JOBS FOR ELDERLY ADMINISTRATION COST Question: What are the administrative costs associated with the grants to national organizations as compared to States. Provide this information for the record for 1978-81, if available. Answer: This information is not readily available for the years 1978 - 1980. The chart below provides the percent of actual administrative cost provided from Federal funds during the last complete program year, which was from July 1, 1980 to June 30, 1981. By regulation, no more than 15 percent of the Federal funds may be used for administrative cost. All sponsors are subject to this requirement. JOBS FOR ELDERLY Question: If there is a large difference in the administrative costs associated with grants to national organizations as compared with grants to States, to what do you attribute it? Answer: On the whole, there is not a great difference between the level of administrative cost charges by States when compared to national sponsors. The average administrative cost for National sponsors is 11%; that of State sponsors 10.4%. CETA STATE COUNCILS Question: How effective have the CETA-funded State Employment and Training Councils been in fulfilling their planning, coordinating, reviewing and reporting responsibilities? Answer: The effectiveness of the CETA-funded State Employment and Training Councls (SETC's) has varied, according to the placement of the councils in the administrative hierarchy of the State, and to the authority granted to the Councils by the Governor. Those councils given clear responsibility for CETA as well as for other related programs, such as vocational education and the Employment Service, have been able to fulfill their planning and coordination functions relatively well at the State level for the balance-of-State's CETA program. Under the Administration bill, the State council role is no longer advisory in nature. Instead the State Job Training Council, subject to the Governor's approval, has major responsibilities, such as designating substate delivery areas and approving area plans and activities, planning resource allocations, reviewing and providing management guidance for all programs, and developing appropriate linkages with other programs. Coordination will be facilitated under the Administration bill by this strengthened State Council role, the elimination of the direct funding relationship between the Federal Government and local areas, and the transfer of WagnerPeyser State Council functions to the State Job Training Council. Question: GRANT AND CONTRACTING PROCEDURES What percentage of grants and contracts awarded by the Office of National Programs are sole source awards? Answer: In Fiscal Year 1982, sixty-nine percent of contract awards, or twenty-two contracts have been awarded by the Office of National Programs on a sole source basis. This compares with 100 percent in FY 1981. In addition, the percentage of sole source contracts will decrease as new contracts under the competitive OJT and TOP RFP's are let. These twenty-two procurements are Title III discretionary grants and contracts under Special National Programs and Activities (SNPA) and not those awarded by formula, such as those under the Native American, Migrant and Older Worker Programs. Question: Why aren't these awarded through a competitive process? Answer: These contracts were awarded on a sole source basis because the contractors are special purpose organizations, singular in nature, which have a direct relationship to a constituency. The utilization of each of these single purpose organizations will be reviewed in Fiscal Year 1983 for competitive advertising. Most of the FY '81 contracts were due to expire at the same time (November-December 1981). If we had not made the sole source awards, there would have been a lapse of services for at least 90 days because of the time needed to award contracts competitively through the RFP process. We are now placing greater reliance on competitive contracting and are limiting the issuance of sole source contracts to cases that are clearly in the public's best interest. Question: When grants and contracts are renewed each year to the same organization, is the organization's prior performance always assessed before the award is made? If not, why not? Answer: Yes. Under the new contracting procedures which have been instituted, each contract and/or contract extension is subject to review by: 1. Officials in the originating program office 2. Contract specialists in the Office of Contracting Services 4. The Inspector General's office for any prior audit problems, or any other indications of improprieties. The past performance of each of the sole source contractors was thoroughly assessed prior to their FY '82 contract award. The performance assessment was documented separately and reviewed along with the proposal package in the extensive review mentioned above by the various offices in the ETA structure. These assessments measure performance against agreed upon goals and responsiveness to reporting requirements and financial management. Question: What has been done to improve the grant and contract management practices used by the Office of National Programs (ONP), as recommended by the General Accounting Office? Answer: The Department has taken steps to achieve this objective by substantially strenthening the process through which the individual contractors and grantees are selected for funding. In line with recent recommendations made by the General Accounting Office, the Department is placing greater reliance on competitive contract and grant awards and is limiting