USDA Reorganization Progress 'Mixed’

April 5, 2000

The General Accounting Office says USDA’s five-year-old project to reorganize and modernize its agencies has produced some progress, but little has changed in how three agencies serve their customers. Many projects have encountered delays, GAO adds

GAO cited as an example that USDA closed more than 1,000 of its 3,726 county office locations and established collocated service centers throughout the country. It also deployed personal computers and a modern telecommunications network to most of its service centers.

"However, despite the agencies’ collocation, little has changed in how the three agencies (Farm Service Agency, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and Rural Development) serve their customers, and many modernization and re-engineering projects have encountered delays," said GAO.

USDA attributed the delays to program demands and funding constraints that have limited the agencies’ ability to direct resources to the modernization effort; limited cooperation among the agencies, and some employees’ resistance to change. Also, Congress stopped USDA from implementing the administrative "convergence initiative." But USDA ":remains committed to obtaining approval for merging the agencies’ administrative organizations," GAO noted.

GAO identified two issues that have impeded the department’s progress: the lack of a comprehensive plan to guide the modernization effort and the lack of a management structure with the accountability and authority to resolve differences among the agencies.

"USDA is working toward addressing these issues," the report said. In November, USDA issued its final service center modernization plan that lays out the department’s goals for the service centers and the phases for implementation and also describes its management strategy and processes.

A third issue – the need for a change in the existing organization culture – "is crucial to completing the reorganization and modernization effort," said GAO. "While USDA has recognized the importance of this issue by making it the focus of one of the five initiatives, it has not succeeded in overcoming resistance from the affected agencies and employees. Without this support, progress on each of the initiatives is at risk."