year 2015

A 2012 USDA policy memo requires that all vehicles be utilized. Specifically, all of the USDA and NRCS fleet managers we spoke to were  unaware of this policy memo, which officials from USDA said had not  been re-circulated since 2012. According to USDA officials, the utilization  policy and the requirement for annual justifications were not widely  discussed or shared. Thus, NRCS did not apply USDA’s utilization criteria  to its vehicles to determine if the vehicles were utilized. While new telematics devices are  capable of providing vehicle usage information, CBP risks losing the  opportunity to use these new data to identify and remove underutilized  vehicles because CBP has not developed a plan to determine how it will  use this usage data to improve its utilization assessment processes,  including processes for vehicles without telematics devices. Specifically, we analyzed information on more than 64,500 passenger  vehicles and light trucks purchased by federal agencies through GSA  from fiscal year 2011 through fiscal year 2015 (the most recent, complete  fiscal year at the time of the request), including information such as:  the quantity of vehicles purchased;  the type of vehicle, such as a pickup truck or sedan;  the agencies that acquired vehicles;  the cost of the vehicles purchased; and  the location of where the purchased vehicles were delivered. 2. 3. 4. To determine how selected federal agencies identify what vehicles are  utilized, we judgmentally selected three federal agencies for review: the  U.S. Navy (Navy); U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources  Conservation Service (NRCS); and U.S. Department of Homeland  Security’s Customs and Border Protection (CBP). First, we focused  on a selected population of vehicles, which included:  light trucks or passenger vehicles, because these two categories  comprise the majority of federal-owned vehicle fleets (approximately  55 percent and 15 percent respectively);  vehicles that are still in the selected agencies’ inventories as of  November 2016; and  vehicles that were acquired prior to fiscal year 2015, so that the  agencies were fully accountable for the selected vehicles’ utilization  over the entire fiscal year 2015 time period. In total,  the selected vehicles from these agencies accounted for about 3 percent  of the federally owned fleet. Group 1: Vehicle must be a law enforcement, emergency response, or  tactical vehicle or located outside of the United States or no longer in the  agency’s owned inventory.
Why GAO Did This Study

Federal agencies spent about $3.4 billion in fiscal year 2015 to keep and operate almost 450,000 federally owned vehicles. Each federal agency is responsible for determining utilization criteria and assessing vehicle utilization. GAO was asked to describe federally owned vehicles and examine federal processes for assessing their utilization.
This report, among other objectives: (1) describes recently purchased vehicles, and (2) assesses selected agencies' efforts to determine if vehicles are utilized.
GAO analyzed government-wide data on approximately 64,500 light trucks and passenger vehicles purchased through GSA from fiscal years 2011 through 2015, the most recent available. To assess utilization efforts, GAO selected three agencies (using factors such as fleet size), and reviewed agency utilization information on over 12,000 owned vehicles from fiscal year 2015. GAO also interviewed federal officials. These findings are not generalizable to all agencies but provide insight into the practices of agencies that procure thousands of vehicles.

What GAO Found

Federal agencies spent more than $1.6 billion to purchase approximately 64,500 passenger vehicles and light trucks through the General Services Administration (GSA) from fiscal years 2011 through 2015. Five departments—Defense (DOD), Homeland Security (DHS), Agriculture (USDA), Justice, and Interior—purchased 90 percent of these vehicles, and spent a comparable percentage of the associated funds. The vehicles cost an average of approximately $25,600 each.
GAO determined that the three agencies reviewed—Navy within DOD, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) within DHS, and Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) within USDA—varied in efforts to determine if vehicles were utilized in fiscal year 2015. Navy determined that all of the 3,652 vehicles GAO selected for review were utilized by applying DOD and Navy criteria such as for mileage and individually justifying vehicles. CBP did not determine if 1,862 (81 percent) of its 2,300 selected vehicles were utilized in fiscal year 2015 even though the vehicles did not meet DHS's minimum mileage criteria. CBP officials stated that, contrary to DHS policy, CBP did not have criteria to measure these vehicles' utilization because it was difficult to manually collect the data needed to establish appropriate criteria and assess if vehicles met those criteria. CBP is currently installing devices in many of its vehicles that will allow it to more easily collect such data, but lacks a specific plan for how to ensure these data will allow it to determine if vehicles are utilized. NRCS did not determine if 579 (9 percent) of its 6,223 selected vehicles were utilized in fiscal year 2015. USDA and NRCS fleet officials stated that the agency did not annually assess vehicle utilization, nor did it apply USDA criteria such as mileage or days used. USDA and NRCS officials said they were unaware of USDA's policy requiring these steps because the policy had not been widely discussed or shared within USDA since 2012. CBP and NRCS cumulatively incurred an estimated $13.5 million in depreciation and maintenance costs in fiscal year 2015 for vehicles with unknown utilization (see table). While these costs may not equal the cost savings agencies derive from eliminating underutilized vehicles, without corrective action, agencies are incurring expenses to retain vehicles without determining if they are utilized.
a Selected owned vehicles for each agency in GAO's review covered all passenger vehicles and light trucks, except those that were: 1) emergency responder vehicles, 2) law enforcement vehicles, 3) tactical vehicles, or 4) located outside the Continental United States, among other limited exclusions.

What GAO Recommends

GAO recommends that CBP develop a plan for how it will use its new data collection devices to establish criteria and assess vehicle utilization and that USDA communicate its vehicle utilization policy to fleet officials. DHS and USDA plan to implement these recommendations.