Since the beginning of the Obama Administration, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has made an unprecedented commitment to efficiency and fiscal discipline in order to best support our frontline operations.
In March 2009, Secretary Napolitano launched the Department-wide Efficiency Review to foster a culture of responsibility and fiscal discipline and make the Department a leaner, smarter agency better equipped to protect the nation.
To date, DHS has identified over $1 billion in cost avoidances and cuts as a result of these efforts. Additionally, the Department’s fiscal year 2012 budget request included more than $800 million in reductions associated with administrative savings and Efficiency Review initiatives currently underway, from efforts to reform acquisition, asset and real property management processes to administrative savings in professional services contracts, printing, supplies and materials, travel, and training.
And just last week, we began implementing an initiative from the 2010 President’s SAVE Award, submitted by Paul Behe, a DHS employee from Customs and Border Protection. This initiative changes current DHS practices by posting notices of seized property online instead of in print newspapers – avoiding approximately $1 million annually in advertising costs.
The Administration-wide Campaign to Cut Waste, announced yesterday by President Obama and Vice President Biden, brings this same spirit of efficiency and fiscal responsibility across the entire federal government.
The Campaign to Cut Waste will establish a new Government Accountability and Transparency Board that will bring together the nation’s top waste, fraud and abuse watchdogs to ensure we bring the kind of unprecedented transparency and accountability we saw in the Recovery Act to all federal spending, and will require Cabinet agencies like DHS to report regularly on their progress in cutting waste and improving effectiveness.
In the current economic environment, all agencies must continue to maximize the effectiveness of every taxpayer dollar we receive. DHS will work closely with our partners across the Federal government on the Campaign to Cut Waste, continuing our unprecedented work to increase the accountability, efficiency, and effectiveness of our services and programs.
For more information on DHS’s efforts to cut waste through the efficiency review, please visit the efficiency review page on DHS.gov
Published by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Washington, D.C.