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Assault Prevention and Response Programs Need to Be Further 
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Testimony: 

Before the Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs, 
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, House of Representatives: 

United States Government Accountability Office: 
GAO: 

For Release on Delivery: 
Expected at 2:00 p.m. EST:
Thursday, February 24, 2010: 

Military Personnel: 

DOD's and the Coast Guard's Sexual Assault Prevention and Response 
Programs Need to Be Further Strengthened: 

Statement of Brenda S. Farrell, Director: 
Defense Capabilities and Management: 

and: 

Randolph C. Hite, Director: 
Information Technology Architecture and Systems: 

GAO-10-405T: 

[End of section] 

Chairman Tierney and Members of the Subcommittee: 

Thank you for the opportunity to be here today to discuss our efforts 
to evaluate the Department of Defense's (DOD) and the U.S. Coast 
Guard's oversight and implementation of their respective sexual 
assault prevention and response programs. Our statement today 
summarizes the findings of a report that we are issuing concurrently 
with today's hearing, and it builds upon our previous work related to 
sexual assault in the military services.[Footnote 1] Our main message 
today is that DOD and the Coast Guard have taken a number of positive 
steps to increase program awareness and to improve their prevention 
and response to occurrences of sexual assault, but additional actions 
are needed to strengthen their respective programs. As we have 
previously reported, sexual assault is a crime with a far-reaching 
negative impact on the military services in that it undermines core 
values, degrades mission readiness and esprit de corps, subverts 
strategic goodwill, and raises financial costs.[Footnote 2] Since we 
reported on these implications in 2008, incidents of sexual assault 
have continued to occur; in fiscal year 2008, DOD reported nearly 
3,000 alleged sexual assault cases, and the Coast Guard reported about 
80.[Footnote 3] However, it remains impossible to accurately analyze 
trends or draw conclusions from these data because DOD and the Coast 
Guard have not yet standardized their respective reporting 
requirements.[Footnote 4] 

Mr. Chairman, your ongoing attention to this important issue has led 
to a number of improvements to both DOD's and the Coast Guard's sexual 
assault prevention and response programs, and has significantly 
contributed to the broader congressional effort to raise the awareness 
of and accountability for sexual assault in the military services. Our 
August 2008 report examined sexual assault in the military and Coast 
Guard services,[Footnote 5] and highlighted that DOD's and the Coast 
Guard's program implementation was hindered by several issues, 
including the lack of an oversight framework, limited support from 
commanders, and training that was not consistently effective. 
Accordingly, we made a number of recommendations--nine to DOD, and two 
to the Coast Guard--for improving program implementation. We 
recommended that DOD: 

* review and evaluate the department's policies for the prevention of 
and response to sexual assault to ensure that adequate guidance is 
provided to effectively implement the program in deployed environments 
and joint environments, 

* evaluate the military services' processes for staffing and 
designating key installation-level program positions, such as 
coordinators, at installations in the United States and overseas, to 
ensure that these individuals have the ability and resources to fully 
carry out their responsibilities, 

* review and evaluate sexual assault prevention and response training 
to ensure that the military services are meeting training requirements 
and to enhance the effectiveness of the training, 

* systematically evaluate and develop an action plan to address any 
factors that may prevent or discourage servicemembers from accessing 
health services following a sexual assault, 

* direct the military service secretaries to emphasize to all levels 
of command their responsibility for supporting the program, and review 
the extent to which commanders support the program and resources are 
available to raise servicemembers' awareness of sexual assault matters, 

* require the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office to develop 
an oversight framework to guide continued program implementation and 
evaluate program effectiveness, 

* improve the usefulness of the department's annual report as an 
oversight tool both internally and for congressional decision makers 
by establishing baseline data to permit analysis of data over time and 
to distinguish cases in which (1) evidence was insufficient to 
substantiate an alleged assault, (2) a victim recanted, or (3) the 
allegations of sexual assault were unfounded, 

* direct the military service secretaries to provide installation-
level incident data to the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response 
Office annually or as requested, to facilitate analysis of sexual 
assault-related data and better target resources over time, and: 

* direct the Defense Task Force on Sexual Assault in the Military 
Services to begin its examination immediately, now that all members of 
the task force have been appointed, and to develop a detailed plan 
with milestones to guide its work. 

