Air Pollution

EPA's Process for Planning, Budgeting, and Reviewing Research Gao ID: RCED-88-47BR December 15, 1987

In response to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) planning and budgeting process to determine: (1) whether EPA adequately considered the needs of its regulators in planning and budgeting for research; and (2) the extent to which EPA and outside experts reviewed EPA research programs.

GAO found that: (1) EPA used a three-tiered, 19-step process for planning and budgeting research activities; (2) the first tier identified and documented key issues for determining the EPA research programs for the next 5 years; (3) the second tier defined resources and outputs required for specific scientific issues; and (4) the third tier defined program office research needs for the next year. GAO also found that: (1) EPA designed its planning and budgeting process to incorporate EPA regulators' needs; (2) the process included extensive involvement from research and laboratory managers and from various program offices that will ultimately use the research; (3) EPA subjects planned, ongoing, and completed research to both internal and external review; and (4) the planning and research process and multiple review processes EPA used were not part of official EPA policy.

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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