The Honorable Ted PoeUnited States House of Representatives430 Cannon House Office BuildingWashington, DC 20515
Dear Representative Poe:
On behalf of the 362,000 members ofthe National Taxpayers Union (NTU), I write in support of your bill, H.R. 3159,the “Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act of 2012.” Your legislationwould bring accountability and transparency to the foreign aid process byrequiring federal agencies to establish performance-evaluation guidelines forassistance programs and creating a user-friendly website to track how taxpayermoney is being spent.
Increasingly complex globalchallenges, in combination with a proliferation of foreign aid programs haveled to muddled objectives and poor results for America’s foreign assistancefunding. According to an independent study commissioned by the U.S. Agency forInternational Development (USAID), “Current monitoring and evaluation of mostU.S. foreign assistance is uneven across agencies, focuses on outputs ratherthan outcomes and impact, lacks sufficient rigor, and does not produce thenecessary analysis to inform strategic decision making.”
In an era of historically highdeficits, it has never been more critical for Washington to ensure thatAmericans’ tax dollars are being spent wisely and only in furtherance of ourforeign policy and security objectives. The Obama Administration has takenmodest steps to introduce some level of accountability to these programsthrough the creation of a Foreign Assistance Dashboard and USAID’s formulationof a Monitoring and Evaluation policy. However, these approaches are limited inthe number of aid-providing agencies they cover and the metrics they are meantto assess.
The Foreign Aid Transparency andAccountability Act would build upon this foundation by examining all of ourforeign assistance investments and then creating an Internet-based hub topublicly display the information. This would be accomplished by creating measurablegoals and a feedback loop to encourage continuous improvements. H.R. 3159 wouldalso expand the Foreign Assistance Dashboard initiative to ensure allgovernment agencies involved in foreign aid provide searchable information suchas expenditures, congressional budget justifications, country assistancestrategies, and program evaluations. This would not only add much-neededtransparency for U.S. taxpayers, but would also provide foreign stakeholderswith a powerful tool to fight corruption in their own countries.
In the current partisan climate, H.R. 3159 promises toeliminate wasteful spending and increase the effectiveness of our foreign aidprograms – goals that should unite all lawmakers. NTU applauds the introductionof the Foreign Aid Transparency and Accountability Act and encourages allMembers to work toward its passage.
Sincerely,
Brandon GreifeFederalGovernment Affairs Manager
108 North Alfred Street Ø Alexandria,Virginia 22314 Ø Phone: (703)683-5700 Ø Fax: (703)683-5722 Ø Web:www.ntu.org