We recommended that the Coast Guard: 

* evaluate its processes for staffing key installation-level program 
positions, such as the coordinators, to ensure that these individuals 
have the ability and resources to fully carry out their 
responsibilities, and: 

* develop an oversight framework to guide continued program 
implementation and evaluate program effectiveness. At a minimum, such 
a framework should contain long-term goals, objectives, and 
milestones; performance goals; strategies to be used to accomplish 
goals; and criteria for measuring progress. 

We also testified twice before your Subcommittee in 2008 on matters 
related to sexual assault in the military services; first, in July 
2008,[Footnote 6] to present our preliminary observations on DOD's and 
the Coast Guard's sexual assault prevention and response programs, and 
second, in September 2008, to present the findings and recommendations 
of our August 2008 report.[Footnote 7] In November 2008, you asked us 
to continue to monitor DOD's and the Coast Guard's progress in 
addressing those recommendations. Our statement today specifically 
addresses the extent to which: 

* DOD has taken steps to implement our recommendations from 2008 and 
has further developed its programs to prevent and respond to sexual 
assault; 

* DOD has taken steps to address a congressional requirement to 
establish a centralized, case-level sexual assault incident database; 
and: 

* the Coast Guard has taken steps to implement our recommendations 
from 2008 and has further developed its programs to prevent and 
respond to sexual assault. 

To conduct our work, we reviewed current DOD and Coast Guard policies 
and programs and compared them with our findings and recommendations 
from 2008. We also interviewed DOD and Coast Guard officials to 
supplement our analyses of program modifications. In addition, we 
assessed the extent to which DOD has addressed a congressional 
requirement to establish a centralized, case-level sexual assault 
database by reviewing applicable legislation and DOD documentation, 
and compared it with DOD, federal, and industry guidance on key system 
acquisition best practices. We also interviewed DOD officials to 
obtain information on the status of the department's efforts to 
establish the database. 

For our report based on this performance audit, we conducted our work 
from February 2009 to February 2010 in accordance with generally 
accepted government auditing standards. Those standards require that 
we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate 
evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and 
conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that the 
evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and 
conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

DOD's Efforts to Address Our Recommendations from 2008 Reflect Varying 
Levels of Progress: 

DOD has taken steps to implement our August 2008 recommendations to 
improve its sexual assault prevention and response program; however, 
its efforts reflect various levels of progress, and opportunities 
exist for further program improvements. To its credit, DOD has 
implemented four of the nine recommendations in our August 2008 
report. First, the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) 
established a working group to address our recommendation to evaluate 
the adequacy of DOD policies for implementing its sexual assault 
prevention and response program in joint and deployed environments. 
Based on the working group's findings, OSD suggested revisions to 
joint policy, which a Joint Staff official told us they are using to 
modify related publications. Second, the military service secretaries 
have each taken a variety of steps to address our recommendation to 
emphasize responsibility for program support at all levels of command. 
The most notable examples of this support include the U.S. Navy's 
recent establishment of a sexual assault prevention and response 
office that will report directly to the Secretary of the Navy, and the 
Army's incorporation of a sexual assault program awareness assessment 
into promotional boards for its noncommissioned officers. Third, OSD 
chartered the Health Affairs Sexual Assault Task Force to address our 
recommendation to evaluate and address factors that may prevent or 
discourage servicemembers from seeking health services. Specifically, 
the task force evaluated and subsequently issued a number of 
recommendations that are intended to improve access to health care 
following a sexual assault, including chartering a Sexual Assault 
Health Care Integrated Policy Team to review department-level policies 
regarding clinical practice guidelines, standards of care, personnel 
and staffing, training requirements and responsibilities, continuity 
of care, and in-theater equipment and supplies. Fourth, in August 
2008, the Defense Task Force on Sexual Assault in the Military 
Services began its examination of matters related to sexual assault, 
as we recommended, and on December 1, 2009 the task force released a 
report with its findings and recommendations. 

