On August 27, the White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) responded to AGC’s request to review the Build America, Buy America Act (BABAA) information collection procedures of 19 different federal agencies. OMB indicated that the 19 agencies, which had been identified as out of compliance with all requirements under the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA), have addressed those concerns and are using approved forms for their information collections.
As a reminder, AGC along with a coalition of industry partners, submitted a request for OMB to review PRA compliance of various federal agencies. Proper collection practices are necessary in order for agencies to properly assess the need for BABAA waivers on a project-by-project basis or using ones with general applicability for all projects. A recent report, further highlighting the need for transparency, found that the EPA was unable to identify how many award recipients had used the approved waivers in their projects or to quantify how many infrastructure projects were subject to a waiver.
The request submitted by AGC on February 15th also called for the OMB to amend its BABAA implementation to streamline the waiver process and expedite the time necessary for approvals and denials. OMB did not respond to this portion of the request but indicated that they will respond to that request separately.
Additional actions that AGC has taken to ensure the BABAA regulations do not pose an undue burden on contractors:
- AGC expresses concerns with proposals to expand Buy America requirements –June 2021
- AGC weighs in on Buy America to US Senate – July 2021
- AGC asks for Buy America transition period and improvements to waiver process – January 2022
- AGC meets with Made in America Office – March 2022
- AGC calls on White House to study impacts of Buy America on Supply Chain – May 2022
- AGC calls for delay of implementation of Buy America requirements – June 2022
- AGC Member, Ali Mills, testifies on Buy America – December 2022
- AGC Meets with FHWA Administrator on Buy America – January 2023
- AGC Member, Jeff Firth, testifies on Buy America – February 2023
- AGC weighs in on Made in America Guidance – March 2023
- AGC meets with Made in America Office – May 2023
- AGC Member, Lauren Benford, testifies on Buy America – January 2024
- AGC and coalition allies file an administrative action to address implementation challenges – February 2024
- AGC Member, Ty Edmondson, testifies on Buy America – February 2024
- AGC weighs in on removing long-standing FHWA waiver – May 2024
- AGC and ARTBA Survey Members to Inform FHWA on Material Availability – May 2024
- OMB responds to AGC and coalition allies’ request to address implementation challenges – August 2024
For more information, please contact Deniz Mustafa at Deniz.Mustafa@agc.org.