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OPA News Release: [03/29/2006]
Contact Name: Peggy Abrahamson or Public Affairs
Phone Number: (202) 693-7909 or (202) 693-4676
Release Number: 06-0564-NAT

Department of Labor's New Public Window on Performance

ExpectMore.gov Allows Citizens to See Program Results

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) is now participating in ExpectMore.gov, a government-wide effort to encourage greater accountability for results and for how taxpayers' money is spent. Launched with the release of the President's 2007 budget, www.ExpectMore.gov is a new Web site that provides candid assessments of federal programs in jargon-free language.

"The President's Management Agenda compelled federal agencies to take a clear and honest look at how we function administratively. The Department of Labor once again stepped up by being the first to earn the highest ranking in all five government-wide categories of the President's Management Agenda," said Secretary of Labor Elaine L. Chao. "ExpectMore.gov provides greater transparency of the department's performance in effective administration of taxpayer-funded programs."

ExpectMore.gov allows the general public to review the performance of 28 DOL programs and almost 800 other federal programs accounting for 80 percent of the federal budget. The remaining 20 percent will be included within a year. For every program assessed, visitors can find a rating of performance, strengths and weaknesses and the program's improvement plan. ExpectMore.gov also links to detailed program assessments and the program's own site.

For example, if you are a regular user of labor data and want to know how well DOL's Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is performing, ExpectMore.gov provides a single Web page summary of BLS's performance. This summary also details BLS's purpose and the actions it is taking to improve its performance. ExpectMore.gov tells you candidly those DOL programs that are demonstrating results and those that are not and lists the actions DOL is taking to improve performance in all its programs.

"ExpectMore.gov honestly shows how government programs perform and whether taxpayers are getting their money's worth," said U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Deputy Director for Management Clay Johnson. "It is our hope that Congress and the American people will use the information on this site to hold us accountable and begin to 'expect more' from the programs that serve them."

To produce the DOL assessments on ExpectMore.gov, OMB and DOL employees assessed the programs using a standardized, objective approach called the Program Assessment Rating Tool, or PART. The PART consists of 25 questions about a program's performance (whether it sets ambitious goals and achieves them), design and management. Once the assessments were completed, programs developed improvement plans to address PART findings.