Saturday, February 06, 2010
Nancy Fichtner (photo: Sharon Sullivan, Grand Junction Free Press)
Nancy Fichtner isn’t the only federal employee with an idea for how the U.S. government can save money. Fichtner, winner of last year’s contest sponsored by the White House, proposed that the Department of Veterans Affairs stop throwing away unused medicine after patients are discharged from a VA hospital, and instead send them home with the medication.
The new 2011 budget proposal submitted by President Barack Obama includes 19 other cost-savings ideas put forth by federal workers. These include: Ending the Department of Agriculture’s Resource Conservation and Development Program; reducing IT duplication, consolidating purchases of goods and services, increased use of videoconferencing at the Department of Energy, and cutting travel costs at the Department of the Interior; and requiring employees at the Labor Department to turn off their computers at the end of the day.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
2011 Budget: Cost-Cutting Ideas from Federal Workers (by Ed O’Keefe, Washington Post)
Colorado VA Clerk Wins Federal Cost-Cutting Contest (by Noel Brinkerhoff and David Wallechinsky, AllGov)
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