Recovery Act (Stimulus) Solutions

Under the Recovery Act, the federal government is making a huge investment in an effort to create jobs and stimulate the economy to a quick recovery. A fundamental principle of the Act is to promote an extremely high level of transparency and accountability so that citizens know how their tax dollars are being spent. Federal agencies and recipients of Recovery Act funds are required to report their progress in detail. Examples of reporting requirements are:

• Federal agencies are required to provide information to OMB on the funding notifications made for all award types. Funding notifications including grants, contract funding, loans, loan guarantees and funds under cooperative agreements which agencies have publicly announced as being available to non-federal entities.
• Agencies are required to submit weekly financial and activity reports to OMB, which must include funds that have been obligated, gross outlays and short lists of the major actions taken to date and major planned actions.
• Initial, non-federal recipients of Recovery Act funds must report to the agencies that provided them with such funds by October 10, 2009 and on a quarterly basis after that. These reports must include: (a) the amount of funding received from the agency, (b) the amount of funding expended or obligated to projects or activities, (c) a list of specific projects receiving Recovery Act funding and (d) detailed information on subcontracts or subgrants awarded by the initial recipient.

We can quickly develop and implement practical applications to satisfy the mandatory reporting requirements and meet the necessary deadlines. Because the reporting requirements are still evolving, our proactive approach enables you to rapidly respond to changes.

We can quickly add data visualization tools to your agency's web site. Charts and graphs have long been used for data visualization, but Johnston McLamb adds a whole new dimension with interactive features. Users will be able to focus on issues of greatest interest to them. For example, a graph could display the total appropriations, obligations and gross outlays of your agency's Recovery Act funding by program source on a weekly basis. This enables users to view the flow of funds over time.

What can it do for you? See Johnston McLamb's Recovery Act demo.

In addition, you might want to display data by Treasury Account Symbol (TAS) Code, vendor, congressional district, or another factor. Maybe you want to enable users to see the top 10 vendors by obligated funding amount. Or you may want to display TAS Codes with the lowest percentage of expended funding late in the fiscal year.

Effective visualization of data can take many forms. For data with a location component such as city, county, or congressional district, a map is often the best way to visualize the recovery funding. Interactive features allow you to drill down, zoom in and out, and select the detailed data you want to display. One example is grant data shown in this map. [Note: I recommend including a larger graphic or one that is "clickable" and turns into a larger graphic where the text is more legible.]

Johnston McLamb's data visualization experts will work with you to quickly implement the most appropriate visualization solution(s) for your agency.