Agencies have problems collecting Recovery.gov data – Reporting on Stimulus Money Spent

Many government agencies need some IT upgrades to report back where the money is spent and grants released, HHS might be able to help here since it is already a shared provider of information. This somewhat speaks out again for the need for standards as some of the back end data bases will need upgrades, revisions, etc. to be able to communicate. We all want to know where the money goes, so upgrades it appears are on the way for some old and even perhaps new systems so our government reporting can work and generate the desired information on where the money from the stimulus bill goes. BD

Agencies must implement new computer systems or modify existing ones to collect and transmit the data required to show where and how they have spent the money authorized by the economic stimulus law, federal information technology officials have said.

Agencies must post information that accounts for how they have used the funds on federal programs or distributed as grants to states and local governments on the White House’s Recovery.gov Web site. Agencies have also established their own Recovery.gov sites.

To collect the financial, performance and control data that is required for posting on Recovery.gov, agencies must re-engineer their back-end systems, said Michael Carleton, CIO at the Health and Human Services Department.

“At present, we’re not organized that way because we didn’t have such a system,” he said.

However, HHS may be able to assist some other agencies with gathering data related to grants that agencies distribute to states. HHS is a shared services provider for a number of agencies for OMB's Grants Management Line of Business consolidation effort.

Agencies have problems collecting Recovery.gov data -- Federal Computer Week