Final Bush-era cards show more green

The President’s Management Agenda latest score card — the last one of the Bush administration — showed more instances of success, as agencies have steadily achieved results in several performance categories. The Office of Management and Budget released the PMA score card that covers the first quarter of fiscal 2009, which spanned October 2008 through December 2008.

The State Department joined the Environmental Protection Agency, Social Security Administration and Labor Department as the only agencies to achieve the green success rating in all five management categories, according to the score card’s findings.

OMB uses the PMA score card to illustrate agencies’ quarterly progress in fulfilling measures for results in financial performance, human capital, e-government, performance improvement and commercial services management, using a rating system based on traffic-signal colors.

Several agencies demonstrated progress in the way they handled finances or delivered e-government services, with the Interior and State departments rising to green in both categories, the score card showed.

The score card is becoming a blanket of green because agencies have made significant improvement in the way their agencies function in the last seven years, said Clay Johnson, OMB’s deputy director for management.

“Seven years ago, all federal management practices were unacceptable, or 98 percent of them were red,” he said. “Today, 55 percent of management practices across the government are acceptable.”

The score card rating improvements indicate that federal employees are making their agencies work better, he said.

“We are doing things now in the federal government — managing improper payments, managing our IT investments, managing our costs, managing programs — that eight to 10 years ago were thought to be impossible,” Johnson said.