SAVE Award 2011 Ideas

The government spends thousands to millions of dollars making plastic IDs for their government employees each year. When these IDs expire or their beholder leaves his/her position, they are then tossed into the trashed and disposed as waste; waste destined to sit in a landfill. Why not recycle them? By making IDs out of recycled plastic and then recycling the IDs themselves after use, the government could not only increase... more »

We could save a lot of paper if our printers defaulted to two-sided (duplex) printing, with the option to print one-sided, across all government agencies.

Turn the VA into more of an HMO and let the Veterans decide where and who they go to for Medical Treatment as a result of service. This will have the ability to save literally HUNDREDS of BILLIONS of dollars a year.

Currently for credentialing and privileging purposes, all licenses must be verified before completing an application which is usually done online as primary source verification which is acceptable by the Joint Commission. Then within 5 days a written license request has to be mailed. Usually the state licensing boards require a fee, some as high as $50 per license verification. And our office has never gained any additional... more »

There is no reason the government nor the tax payer to be providing tax breaks for any company. The amount of time spent on this at the IRS is astonomical. This should be eliminated and then use that revenue to pay down the national debt. Make corporations pay their share of taxes. After all if they want to do business in this country they have a stake in its success.

Combine the Navy, Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard online training programs into a single web-enabled entity.
Having multiple agencies and organizations manage the education of our combat personnel is inefficient and highlights the disparity and unfocused attempts the different services take on online education. It is simply a waste of time and money to break up online education into different areas for... more »

Do away with this agency completey and return the responsbility of education to the states and to the parents of children. Maintain a staff to run the Pell Grant program and do away with the rest. Having national standards for education is a complete waste of time. Education should be focused on developing an individual students talents instead of a broad liberal arts education. Having someone focus on a specific... more »

Some government employees abuse their transit benefits -- for example, someone who receives a transit benefit that fully covers the cost of vanpooling may only use the vanpool one day a week or less. In my area, that cost would work out to a cost to the government of over $20 for each day this employee chooses to use the transit benefit. There should be a standard policy in effect that stipulates what percentage of... more »

Simply stop minting the penny. It wouldn't be missed and the government would save vast amounts in acquisition, labor, distribution, and mgt costs.

The Rollover Budget Initiative (RBI) would allow units to maintain their annual budgets without being penalized for not fully utilizing the last year’s budget. Any remaining money from a fiscal year would be the base amount for the next fiscal year, which will then have additional money added to meet the unit’s requested budget. For example, if a unit requests $10,000 and has $2,000 left over from the previous year, that... more »

The cost of training each and every employee is extremely high and I believe that there is a better, more cost efficient way of doing things. Currently, the Government sends each employee to their required training, paying for their flight, hotel and per diem. For a two week course, this can easily be $5000 per person. If there are 20 people in this class, then the cost is $100,000 plus the cost of the instructors... more »

I noticed people wearing coats/sweaters in the summer. By setting thermostat back up to 10 degrees saves up to 20% on Cooling/Heating bill. We conserve energy where ever possible at home; the same should apply at work.

Many times over the weekend at federal facilities the lights and computers remain on. The cost savings would be enormous if we can encourage people to shut the power off and get engineering to power down the central controlled electricity on unused floors.

We may be using Fluorescent light bulbs, but we should continue to alternate bulb use like we did prior to using Fluorescent light bulbs. We should keep some lights bulbs Off while others light bulbs are On (alternating bulbs). Thus still providing enough lighting to do the job while conserving Electricity; Reducing lighting where necessary.

I love having two monitors on my desk so that I can work on a Word document and look at an Excel spreadsheet at the same time. But come on... if the Government is looking for ways to save money, that's a pretty easy place to start. Just limit everyone to a single monitor. The dual monitors are convenient but let's not be greedy.