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Transparency Act

Highlights and Timeframes for Implementation of the Act

June 10th, 2008

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Background

President signed the Federal Financial Accountability and Transparency Act (Transparency Act) on September 26, 2006.

The law mandated the creation of a searchable website for the public to search funding by data elements. Public must be able to: Ascertain amount of Federal funding awarded to

an entity Download results of search

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Timeline January 1, 2008: Single searchable website for

awards January 1, 2009: Include subcontractor and

subgrantee award Waiver for entities that prove they have

annual gross revenues from previous tax year <$300,000

January 1, 2010: Comptroller General Report to Congress on compliance

Annually: Report to Congress on implementation progress

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Awards Website Overview Managed by a special Task Force USAspending.gov went live December 13, 2007 Components:

Name of Entity Receiving Award Award Amount Transaction type Funding agency North American Industry Classification Code of Catalog of

Federal Domestic Assistance number Program source Descriptive award title Entity physical address Unique identifier of entity and parent entity Other relevant information

Other guidelines: Data must be available within 30 days of award

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Current Data Submission 26 Agencies have

submitted data Data Quality metrics:

Timeliness of data provided by each agency

Data Completeness Available soon:

Accuracy of Agency Data

Timeliness of data provided by agencies

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Current Status Grants data is submitted in FAADS Plus Format FY07 data was submitted by November 30, 2007 Website data was updated April 29, 2008 Grants Subaward requirements were published in the

Federal Register on June 6, 2008 for public comment Subaward pilot occurring June 23rd- August 23rd

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Next Steps Taking action to improve the quality of the data on

USAspending.gov: Making immediate changes to the website to clearly

communicate data quality issues, including more transparent reporting of agency progress and better explanation of procedures.

Developing an agency data submission portal, where agencies can track the status of their submissions and enter key metadata that will be used for quality assurance (i.e. batch totals).

Developing quality assurance procedures for agencies submitting data to USAspending.gov.

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USAspending.gov

US Citizen

FFATA Warehouse

Agency Data

Web / App Server

Agency DB

Agency DB

Agency DB

FPDSGSA (FAADS+, Procurement +)

FAADSContracts

Grants

Phase 1

Transparency Act Data Flow

11US Citizen

FFATA Warehouse

Agency Data

Web / App Server

Agency DB

Agency DB

Agency DB

FPDS

FAADSContractsGrants

USAspending.gov

GSA (FAADS+)

Grants

Phase 2

Transparency Act Data Flow

12US Citizen

FFATA Warehouse

Agency Data

Web / App Server

Agency DB

Agency DB

Agency DB

Agency DB

Agency DB

Agency DB

Batch / Synch Scripts

FPDS

XML Schema

Web Services

Federal Spending Community of

Interest Environment

USA.Gov

Metadata Registry

US Citizen

Grants Loans

Federated SearchAggregator

Federated Search provides services to find and aggregate information across federal data sources.

The registry will store the FFATA defined vocabulary (XML) so data producers and consumers can search and reuse the schemas.

SOA

Foun

datio

n

The Service Discovery Service allows users to find enterprise services registered and categorized in an enterprise registry.

Service Discovery

Fed Search Web Service is implemented at the data sources exposing data in a community defined vocabulary (XML schemas)

FeSRS

Cont

ract

s

Sub-ContractsFPDS-NG

MAX Code

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATA XML Schema

SOA Foundation (provided by DISA)

Content Discovery

Community agreed data stored as an XML schema and exposed via a Federated Search Web Service

FFATAXML

USA.gov portal entry point run by GSA

FFATAPortlet

FFATAPortlet FedSpenging.

Org Portal

Optional

Federal Spending Community of

Interest Environment

USA.Gov

Metadata Registry

US Citizen

Grants Loans

Federated SearchAggregator

Federated Search provides services to find and aggregate information across federal data sources.

The registry will store the FFATA defined vocabulary (XML) so data producers and consumers can search and reuse the schemas.

SOA

Foun

datio

n

The Service Discovery Service allows users to find enterprise services registered and categorized in an enterprise registry.

Service Discovery

Fed Search Web Service is implemented at the data sources exposing data in a community defined vocabulary (XML schemas)

FeSRS

Cont

ract

s

Sub-ContractsFPDS-NG

MAX Code

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATAXML

FFATA XML Schema

SOA Foundation (provided by DISA)

Content Discovery

Community agreed data stored as an XML schema and exposed via a Federated Search Web Service

FFATAXML

USA.gov portal entry point run by GSA

FFATAPortlet

FFATAPortletFFATAPortlet FedSpenging.

Org Portal

Optional

Federated Search Aggregator

Transparency Act Data Flow

FAADS

USAspending.gov

Phase 3

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Action Checklist for Recipients of Federal Funds

Ensure that you are making all preparations necessary for reporting accurate information pertaining to your organization’s subawards.

Be prepared to meet timely reporting requirements for each obligation of funds under a subaward: Federal agencies will expect requisite data Will be a condition of your award

Be prepared for heightened public scrutiny of your Federal government grants, cooperative agreements, other types of Federal financial assistance and contracts.

Get involved! Participate in a subaward pilot, view the Transparency Act webcast on demand, or at the very least submit a comment today on http://www.USAspending.gov.

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Learn More About the Task Force Visit the USASpending.gov Community Requirements

Wiki: Located under “Provide Feedback” at www.USAspending.gov

Recent webcasts with the Task Force and joint Transparency Act-Grants Policy Committee: http://grants.gov/aboutgrants/grants_news.jsp Webcast Feedback: GPCWebcast@nsf.gov