For immediate release: Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Contact: Oversight and Government Reform Committee Press Office, (202) 225-5051

Chairman Towns Applauds House Passage of the Federal Financial Assistance Management Improvement Act of 2009

WASHINGTON – This week, the U.S. House of Representatives passed S.303, the Federal Financial Assistance Management Improvement Act of 2009.  S. 303 was introduced in the Senate on January 22, 2009 by Senators George Voinovich (R-OH), Joe Lieberman (I-CT), and Thomas Carper (D-DE).  The legislation reauthorizes and improves the Federal Financial Assistance Management Improvement Act of 1999, specifically the website Grants.gov.  On March 18, 2009, S. 303 was referred to the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

During the committee’s business meeting on December 10, 2009, Chairman Towns and Ranking Member Darrell Issa (R-CA) offered a manager’s amendment to incorporate provisions of H.R. 2392, the Government Information Transparency Act.

“I am proud to support this important legislation that will continue to provide grant applicants a central location to search and apply for federal grants,” said Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Edolphus “Ed” Towns (D-NY).

The amendment offered by the Chairman and Ranking Member was adopted unanimously by the committee and directs the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to adopt a single data standard for the collection, analysis and dissemination of business and financial information.  In doing so, S.303 will not only help streamline reporting and standardize data so that it is fully interoperable, it will also improve the accessibility and usefulness of federal business and financial information by making it available to the public in a machine-readable format.

“This is another important step toward improving the openness and transparency of our federal government.  I was pleased to work with the Ranking Member, Mr. Issa, on this legislation and look forward to it becoming law,” said Chairman Towns.

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