Inspector General

Department/Agency: Cross-Cutting Management Positions

Position:

Inspector General

Sixty-Four Positions in Cabinet Departments and Agencies
-- 30 Nominated by the President and Confirmed by Senate
-- 34 Appointed by Agency head

Executive Schedule: Executive Level III - Presidential Appointment with Senate Confirmation

Major Responsibilities:

Audit and investigate programs and activities
Prevent and detect fraud, waste, and abuse
Review legislative proposals and regulations
Independently report findings to Congress

Key Competencies and Preferred Qualifications:

Financial, legal and business skills
Investigative experience in the public or private sector
Knowledge of government auditing standards and accounting
Understanding the federal budget, appropriations, and legislative process
Familiarity with federal acquisition procedures
Law enforcement experience
Ability to build relationships across organizational and functional boundaries

Insight:

Inspectors have policed the operations of armies and bureaucracies since ancient times. Auditors were embedded within U.S. government offices from the beginning, but these waste-watchers gained new power and prominence with passage of The Inspector General Act of 1978. That law put a single Inspector General (IG) in charge of all audits and investigations inside a dozen Cabinet departments and expanded their duties. It also ensured independence by mandating that IGs report their findings twice annually to Congress, which had pushed for this change. President Jimmy Carter promised to put the new authority “to a good and vigorous use.”

Today, 64 statutory IGs provide audit and investigative oversight across the Federal government, expending over $2 billion and supported by more than 12,000 staff. They ferret out fraud but also recommend ways to run government programs more efficiently. In 2007 alone, the IGs reported that their investigations recovered $5.1 billion for the taxpayers and resulted in nearly 9,000 successful prosecutions and 6,800 indictments. If all the IG audit recommendations were implanted, taxpayers could save an additional $11 billion, they maintained. Some IG investigations are internal, targeting government employees; others are external, targeting contractors and recipients of federal grants, loans and subsidies. While the IGs devote a large portion of their resources to auditing (especially financial statements), evaluating the security of government information systems and protecting privacy is also an important part of their mission.

The Inspector General Reform Act of 2008 – enacted one month before the election – reaffirmed that IGs must be appointed based on competence and without regard to political affiliation. It established new pay levels, required the President to give Congress 30 days’ notice before trying to remove or transfer any IG, and created a new unified Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency. All IG offices now will get certain law enforcement powers. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 first authorized IG special agents in large offices to carry firearms, make arrests, and execute search warrants on their own.

Although the basic responsibilities are the same for all agencies, the IG role differs depending on the agency mission. The Department of Labor IG, for example, is unique in that it has an “external” role conducting criminal investigations to combat labor racketeering and organized crime in labor unions. In the Defense and Health and Human Services departments, the focus is on fraud by military contractors and health care providers. Impartiality is the key to IG effectiveness, and several unusual features protect it from politicization. They cannot be removed without notice to Congress. Each IG office has its own personnel authority and budget line separate from the rest of the agency. Perhaps most importantly, the IG is the only official in a department who may communicate directly with Congress without OMB clearing it first. That often comes as a surprise to new agency heads.

The IGs’ dual accountability to their agencies and to Congress can create tension. A former HHS IG said, “You’re walking a fine line. To satisfy Congress you need to make sure your work is respected on both sides of the aisle. To satisfy the agency you have to be accurate and thorough; it only takes one bad product to sour people.” Still, developing a good relationship with agency leaders is crucial, this former inspector general said. “If they don’t respect your office and what you’re producing, you may as well forget it, because you’re not going to get changes as a result of your work.” The IG community over time has embraced a less adversarial approach, encouraging more collaboration to prevent losses in the first place. As a current IG noted, no one takes easily to criticism of what they’re doing. It makes sense to “go about our work in as constructive and positive manner as possible, being as diplomatic as possible, and keeping in mind that at the end of the day our power is hortatory. It’s up to the department managers … to implement our recommendations.”

The recent amendments to the Inspector General Act will combine two existing IG councils into a new Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency, no later than April 2009. The OMB Deputy Director for Management will be executive chair. The new Council’s charge is to “address integrity, economy, and effectiveness issues that transcend Government agencies and increase the professionalism and effectiveness of (IG) personnel.” Additional information on the IG community is available through the IG website at www.ignet.gov.

By statute, these IGs are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate: AID, Agriculture, CIA, Commerce, Corporation for National and Community Service, Defense, Education, Energy, EPA, Export-Import Bank, FDIC, GSA, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Justice, Labor, NASA, NRC, OPM, Railroad Retirement Board, SBA, Social Security, State, TVA, Transportation, Treasury, Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, and Veterans Affairs.

These IGs are appointed by the agency head: Amtrak, Appalachian Regional Commission, CFTC, CPSC, CPB, Denali Commission, Election Assistance Commission, EEOC, Farm Credit Administration, FCC, Federal Election Commission, Federal Housing Finance Board, Federal Labor Relations Authority, Federal Maritime Commission, Federal Reserve Board, FTC, GPO, Legal Services Corporation, Library of Congress, National Archives, National Credit Union Administration, NEA, NEH, NLRB, NSF, Peace Corps, Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, Postal Regulatory Commission, SEC, Smithsonian, Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, U.S. Capitol Police, U.S. International Trade Commission, U.S. Postal Service.

Most IGs are paid on the Executive Level III scale. However, in some agencies IGs are paid on the same scale as the Agency’s other senior managers, including the chief financial and chief information officers.

Key Relationships – Within the Department or Agency:

Secretary and Deputy Secretary
Chief Financial Officer
Chief Information Officer
Chief Acquisition Officer
Chief Human Capital Officer
General Counsel or Solicitor
Assistant secretaries in charge of programs
Senior career staff in IG office
Congressional Relations and Public Affairs officers

Key Relationships – Within the Government:

OMB Deputy Director for Management
OMB Controller, Office of Federal Financial Management
Other agency IGs through the President’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency (PCIE) and the Executive Council on Integrity and Efficiency
The Federal Bureau of Investigation, Office of Special Counsel
Government Accountability Office
Staff of House and Senate authorizing, appropriations, oversight and reform committees

Key Relationships – Outside the Government:

Association of Government Accountants
American Institute of Public Accountants
Institute of Certified Fraud Examiners

Nomination Referred to:

Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs