Federal Reports

What We Looked AtAccelerating project delivery has been a longstanding priority for the Department of Transportation (DOT) and is a key part of the most recent reauthorization for surface transportation programs--the Fixing America's Surface Transportation (FAST) Act. The FAST Act includes a number of provisions intended to streamline the environmental review process for transportation projects. In particular, section 1313 of the act requires DOT to undertake several actions to align Federal environmental reviews such as developing a coordinated and concurrent environmental review and permitting process and a checklist to facilitate interagency collaboration. The FAST Act also directs the Office of Inspector General to report on DOT's progress in implementing section 1313 and its associated impact. Accordingly, we initiated an audit to (1) determine DOT's progress in aligning Federal environmental reviews and (2) assess the impact of DOT's actions on accelerating the environmental review and permitting process.What We FoundDOT has completed all the actions required by section 1313 and has met or exceeded the associated deadlines. However, the impact of those actions is limited because the legislation applies to only a small subset of transportation projects. Specifically, section 1313 generally applies only to transportation projects when there is a major action that significantly affects the quality of the human environment, which requires agencies to initiate an environmental impact statement under the National Environmental Policy Act. Additionally, a statutory provision excludes highway, railroad, transit, and multimodal projects, which are subject to other requirements for streamlining environmental reviews. As a result, section 1313 only covers certain aviation and maritime projects. We identified two current aviation projects and no maritime projects that are subject to this section, and the actions mandated by section 1313 do not impose any additional requirements on the covered projects. Nonetheless, the Department has several other initiatives--based on the FAST Act, prior legislation, and executive action--to streamline environmental reviews for transportation projects.Our RecommendationsWe did not make any recommendations in this report as the data gathered are informational and meant to be responsive to the statutory mandate.

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This report presents the results of our unannounced inspection August 16, 2018, of passenger ferry safety aboard ferry service to Bulls Island in the Cape Romain National Wildlife Refuge, Awendaw, SC. The objective of our inspection was to determine whether Coastal Expeditions, Inc., a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) concessionaire, operated its ferry service to Bulls Island in compliance with Federal safety requirements.Specifically, each of its two vessels had a U.S. Coast Guard Certificate of Inspection on board, carried enough life vests for all passengers, had fire extinguishers available that had been inspected regularly, and carried first aid kits. In addition, crew members possessed current operating licenses and CPR certifications, and passed random drug tests. While we inspected both ferries, the concessionaire’s largest ferry was the only one in use during the period of our inspection and we found that it did not carry more passengers than allowed.

This report presents the results of our unannounced inspection on August 14, 2018, of passenger ferry safety at Fort Sumter National Monument, Charleston, SC. The objective of our inspection was to determine whether Fort Sumter Tours, Inc., a National Park Service (NPS) concessionaire, operated its ferry service to Fort Sumter in compliance with Federal safety requirements.Fort Sumter Tours met all the safety requirements that we tested on three of its four vessels (the fourth was out of service). Each had a U.S. Coast Guard Certificate of Inspection on board, and none of the ferries carried more passengers than allowed. Furthermore, the ferries carried enough life vests for all passengers, had fire extinguishers available that had been inspected regularly, and carried first aid kits on board. In addition, sufficient crew members possessed current operating licenses and CPR certifications and passed random drug tests.

The objective of this report was to assess the maturity of the U.S. Postal Service Ethics Program in three areas: (1) agency goals and metrics, (2) accountability and consistency, and (3) cause and prevention. We discuss these areas using a maturity model framework to demonstrate the value of approaching an organization’s ethical efforts in a comprehensive, integrated manner that actively contributes to the organization’s mission.

Although Northwestern claimed allowable expenditures on subawards it awarded and received, it did not always perform required subaward risk assessments. For 24 of the 30 grants to subrecipients, Northwestern did not perform a risk assessment on 1 or more of the subrecipients. The 30 grants had subawards to 61 subrecipients, 48 of which should have had a risk assessment, but did not. The remaining 13 subrecipients either had a risk assessment or were not required to have a risk assessment. As a result, Federal funds of approximately $9.7 million were awarded to subrecipients without performing the required risk assessment.