However, DOD's actions toward implementing the other five 
recommendations from 2008 reflect less progress. For example, although 
OSD has drafted an oversight framework, that framework does not 
contain all the elements necessary for effective strategic planning 
and program implementation, such as criteria for measuring progress to 
facilitate program evaluation and to identify areas needing 
improvement. However, according to OSD officials, they plan to develop 
these within the next 2 years. Further, the draft oversight framework 
does not include information on how OSD plans to use or report the 
results of its performance assessments, does not identify how program 
resources correlate to its achievement of program objectives, and does 
not correlate with the program's two strategic plans. Therefore, to 
improve oversight of the department's sexual assault prevention and 
response programs, in our February 2010 report we recommend that OSD 
strengthen its oversight framework by identifying how the results of 
performance assessments will be used to guide the development of 
future program initiatives, identifying how program resources 
correlate to its achievement of strategic program objectives, and 
correlating the oversight framework with the program's two strategic 
plans. In written comments on our draft report, DOD concurred and 
noted that it has already taken steps toward implementing these 
recommendations. For example, DOD stated that it currently has efforts 
underway to establish criteria for measuring its progress and expects 
to have a plan in early 2010 for tracking the department's progress 
toward performance objectives. DOD also noted that it plans to align 
its budget categories with specific performance objectives, starting 
with the 2012 budget cycle. Further, DOD noted that the process it 
plans to use to track its progress toward performance objectives will 
also allow the department to synchronize the objectives, timelines, 
and strategies of its two strategic plans. We commend DOD for taking 
immediate steps in response to our recommendations, and encourage the 
department to continue taking positive actions toward fully 
implementing them. 

Further, while OSD has introduced some changes in DOD's annual report 
to Congress, it has not completed the process of developing a 
standardized set of sexual assault data elements and definitions. OSD 
officials noted that the standardization of data definitions is 
something they expect to accomplish in the near term, while 
standardizing data elements will take longer as it is a task that will 
be completed in conjunction with their development of a centralized 
sexual assault database. However, we note that in the meantime, 
information in DOD's annual report still cannot be compared across the 
military services, and it may not be effectively characterizing 
incidents of sexual assault in the military services. Thus, to enhance 
visibility over the incidence of sexual assaults involving DOD 
servicemembers, and to improve the department's sexual assault 
prevention and response programs and the pending implementation of the 
Defense Sexual Assault Incident Database, in our February 2010 report 
we recommend that DOD standardize the type, amount, and format of the 
data in the military services' report submissions. In written comments 
on our draft report, DOD stated that it is working to achieve complete 
data uniformity among the military services, but that this will 
ultimately be accomplished once the Defense Sexual Assault Incident 
Database--which I will discuss next--has been established. While we 
recognize the complexity of this task, we continue to assert that the 
full establishment and implementation of standardized data elements 
and definitions will facilitate a more comprehensive understanding of 
DOD's sexual assault prevention and response programs. 

We also found that OSD cannot assess training programs as we 
recommended, because OSD's strategic plans and draft oversight 
framework do not contain measures against which to benchmark 
performance, and DOD has not implemented our recommendation to 
evaluate processes for staffing key installation-level positions 
because, according to OSD officials, they were advised that the 
Defense Task Force on Sexual Assault in the Military Services would be 
making related recommendations. Finally, OSD officials stated that 
they will not address our recommendation to collect installation-level 
data--despite its availability and the military services' willingness 
to provide them--until they have implemented the Defense Sexual 
Assault Incident Database to maintain these data. We did not make any 
new recommendations to DOD in our February 2010 report regarding these 
findings however, we continue to assert that until these 
recommendations are fully implemented, OSD cannot be sure that the 
programs are improving the department's prevention of and response to 
sexual assault incidents. 

