Problems in Collecting and Setting Aside Adequate Knutson-Vandenburg Funds To Do Planned Work

GAO undertook a review of the problems in collecting and setting aside adequate funds authorized by the Knutson-Vandenburg (K-V) Act. In a previous report, GAO found that the Forest Service was having difficulty in collecting and setting aside enough money under the K-V act to finance reforestation and timber stand improvement work needed in harvest areas. GAO limited its review to an analysis of procedures at 16 district and 6 national forest offices in Region 6.

In its review, GAO found that: (1) some Forest Service officials are not adequately considering the expected impact of inflation when making K-V estimates; (2) in some cases Forest Service officials are not using any inflation factor; (3) K-V plans have not always been revised on a timely basis and the amount of monies that can be deposited in the K-V fund to cover any upward revisions has been administratively limited to the total receipts to be collected from the volume of unharvested timber under a contract; and (4) K-V balances may not be accurate since the K-V deficits may only be on paper because of problems in developing work plans and cost estimates and the fact that procedures permit K-V plans to be updated and some additional funds to be deposited in the K-V account, thus reducing the deficit.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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