Traffic Safety: Implementing Leading Practices Could Improve Management of Mandated Rulemakings and Reports
Fast Facts
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration conducts research aimed at reducing crashes, issues regulations that set standards for safety equipment, and more. Its regulations are the product of a rulemaking process, which includes developing a proposed rule and responding to public comments.
Legislation in 2012 and 2015 required the agency to issue 19 reports for Congress and publish 22 rules. As of April 11, 2022, the agency completed all the reports but almost all of them were late. It completed 6 rules.
We found that greater adherence to leading practices could help the agency reduce delays. Our recommendations address this issue.
Highlights
What GAO Found
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) was mandated to complete numerous rulemakings and reports to address safety and related issues by both the 2012 Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21) and the 2015 Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act (FAST Act). As of April 11, 2022, NHTSA completed all 19 reports and 6 of the 22 rulemakings required by these Acts that GAO identified. Agency officials and regulatory experts GAO interviewed cited administration priorities, issue complexity, and resource availability as factors affecting NHTSA's completion of rulemakings and reports.
NHTSA has not consistently followed leading project schedule management practices when developing mandated rulemakings and reports. These practices, which include establishing milestones and sequencing activities, can help manage project timeframes and reduce delays. While these practices should be applied to all stages of a project, NHTSA only consistently followed them for the review stage of its rulemaking and report processes, where NHTSA's procedures specify that it do so. (See fig.) For example, NHTSA followed leading project schedule management practices for the review of a proposed rule on tire pressure standards, but not for the activities, such as securing and managing a research contract, needed to draft that proposed rule. Regulatory experts have noted that these time-consuming stages of the rulemaking process are important, as they influence the contents of rules.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's (NHTSA) Use of Leading Project Schedule Management Practices in Its Rulemaking Process
Similarly, for each mandated report to Congress, NHTSA followed leading project schedule management practices when reviewing draft reports, but not for the tasks needed to draft each report prior to review. While NHTSA has completed all of the reports mandated by MAP-21 and the FAST Act, it issued nearly all of these reports after their statutory deadlines, delaying information to Congress on topics such as traffic safety that are critical to congressional oversight.
Why GAO Did This Study
According to NHTSA estimates, 38,824 people died in motor vehicle crashes in 2020 on U.S. roads and highways, with even more projected to have died in 2021. NHTSA is responsible for overseeing the safety of motor vehicles on U.S. roads.
GAO was asked to examine NHTSA's processes for developing statutorily required, or “mandated,” rulemakings and reports. In this report, GAO examined: (1) the number of rulemakings and reports mandated by MAP-21 and the FAST Act that NHTSA completed, and factors that affected its completion of selected mandates; and (2) the extent to which NHTSA followed leading project schedule management practices when developing mandated rulemakings and reports, among other objectives.
GAO analyzed publicly available information on regulations under development, including Reginfo.gov; reviewed relevant agency procedures; summarized literature issued in the past 10 years on factors affecting rulemaking; and interviewed NHTSA officials, six regulatory experts, and nine transportation stakeholders. GAO also selected for review five mandated rulemakings and four mandated reports to provide additional insights on factors affecting mandate completion.
Recommendations
GAO is making four recommendations, including that NHTSA update its procedures on rulemaking and developing reports to Congress to require the use of leading project schedule management practices. NHTSA concurred with the recommendations.
Recommendations for Executive Action
| Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
|---|---|---|
| National Highway Traffic Safety Administration |
Priority Rec.
The NHTSA Deputy Administrator should update NHTSA's rulemaking procedures to require the use of leading project schedule management practices for the activities needed to draft a proposed rule. (Recommendation 1) |
NHTSA concurred with this recommendation. In its February 2024 180-day letter, NHTSA stated that the agency would update its procedures for drafting a proposed rule by June 30, 2024. We will evaluate those procedures once they are completed and provide updated information on the status of NHTSA efforts to implement our recommendation.
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| National Highway Traffic Safety Administration | The NHTSA Deputy Administrator should update NHTSA's procedures for developing reports to Congress to require the use of leading project schedule management practices for the activities needed to draft a report. (Recommendation 2) |
NHTSA concurred with this recommendation. In its February 2024 180-day letter, NHTSA stated that it would develop procedures for the activities needed to draft a mandated report to Congress by June 30, 2024. We will evaluate those procedures once they are completed and provide updated information on the status of NHTSA efforts to implement our recommendation.
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| National Highway Traffic Safety Administration | The NHTSA Deputy Administrator should provide additional information on incomplete rulemakings to Congress, including the substantive activities that NHTSA completed between rulemaking milestones. NHTSA could consider providing this information as part of the biannual reports required by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. (Recommendation 3) |
NHTSA concurred with this recommendation. In its February 2024 Rulemaking Status Report to Congress, NHTSA provided additional information on most of the incomplete rulemakings mandated by MAP-21 and the FAST Act. NHTSA described the reasons why they did not meet mandated deadlines for these incomplete rulemakings, and for about half of the rulemakings, NHTSA described examples of substantive activities it had completed between rulemaking milestones. We will review the next biannual Rulemaking Status Report to Congress once it is available and provide updated information on the status of NHTSA efforts to implement this recommendation.
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| National Highway Traffic Safety Administration | The NHTSA Deputy Administrator should update NHTSA's publicly available information, such as the Reports Sent to Congress webpage or the DOT Research Hub, to include mandated research reports. (Recommendation 4) |
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is responsible for overseeing the safety of motor vehicles on U.S. roads. As part of this responsibility, NHTSA was mandated to complete 19 reports to address safety and related issues by the 2012 Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21) and the 2015 Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act (FAST Act). These included research reports on topics such as drug- and alcohol-impaired driving, distracted driving, seatbelts in motor coaches, and crash data related to children as vehicle occupants. In 2022, GAO reported that for all 19 mandated reports to Congress, NHTSA notified and sent final reports to the appropriate congressional committees when it completed each report. However, NHTSA rarely notified the public when it completed these reports, or made them publicly available. The FAST Act required DOT, among other things, to "annually publish on a public website a comprehensive database of all research projects conducted by the Department of Transportation." DOT expanded its Research Hub database-a public, searchable database on active and recently completed DOT-funded research projects-to address this mandate. NHTSA officials told us that most of the 19 mandated reports should be available in either DOT's Research Hub or on NHTSA's website titled NHTSA Reports Sent to Congress. However, GAO searched for all 19 mandated reports in the DOT Research Hub and on NHTSA's website, and as of March 2022 was only able to find one potential match. Without communicating mandated reports to the public, the public could not engage with NHTSA or benefit from NHTSA's research on these important safety topics. One of NHTSA's goals is to improve motor vehicle safety through education and research, but not making mandated reports on motor vehicle safety issues publicly available prevented the agency from fully meeting this goal. As such, GAO recommended that the NHTSA Deputy Administrator update NHTSA's publicly available information, such as the Reports Sent to Congress webpage or the DOT Research Hub, to include mandated research reports. In August 2023, GAO confirmed that NHTSA had posted all 19 mandated reports to its Reports Sent to Congress webpage. With easy access to these mandated reports, the public is able to engage and learn from NHTSA's research on important safety topics.
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