The Senate committee has also passed a bill reauthorizing the e-Gov Act and a pilot program to dispose of unused federal buildings.
The e-gov bill, S-2321, would reauthorize for five years provisions that are set to expire in the act passed in 2002.
The measure would require OMB to continue working with federal agencies to make sure their information and services can be found by search engines, as well as improve privacy protections by requiring the development of best practices for privacy impact assessments, also mandated in the original act.
The other measure, S-1667, would set up a pilot program for the expedited disposal of federal real property, something the committee said would allow agencies to recoup administrative costs associated with the sale of excess federal property, as well as a portion of the proceeds of the sale.
OMB issued a report in July identifying real property assets that are unneeded and could be disposed of to reduce operating costs and more effectively manage federal assets.
The report identified 21,802 federal real property assets worth $17.7 billion as either excess — property under agency control but not required as determined by the agency head, or surplus — property declared excess by a particular agency and determined by GSA to be no longer required by the government.
As of April 1, 2007, there were 509 properties for sale government-wide, of which OMB determined 76 domestic and 54 overseas properties to be most eligible, representing about $362 million.
