Veterans and the Environment Are Winners in Latest Agency Management Efforts

The Office of Management and Budget on Thursday announced that third-quarter data on intra-agency and cross-agency performance goals show “significant progress,” including a 33 percent decline in veterans homelessness since 2010.

“By using a data-driven, implementation-focused approach, agencies are achieving significant gains in their respective missions to accelerate economic growth and expand opportunity for the American people,” wrote budget director Shaun Donovan in a blog post.

Highlights among the data newly posted on Performance.gov include:

• Reducing the number of homeless veterans by more than 24,800 people through collaboration between the Housing and Urban Development and Veterans Affairs departments. Over the past four years, 35,000 homeless veterans have found permanent housing, OMB reported.

• The Interior Department’s expansion of permits for renewable energy. The department approved more than 14,100 megawatts of renewable energy capacity over the past four years, which could eventually help power some 4.8 million homes.

• The Small Business Administration’s new application process for loans to survivors of disasters has increased its response rate to 80 percent in the third quarter of fiscal 2014, up from 62 percent in the second quarter and 50 percent in the first. The customer-friendly approach reaches more survivors and increases the program’s efficiency, Donovan wrote.

• The General Services Administration’s efforts to refine leasing requirements and consolidate office space put it on track to reduce the amount of federally leased space by 5 percent on replacement leases by the end of fiscal 2015. (Data for fiscal 2014 are not ready, but the reduction in fiscal 2013 was 1.4 percent, the OMB chief noted.)

“The agency and cross-agency priority goals,” Donovan said, “are an opportunity for senior policy officials, career executives, managers, front line employees and providers to come together to accelerate progress on the government’s bottom line outcomes.”

(Image via majeczka / Shutterstock.com)