Titus On Bill To Save Taxpayers Nearly $100 Billion On Improper Payments By Federal Agencies

Press Release

Congresswoman Dina Titus of Nevada's Third District supported legislation today that saves taxpayers nearly $100 billion a year by cracking down on waste, fraud, and abuse in government programs. H.R. 3393, the Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Act, improves accountability and oversight on the part of federal agencies.

"Supporting this bill represents my latest effort to change how Washington works," Congresswoman Titus said. "For too long, taxpayer money has been wasted through fraud and abuse. It's time to make our government work smarter and more efficiently for the American people. We need to take a page from Nevada families who are doing more with less. Reforming an inefficient system will prevent billions of dollars from being thrown away each year."

According to the Office of Management and Budget, federal agencies were estimated to have made nearly $98 billion in improper payments in fiscal year 2009. Improper payments occur when a federal agency pays too much, pays twice, or pays for the wrong product or service. These improper payments may occur as a result of fraud or poor financial management systems that do not detect or prevent mistakes before federal dollars are misspent.

This legislation would help identify, reduce, and eliminate improper payments, as well as recover lost funds that federal agencies have improperly spent. Specifically, the bill contains provisions to increase transparency by lowering the improper payment threshold for agencies. Currently, agencies are only required to report on improper payments that exceed both $10 million and 2.5 percent of total program payments. It also requires agencies to develop action plans to avoid future waste, recover overpayments, and hold agencies accountable. Under current law, agencies are only required to seek to recover overpayments they make if they hand out more than $500 million in payments to contractors each year. The bill requires all agencies with outlays of more than $1 million to perform recovery audits on their programs and activities.

Source