Data Act: OMB and Treasury Have Issued Additional Guidance and Have Improved Pilot Design but Implementation Challenges Remain

Dec 08

GAO-17-156: Published: Dec 8, 2016. Publicly Released: Dec 8, 2016.

The DATA Act requires more transparency in federal spending data and increases the types of spending data that agencies make available to the public. We found that agencies face challenges in implementing the common data standards required by the act and in preparing their data for submission to Treasury ahead of the act’s May 2017 deadline.

We also looked at a pilot project that is intended to reduce the reporting burden for entities that receive federal funding. We recommended that the Office of Management and Budget clearly document how the results of the procurement portion of the pilot can be applied to other required federal reporting.