"Greater Transparency" Versus "Reduce Administrative Burden"

Government understandably wants to data-mine progress reports. The loss of Fastlane reporting, with its PDF structure, in exchange for plain text/fillable fields in Research.gov, is an example of this.

However, the reporting format in Research.gov is ridiculously time-consuming. It has generated an extreme, labor-intensive, administrative burden. Not one Principle Investigator I know wants anything to do with Research.gov, and every Principle Investigator I know laments the loss of PDFs submitted via Fastlane.

We need the federal government to acknowledge this particular source from which administrative burden originates: Reporting systems with fillable fields, plain text, or upload links, or image attachments, or drop-down menus, ARE an administrative burden.

What does this say? I suggest we acknowledge that there is an inherent, systemic contradiction between these two goals:

- Reduce administrative burden

- Greater transparency and analyses of project details

No new or revised fillable-field, web-based reports or reporting system, whose function, in part, will be to collect data, will reduce the administrative burden on the researchers. Instead of trying to invent more of the same, I suggest what will likely sound like an impossibility:

- Allow PDFs, similar to how Fastlane works/worked. This reduces the administrative burden on the investigators.

- Format the PDFs with specific headers, and/or codes.

- Then tackle the "Grand Challenge" - We need a software program that can mine the PDFs.

If this technology doesn't exist, it needs to be discovered. Otherwise the generation of new systems of reporting, alongside the requirement for greater levels of transparency and detail, will result in a greater administrative burden.

Don't say, "Oh, she doesn't understand how these systems work; she doesn't understand the constraints of software programs." Instead say, "This might be beyond our current comprehension, but inventing the seemingly impossible is critically necessary at this juncture."

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Contractors and Grantees
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Reporting compliance requirements shared by prime and subawardees of Federal procurements and grants
Key Participants: contractors, grantees, cooperative agreement holders, and subawardees
- Question: If you could change one thing that would ease your reporting burden associated with your awards, what would it be (e.g. time, cost, resource, other)?
- Question: If you have reporting requirements to the Federal government, how are those met?
- Question: If you could create a central reporting portal into which you could submit all required reports, what capabilities or functions would you include?
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Contractors
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Procurement practices, processes, and reporting
Key Participants: Contractors and subcontractors
- Question: If you could change one thing that would ease your reporting burden associated with your awards, what would it be (e.g. time, cost, resource, other)?
- Question: If you have reporting requirements to the Federal government, how are those met?
- Question: If you could create a central reporting portal into which you could submit all required reports, what capabilities or functions would you include?
- Question: Are there any reporting areas in the FAR that are similar in nature to those in Federal agency supplements?
- Question: What other compliance information are you providing to the Federal government outside of the procurement process that could be used in procurement reporting and reduce duplication?
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Grantees
*To participate in the dialogue, you can submit a new idea by clicking "Submit New Idea" to the right, or you can vote and comment on existing ideas below.

Grants practices and processes
Key Participants: grantees, cooperative agreement holders, subgrantees
- Question: If you could change one thing that would ease your reporting burden associated with your grants or subgrants, what would it be (e.g., time, cost, resource burden)?
- Question: If you have reporting requirements to the Federal government, how are those met? (feel free to be specific about what is reported to whom and through what mechanism)
- Question: If you could create a central reporting portal into which you could submit all required reports, what capabilities/functions would you include?
OMB circular A-133:
- Question: If you could make a change to ease your reporting burden for audits under the Single Audit Act (i.e., audits required by OMB Circular A-133 which is being replaced by the Uniform Guidance 2 CFR 200 Subpart F), what one thing would you change about reporting by the auditee?
- Question: If you could make a change to ease your reporting burden for audits under the Single Audit Act (i.e., audits required by OMB Circular A-133 which is being replaced by the Uniform Guidance 2 CFR 200 Subpart F), what one thing would you change about reporting by the auditor?
- Question: If you could make a change to ease your reporting burden for audits under the Single Audit Act (i.e., audits required by OMB Circular A-133 which is being replaced by the Uniform Guidance 2 CFR 200 Subpart F), what one thing would you change about reporting to the Federal Audit Clearinghouse?
Uniform Guidance (2 CFR 200):
- Question: Are there requirements in the new 2 CFR 200 that need additional clarification for improved implementation with reduced administrative burden ?
- Question: What are the perceived burdens associated with the new standards such as the documentation of salaries & wages and time & effort (2 CFR 200.430), subrecipient monitoring (2 CFR 200.331), procurement standards (2 CFR 200.317- 2 CFR 200.324)?
- Question: How can the administrative burden associated with standards compliance be lowered?
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