Megabyte Act of 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. CASSIDY. Mr. President, I rise today in support of H.R. 4904, the Making Electronic Government Accountable By Yielding Tangible Efficiencies Act of 2016, and that is an acronym for the MEGABYTE Act.

H.R. 4904 is the House companion to a piece of legislation Senator Gary Peters and I introduced, S. 2340. I would like to thank Senator Peters for being the lead cosponsor of the Senate version of the MEGABYTE Act and thank Senator Thad Cochran for cosponsoring it. S. 2340 passed the Senate by voice vote last week.

My friends in the House of Representatives--Representative Matt Cartwright, Representative Will Hurd, Representative Steve Russell, and Representative Elijah Cummings--are the lead sponsors of H.R. 4904. It passed the House on June 7, 2016, by a vote of 366 to 0.

The MEGABYTE Act reforms the Federal Government's management of information technology software licensing. The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office, or the GAO, found that implementing oversight and management policies of Federal software licenses saved a single agency 181 million taxpayer dollars per year.

If implemented, the MEGABYTE Act could yield billions in savings across the Federal Government. Now, the Federal Government spends $82 billion a year on information technology. In 2015, for example, for the second year in a row, GAO listed IT software license management as a top priority for its annual duplication report. The GAO stated that the executive branch ``does not have adequate policies for managing software licenses.'' Of the 24 major Federal agencies, only 2 have implemented comprehensive and clear management policies of Federal software licenses. Furthermore, none of the 24 major Federal agencies have fully implemented all 5 industry-best practices recommended by the GAO.

The MEGABYTE Act saves taxpayer dollars and cuts government waste through the following actions:

The Office of Management and Budget Director shall issue a directive requiring that the chief information officer of each executive agency is to identify clear roles, responsibilities, and central oversight authority within the agency for managing enterprise software license agreements and commercial software licenses.

Agencies will also establish a comprehensive inventory, including 80 percent of software licensing spending and enterprise licenses in the agency.

They shall regularly track and maintain software licenses to assist the executive agency in implementing decisions throughout the software license management lifecycle.

They shall analyze software usage and other data to make cost- effective decisions. I notice that every now and then, someone has a database software package and they never use the database. We the taxpayer can save that money.

They should provide training relevant to software license management and establish goals and objectives of the software license management program of the agency.

Lastly, I will mention that they should consider the software license management lifecycle phases--including the requisition, reception, deployment, maintenance, retirement, and disposal phases--to implement effective decisionmaking and incorporate existing standards, processes, and metrics.

Congress has the responsibility to ensure that taxpayer dollars are being used efficiently and effectively.

For all the reasons stated above, I offer my strong support for the MEGABYTE Act and urge the Senate to pass H.R. 4904, sending it to the President's desk.

4904 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.
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Mr. CASSIDY.

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