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Opinions for June 22, 2000: Transition Budget - Opportunity to
test biennial budgeting?
 | For FY 2002 budget preparation, OMB on June 2, 2000, issued instructions
revising the traditional process. President Clinton will not submit a standard
budget request; his successor will. OMB will not go through its traditional budget
review and preparation process this fall. The process is outlined in an OMB
Director's memo of June 2, 2000, on "Requirements for Development of the FY 2002
Transition Budget." (Click for the OMB Director's
memo at the OMB web site.)
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| These changes will be reflected in the new Circular A-11, with
instructions for the "transition budget" for FY 2002. Foregoing some of
the processes involved in preparing the annual budget may provide insights as to
how a biennial budget process may work at the Federal level. (Click for a summary of changes in A-11.)
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| There is a puzzle and an opportunity in this process change. Doing away with a
last opportunity for the current Administration to set forth its message on policy through
a budget submission seems to be wasting a political opportunity, especially in this
environment of continuous bickering and disagreement. There is no reason why the
current President could not submit his budget, leaving a headache for his successor if of
the opposition party, and setting the stage for his successor if of the same party - this
is especially so when the same party potential successor is the current Vice
President. This is the puzzle. |
| Regardless of what the motivations and rationale may be, this change is also an
opportunity for a rehearsal for biennial budgeting. Budget professionals can use
this as a way to test out what could happen without an annual opportunity to reflect
policy and programmatic changes through the budget process. |
| One of the reasons for biennial budgeting is that there will be more time for oversight
and overview of operations. The way this time becomes available is by foregoing an
annual opportunity to set policy or change policy through the budget submission and its
processing by the political system - a year is skipped. Skipping a year in the
setting of major policy directions is exactly what will happen with the
"transition" budget and its development this summer and fall. |
| This "skipping" will only affect the Executive Branch budget process since
eventually Congress will get a budget on time, based on an annual budgeting process.
But all should observe what happens during a period in which only current services
are addressed and no policy initiatives are included in the process. There is no
need to develop, justify, and review policy initiatives yet the staff and time available
in the budget shops, including OMB, is the same as would be available to process policy
initiatives. There is some slack time and resources available to concentrate on
other things. Presumably a similar situation would occur under a biennial budgeting
system. Much could be assessed, including:
 | Is there an improvement in the process for developing or updating strategic plans?
Do the strategic plans better communicate an agency's purpose? |
| Is there an improvement in the annual performance plans? Do the measures improve?
Do the measures and their expression provide a better linkage to the strategic
plan? Do they better communicate what the agency is accomplishing with budgeted
resources? |
| Are the various specialized analyses required by OMB, such as for information
technology, improved? |
| Do the resulting budget justifications sent to Congress in February 2001 better explain
what the agency is doing with the bulk of its resources, i.e., the current services, which
are generally not affected by policy initiatives? |
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| I am sure that there are many other aspects of budgeting that are independent of policy
initiatives in the budget process that could benefit from more work and attention.
It will be interesting to see if there is any change given this windfall in time for those
who work the budget process. If there is no improvement resulting from the
additional focus on more mundane budget work associated with the transition budget,
questions should be raised as to some of the benefits of biennial budgeting. |
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