the issuance of sole source contracts and grants to cases that are clearly in the public's best interest. The procedures to accomplish this overall objective are contained in Employment and Training Order 3-82 which was issued and became effective on December 23, 1981. This order establishes policy and procedures to be used by the Employment and Training Administration (ETA) for initiating, developing, processing, awarding and overseeing National Office Administered, Job Corps and Regional Office contracts, grants, cooperative agreements and other types of financial agreements. As a matter of policy under this Order, ETA shall: a. Make maximum practical use of competitive award procedures when issuing contracts and grants. b. C. d. e. Issue contracts and grants to organizations which have established and documented fiscal integrity and are capable. Issue Letter Contracts or authorize retroactive contracts and grants only under stringent conditions. Clearly specify the work to be performed by contractors Rigorously monitor and assess the performance of contractors Question: Have grant and contract management responsibilities been separated from program responsibilities, as suggested by the General Accounting Office? Answer: Yes. The contracting function in ETA now reports to the Finance Administrator rather than the program office. We have gone one step further in that ET Order 3-82 requires a further review of all procurement activity by an office (Office of Policy, Evaluation and Research) other than the office primarily responsible for the program activity being initiated. ROLE OF NATIONAL ALLIANCE OF BUSINESS Question: According to GAO, 29 organizations were funded last year to either study or provide technical assistance and training for the Private Sector Initiative Program. Funding totalled about $20 million of which the National Alliance of Business received $13.7 million. In view of the large amount of Federal funds provided the National Alliance of Business and various other organizations, for activities involving Private Sector Initiatives, what specific results have been realized from their efforts? Answer: A number of contracts entered into last year were for the purpose of developing technical assistance guides and conducting special research and studies in the Private Sector Initiative Program. These guides and studies are to be used by the Department of Labor and the private and public sectors to specifically address special needs identified for the Private Sector Initiative Program. We are hopeful that the Technical Assistance guides and the studies carried out under these contracts will help us to identify means of developing better employment linkages with and within the private sector. Some of the results obtained from these contracts were: in and took advantage of targeted job tax credit. Evaluation of the private sector initiative program in selected sites and various promotional materials for the private sector initiative program. In addition to the above, these contracts also addressed such areas as Small Business Internship, greater involvement of minority businesses, special technical assistance needs of the balance of State prime sponsors and the types of activities being undertaken. We feel that with this kind of special assistance, prime sponsors and the private sector will be able to address collectively the problems realistically in facilitating the employment of disadvantaged persons. With regard to the National Alliance for Business, the total cost for the NAB contract for the period November 1, 1980, through October 31, 1981, (NAB's contract year) was reduced by contract modification to $10,807,000. (NAB's funding has been further reduced to $6.7 million in FY '82) The major accomplishments achieved during this period can best be described in each of the following areas: a. b. Maximized hiring of the disadvantaged in the private NAB promoted special activities designed to encourage Increased job openings and opportunities, particularly existing CETA economic development linkages and employment generating services and examined the critical assistance needs of selected PIC and prime sponsor sites in formulating similar partnerships. Assisted special disadvantaged groups, especially youth and ex-offenders to obtain meaningful employment opportunities In 1981, NAB operated a summer youth program in 25 project sites, a College Cluster program in 50 pre- Developed new institutions, staff and information systems Operated information exchange system NAB operated a Private Sector Initiative Program (PSIP) Clearinghouse Question: How much is budgeted for Fiscal Year 1983 for studies and technical assistance related to the Private Sector Initiative Program? Answer: We have not yet developed firm plans for funding program support activities for FY 1983. JOBS FOR THE ELDERLY Question: You are proposing to eliminate the Community Service Employment Program for Older Americans, which provides 54,200 jobs for persons aged 55 and over. How many of these individuals do you realistically expect will find other jobs, or be placed in other Federal programs? Answer: We expect that a substantial number of SCSEP participants will be placed in jobs or in training for the following reasons: increased emphasis on placement by current sponsors - utilization of 10% of block grant funds which provide governors with the flexibility to serve groups with special labor market disadvantages including older workers emphasis on training and not income maintenance will expected improvement in the economy will provide more |