DOD Has Yet to Establish A Centralized Sexual Assault Incident 
Database: 

DOD has taken preliminary steps to establish the centralized, case- 
level Defense Sexual Assault Incident Database that Congress directed 
it to implement in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal 
Year 2009, but it did not meet the statutorily mandated January 2010 
deadline for implementing the database. Instead, only general 
milestones for acquiring the database have been set, and DOD cannot 
currently commit to when the system will be implemented because it 
does not have a reliable acquisition and implementation schedule. 
Further, a range of key information technology management practices 
that are essential to successfully acquiring and implementing a system 
remain to be accomplished. Our research and evaluations of information 
technology programs across the federal government have shown that 
adherence to such practices--including assessing a program's overlap 
with related programs and using reliable estimates of life cycle costs 
and benefits to justify investment in the system--is essential to 
delivering promised system capabilities and benefits on time and 
within budget. However, more remains to be accomplished before these 
disciplines will be effectively implemented. For example, while DOD 
developed a business case for the database in June 2009 that includes 
a cost estimate of $12.6 million, the cost estimate does not include 
all costs over the system's life cycle, has not been adjusted to 
account for program risks, and does not include a comparison of 
alternatives on the basis of net present value. To increase the 
chances of the database being successfully acquired and implemented, 
in our February 2010 report we recommend that DOD adhere to key system 
acquisition management processes and controls, including, but not 
limited to developing a reliable integrated master schedule, assessing 
the program's overlap with related programs, and justifying the 
investment based on reliable estimates of life cycle costs and 
benefits. In written comments on our draft report, DOD agreed with 
these recommendations but noted that doing so depends in part on 
hiring a system development contractor. In this regard, DOD expects to 
release the Request for Proposals for a system developer soon, and 
award a contract sometime between April and June 2010. 

Coast Guard Has Partially Implemented One of Our Two Recommendations 
from 2008: 

While the Coast Guard has partially implemented one of our 
recommendations to further develop its sexual assault prevention and 
response program, it has not implemented the other. In August 2008, we 
reported that the Coast Guard's sexual assault prevention and response 
program was hindered by several issues, and we made two 
recommendations to strengthen its program's implementation.[Footnote 
8] In response to these recommendations, the Coast Guard has 
established a headquarters-level program manager position to oversee 
its sexual assault prevention and response program, and it has 
initiated an assessment of the current workload requirements and 
resource allocations for its Sexual Assault Response Coordinators. In 
written comments on our draft report, the Coast Guard stated that it 
had recently completed its assessment of the workload requirements and 
resource allocations for its Sexual Assault Response Coordinators, and 
upon release of the final report the Coast Guard plans to review and 
analyze the recommendations and as appropriate, incorporate additional 
resource requirements into its annual budget process. 

Further, the Coast Guard lacks a systematic process to collect, 
document, and maintain its sexual assault data and related program 
information, and it lacks quality control procedures to ensure that 
program data being collected are reliable. For example, Coast Guard 
officials noted that in fiscal year 2008, the Coast Guard 
Investigative Service documented 78 reports of alleged sexual assault, 
while Coast Guard Headquarters, using its hard copy log of reports 
from its coordinators, had documented only 30. Therefore, in our 
February 2010 report we recommend that the Coast Guard improve the 
oversight and accountability of its sexual assault prevention and 
response program by establishing a systematic process for collecting, 
documenting, and maintaining sexual assault incidence data, and by 
establishing quality control processes to ensure that program 
information collected is reliable. In written comments on our draft 
report, the Coast Guard noted that it is currently developing a 
prototype of an electronic database to track sexual assault reports 
and that it expects to complete the database in 2010. 

