As required by OMB Circular A-11, NOAA revised its budget request to bring it into accord with these decisions. Key Events Associated With NWS’ Budget “Shortfall” and Efforts to Address It

Due to the reductions that OMB and, subsequently, the Congress made to NWS’ fiscal year 1997 budget request, as well as inflation and other cost increases, NWS believed it had a budget “shortfall.” NWS officials felt that NWS’ fiscal year 1997 budget was not sufficient to provide desired levels of services. In a May 15, 1997, hearing before the Subcommittee on Science, Space and Technology, Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, some Members of Congress indicated that they were confused by the varying amounts of reported budget “shortfall.” According to NOAA and NWS officials, the varying amounts provided to the Congress responded to specific questions asked at particular points in time and did not necessarily include all known elements of the “shortfall.” For example, although a January 3, 1997, NWS memorandum to NOAA mentioned the withholding of inflationary increases and a March 18, 1997, NWS memorandum to NOAA mentioned the increased NWS contribution for NOAA-wide support services, these elements of the “shortfall” were not provided to the Congress in the February 1997 and April 1997 briefings, respectively. NWS ultimately succeeded in staying within its fiscal year 1997 budget level by implementing a number of actions. The first event centers on an NWS reprogramming request to NOAA. However, the NWS Deputy Assistant Administrator for Operations assumed that the reprogramming request would be approved by Commerce and that funds were available to hire personnel to fill vacancies in the field that had been deferred because of the “shortfall.” This official told NOAA officials on June 13, 1997, that NWS intended to start filling critical field vacancies. The second event involves NWS’ effort to obtain certification approval from NOAA to consolidate, automate, and/or close weather service offices. Upon learning that NWS would not be able to fill vacancies in the field because the aforementioned reprogramming request had not yet been approved, the NWS Deputy Assistant Administrator for Modernization recommended to the NOAA Deputy Under Secretary on June 20, 1997, that 27 of the 83 certification packages be held back. The Congress enacted appropriations that provided about $668 million in November 1997. We will also send copies to the Secretary of Commerce and to the Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. GAO’s Comments

1. 2. Chronology of Key Events Related to the Formulation and Execution of the NWS Fiscal Year 1997 Budget

Department of Commerce’s fiscal year 1997 budget request submitted to OMB included $2 billion for NOAA’s operations, research, and facilities which included $693 million for NWS. OMB passback and subsequent discussions resulted in reductions of $16.8 and $22.3 million to NOAA and NWS budgets, respectively.
Why GAO Did This Study

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the key events related to the fiscal year (FY) 1997 budget shortfall of the National Weather Service (NWS), focusing on: (1) the formulation and execution of the NWS' FY 1997 budget; and (2) key events regarding NWS' FY 1997 budget shortfall and efforts to address it.

What GAO Found

GAO noted that: (1) based on guidance provided by the Department of Commerce and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) prepared a FY 1997 budget proposal for each of its components--including NWS; (2) the Department of Commerce reviewed this proposal and asked OMB to include $693 million for NWS in the President's budget; (3) based on OMB's direction regarding NOAA-wide and NWS-specific reductions, this request was revised to the $671 million that appeared in the President's budget submission to Congress; (4) Congress further reduced this amount, enacting appropriations that included $638 million in FY 1997; (5) although NWS believed it had a budget shortfall because of the reductions that OMB and Congress made to its FY 1997 budget request, as well as inflationary and other cost increases, NOAA and NWS reported varying amounts to Congress about the size of this shortfall; (6) according to NOAA and NWS officials, the information provided to Congress responded to specific questions asked at particular points in time and did not necessarily include all known elements of the shortfall; (7) NWS ultimately succeeded in staying within its FY 1997 budget level by implementing a number of temporary and permanent actions; (8) other events associated with the shortfall raised concerns among department officials and Congress; (9) the first event centered on a NWS reprogramming request to NOAA and NWS' intention to start filling critical field vacancies prior to receiving NOAA authorization; (10) NWS assumed that the reprogramming request would be approved by Commerce and funds would be available to fill these vacancies; (11) NOAA informed NWS that the vacancies could not be filled because the reprogramming request had not yet been approved; (12) the second event involved NWS' effort to obtain certification approval from NOAA to consolidate, automate, and close weather service offices; (13) upon learning that NWS would not be able to fill critical field vacancies, NWS recommended to NOAA that selected certification packages be held back because, according to NWS, this would have resulted in a degradation of weather services at locations; (14) however, Commerce noted that the certification packages, as submitted by NWS on April 22, 1997, did not indicate that there were vacancies in these offices that would preclude proceeding with certification; and (15) no link was made during this time between the ability to proceed with certification and the need for reprogramming approval by Congress.