Department of Homeland Security's Acquisition Data Management Systems

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) was established by the Homeland Security Act of 2002 (Public Law 107-296) by amendment to the Inspector General Act of 1978. This is one of a series of audit, inspection, and special reports prepared as part of our oversight responsibilities to promote economy, efficiency, and effectiveness within the department.

This report addresses the strengths and weaknesses of the department’s acquisition data management and reporting practices. It is based on interviews with employees and officials of relevant agencies and institutions, direct observations, and a review of applicable documents.

The recommendations herein have been developed to the best knowledge available to our office, and have been discussed in draft with those responsible for implementation. We trust this report will result in more effective, efficient, and economical operations. We express our appreciation to all of those who contributed to the preparation of this report.

Collecting and reporting data about government procurements provides assurance that federal acquisitions are awarded and distributed in a prompt, fair, and reasonable manner. Our objective was to assess the effectiveness of the Department of Homeland Security’s internal controls for managing and reporting acquisition data.

The Department of Homeland Security did not always report complete and accurate acquisition data in the Federal Procurement Data System-Next Generation, which is used to create recurring and special reports to the President, Congress, the general public, and others. Our review of 180 sampled contract files revealed a 94.5% accuracy rate. For 464 of 8,460 (5.5%) data fields reviewed, procurement file documentation did not match the information reported in the Federal Procurement Data System-Next Generation. For example, these discrepancies included 24 instances where the Federal Procurement Data System-Next Generation had an incorrect zip code listed for the principal place of performance. Zip code information is used to populate government reports showing the state, city, county and congressional district where the federal funds are being spent.

We attribute these discrepancies to human errors, the department’s lack of management controls, and user limitations with the Federal Procurement Data System-Next Generation’s auto-populated field elements. Additionally, there were 12 contract files valued at more than $31 million that could not be located by acquisition personnel, preventing us from assessing the accuracy of those contracts. As a result, the department may be reporting inaccurate acquisitions data and not providing the public with full transparency and accountability on some government activities.

We are making three recommendations in this report regarding the need for better guidance and increased accountability to ensure the integrity of reported acquisition data. The department’s Acting Chief Procurement Officer concurred with the recommendations and provided information on plans and actions to strengthen policies, procedures, and controls for reporting acquisition data.

Background Collecting and reporting data about government procurements provides assurance that federal acquisitions are awarded and distributed in a prompt, fair, and reasonable manner. These acquisitions must be transparent to the public, and reported clearly, accurately, and in a timely manner. The government must demonstrate that funds are used for authorized purposes and that steps are taken to prevent instances of fraud, waste, and abuse. Complete and accurate acquisitions data is important to ensure programs meet specific procurement performance goals and targets.

The Office of Federal Procurement Policy within the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) plays a central role in developing the policies and practices that federal agencies use to acquire the goods and services they need to carry out their responsibilities. This office employs several tools to collect, develop, and disseminate government-wide procurement data for use by federal agencies and the general public. The most significant tool federal agencies use is the Federal Procurement Data System-Next Generation (FPDS-NG), which captures numerous elements of procurement performance.

FPDS-NG contains data that the federal government uses to create recurring and special reports to the President, Congress, Government Accountability Office (GAO), federal executive agencies, and the general public. The data is also used to populate the USAspending.gov website in accordance with the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act. USAspending.gov is a single searchable website accessible by the public that includes information for each federal award, such as name, location, and unique identifier of the entity receiving the award; amount of the award; and information on the award such as transaction type and the funding agency.

The Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 4.604 requires that the Senior Procurement Executive in coordination with the head of contracting activity be responsible for developing and monitoring a process to ensure timely and accurate reporting of contractual actions in FPDS-NG. The Office of Federal Procurement Policy requires that executive agencies annually certify that the data reported in FPDS-NG is valid and complete.

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http://www.dhs.gov/xoig/assets/mgmtrpts/OIG_10-42_Jan10.pdf