Additionally, while the Coast Guard's instruction requires that all 
Coast Guard Sexual Assault Response Coordinators be trained to perform 
relevant duties, officials stated that they have not developed a 
curriculum or implemented training for the Coast Guard's 16 Sexual 
Assault Response Coordinators, as they had elected alternatively to 
develop a training curriculum for other program personnel. Thus, to 
ensure that the Coast Guard can provide proper advice to its 
personnel, in our February 2010 report we recommend that it establish 
and administer a curriculum for all key program personnel. In written 
comments on our draft report, the Coast Guard noted that it has 
scheduled training in May 2010 for all of its personnel performing 
Sexual Assault Response Coordinator duties. We commend the Coast Guard 
for the steps it has taken and its plans for further developing its 
sexual assault prevention and response program, and we encourage the 
service to continue taking positive actions toward fully implementing 
our recommendations. 

In summary, we want to reiterate our recognition that both DOD and the 
Coast Guard have taken a number of positive steps toward addressing 
our recommendations from 2008 to further strengthen their respective 
sexual assault prevention and response programs. Additionally, each 
service has proactively developed and implemented a variety of 
initiatives--beyond what we recommended--to increase program awareness 
and to improve prevention of and response to occurrences of sexual 
assault. While such progress is noteworthy, DOD's and the Coast 
Guard's efforts have not fully established sound management frameworks 
that include a long-term perspective and clear lines of 
accountability--all of which are needed to withstand the 
administrative, fiscal, and political pressures that confront federal 
programs on a daily basis. Further, successful program implementation 
will require the personal involvement of top DOD and Coast Guard 
leadership in order to maintain the long-term focus on and 
accountability for program objectives. Without such support, DOD's and 
the Coast Guard's programs will not be able to maximize the benefits 
of their respective prevention and response initiatives, and they may 
not be able to effect the change in military culture that is needed to 
ensure that their programs are institutionalized. 

Chairman Tierney and Members of the Subcommittee, this concludes our 
prepared statement. We would be pleased to answer any questions you 
may have at this time. 

Contacts and Acknowledgments: 

If you or your staff have any questions on matters discussed in this 
statement, please contact Brenda Farrell at (202) 512-3604 or 
farrellb@gao.gov or Randolph Hite at (202) 512-3439 or hiter@gao.gov. 
Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public 
Affairs may be found on the last page of this statement. Key 
contributors to this statement include Marilyn K. Wasleski, Assistant 
Director; Neelaxi Lakhmani, Assistant Director; Divya Bali; Stacy 
Bennett; K. Nicole Harms; Jim Houtz; Ron La Due Lake; Kim Mayo; Adam 
Vodraska; and Cheryl A. Weissman. 

[End of section] 

Footnotes: 

[1] GAO, Military Personnel: Additional Actions Are Needed to 
Strengthen DOD's and the Coast Guard's Sexual Assault Prevention and 
Response Programs, [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-
215], (Washington, D.C.: Feb. 3, 2010). 

[2] GAO, Military Personnel: DOD's and the Coast Guard's Sexual 
Assault Prevention and Response Programs Face Implementation and 
Oversight Challenges, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-924] (Washington, D.C.: Aug. 29, 
2008). 

[3] In fiscal year 2008, DOD reported 2,908 alleged incidents of 
sexual assault involving military servicemembers, and the Coast Guard 
reported 84. 

[4] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-924]. 

[5] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-924]. 

[6] GAO, Military Personnel: Preliminary Observations on DOD's and the 
Coast Guard's Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Programs, 
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-1013T] (Washington, 
D.C.: July 31, 2008). 

[7] GAO, Military Personnel: Actions Needed to Strengthen 
Implementation and Oversight of DOD's and the Coast Guard's Sexual 
Assault Prevention and Response Programs, [hyperlink, 
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-1146T] (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 10, 
2008). 

[8] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-08-924]. 

[End of section] 

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