President Obama has signed into law S-1115, the Grants Oversight and New Efficiency Act, a bipartisan measure that will require agencies to close out expired grant accounts with zero dollar balances.
The GONE Act requires OMB to direct agencies to coordinate with HHS—which led a previous effort that closed out thousands of expired grants–to report to Congress on their expired grants. Agencies will then have one year to confirm that they have closed them out. Tardy grant closeouts delay a determination as to whether the money was spent properly, sponsors say.
Also, the IG of an agency receiving over $500 million in annual grant funding is now required to conduct a risk assessment to determine if an audit or review of the agency’s grant closeout process is necessary.
In 2012, GAO found that users of the Payment Management System were charged a total of roughly $173,000 per month to maintain the more than 28,000 expired grant accounts with zero dollar balances listed on the year-end closeout report.
