The intention of the legislation was to authorize the exchange of some 29 parcels of land between the Federal Government and the District of Columbia.

"This new law may have a real benefit to taxpayers and is a step in the right direction for reducing the federal deficit," says president and CEO of VISTA, David Baxa. The Virginia-based company provides real property asset management services for the Federal government.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that "enacting H.R. 3699 would not significantly affect the federal budget," but a section of the law (Section 408) may be a move toward reducing the deficit by creating an understanding of the negative effect on taxpayers of under-utilized government real property.

Section 408 provides that no later than six months after the enactment of the bill - the end of June 2007 - the OMB Director is must to report to Congress the total value and amount of surplus government property - both the aggregate and totaled by the agency. The 100 most eligible surplus properties for sale must also be listed, along with an estimate of the worth of each property.

The OMB Director is also responsible for reporting on data sharing among federal agencies and Congress requires reporting on the procedures used to share data on surplus Federal real property under the jurisdiction of each agency. The OMB report must also contain an update on the implementation and development of the data sharing procedures.

"Disposal of unused property is just the tip of the iceberg here. The benefit for the Federal budget lies not just in receiving fair market value on the sale of unused buildings and land," says Baxa, "but in avoiding the expense of maintaining and operating this unnecessary real property."

In 2005 testimony by OMB Deputy Director Clay Johnson to the Senate Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, he referred to a $15 billion potential in savings to be realized by the disposition of just five percent of unneeded Federal real property, and that five percent could translate to a possible $15 billion a year savings in operational and maintenance costs, beyond the properties fair market value. With the savings in costs and the return on sold property, this could be as much as $90 billion over five years.

If Johnson's calculations where extended to the whole 100 percent of excess property and unnecessary spending costs, the savings could be as much as $1.8 trillion on a five-year projected basis.

"Of course, the requirement under this newly-approved legislation is to identify only 100 properties out of the entire surplus inventory, so the savings is a tiny fraction of what is possible," VISTA's Baxa cautioned. "Nonetheless, this is an encouraging step in the right direction of shedding the burden of surplus Federal real property."

Government financial and operations executives use VISTA for information technology, management consulting, decision support systems and services. The company services help collect and analyze massive volumes of asset-related data for over 20 years.

Barry McKinsey , 11 January 2007 @ 18:35 PM  typo If Johnson's calculations where extended to the whole 100 percent of excess property and unnecessary spending costs, the savings could be as much as $1.8 Trillion (that's with a 'T' not 'B') on a five-year projected basis.