Process has been made in the past year with interagency reform initiatives aimed at streamlining the grants process, but federal grantees continue to identify complications and inefficiencies with an often-burdensome process, the Government Accountability Office has said.
It said that despite progress with the Federal Financial Assistance Management Improvement Act of 1999, grantees continue to identify areas where the goals of the legislation have not been met, including a lack of standardization and continued inefficiencies in grant administration across agencies and technological difficulties with implementing Grants.gov, the website where grantees can find and apply for grants.
Grantees say they continue to need to use different applications, reporting, and payment systems, that definitions differ across agencies, that agency grant processes often do not align with typical grantee business practices, and they have reported problems with the search engine function and complex registration practices at Grants.gov, according to GAO-06-566.
It said the Grants.gov program management office has taken actions to address some of these problems and has plans for further improvements.
However, grantees have also complained that progress with three federal cross-agency initiatives meant to streamline grants administration — Grants.gov, the Grants Management Line of Business, and the cross-agency workgroups, has been inadequate, GAO said.
It said grantees also complained about inadequate ongoing communication before decisions on process changes were made, saying that may have resulted in poor implementation and prioritization of initiatives.
