GovWin Federal Agency Planner Update – Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services

BACKGROUND:

Account Planners are published on 100 select GovWin Federal Agency Profiles. The Planners serve as an overview of an agency’s complete profile, providing a high-level summary of the organization’s structure, budget and spending information, employment data, and strategic goals and objectives (when made available). The Planners are updated annually or if there is a significant change to agency’s structure or strategic mission.  The following blog highlights notable differences observed when the Planner was updated recently. In order to access any links below, a subscription that includes access to Delta’s GovWin Federal Agency Profiles and Vendor Profiles is necessary.

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services:

Changes in Total Discretionary Budget – Delta’s Agency Profiles use the President’s Budget Authorization, as opposed to the budget appropriations, to measure discretionary budget requests. The budget authorization specifies the total amount an agency is authorized to spend, while the budget appropriations signify the amount Congress will actually make available for any agency’s program during the budget authorization process. Because Congressional budget negations have resulted in continuing budget resolutions (funding agencies at the same appropriation level as the previous year) for well over 20 years, the Budget Authorization provides the best indication of the budget request changes from one year to the next.

Deltek measures changes in discretionary budget growth from the last full fiscal year which, in this case is FY 2017, through the budget request year, FY 2019.  During this period, CMS’s budget request declined 59.2% - decreasing from $6.6 billion in 2017 to $2.7 billion in 2019.  The decrease in CMS occurred in two authorization accounts in the FY 2019 budget request; the Child Enrollment Contingency Fund which saw reauthorizations of $1.2 billion in 2018 and $667 million in 2019, and the Children's Health Insurance Fund which saw reauthorizations of $2.7 billion in 2017 and $3.1 billion in 2019. A decrease in its overall authorization limit was not the only challenge the Children’s Health Insurance Fund faced this year as it became a central figure during the February budget battle in Congress, which led to a brief government shutdown.  However, as part of the final continuing budget resolution the fund was extended for an additional 10 years through 2027.

Source: Deltek, OMB, President’s FY 2019 Budget Authorization

Changes in Contract Spending – Overall prime spending from FY 2016 and FY 2017 (the last two complete government fiscal years) at CMS was down 6.4%. However, certain areas did show increased spending, specifically Architecture Engineering and Construction which grew 39% from $3.5 million to $4.9 million. Information Technology was another growth area for CMS, which saw overall spending increase slightly from $2.4 billion to $2.6 billion, up 8.5%.

Growth in CMS AEC spending was driven by contracts made under GSA Schedules, funded by the GSA Building Fund. The work was mostly focused on renovations and improvements to CMS facilities – mostly in the Mid-Atlantic region. The largest of the contracts in 2017 was single source contract awarded to Commfed Solutions Inc., which totaled $1.8 million in spending obligations.

Growth in CMS’s Information Technology spending between 2016 and 2017 was largely derived from the agency’s top 10 IT contracts which totaled $1.2 billion of the agency’s 2.6 billion in spending, 46% of the total.   Largest amongst these contracts was the CMS IT Virtual Data Center Primary Large Business IDIQ (VDCP). While multiple contractors hold this contract, DXC Technologies had the most prime obligations reported during 2017 totaling $349 million.

Changes in Employment – Between 2017 and 2016 CMS’s civilian employee population decreased 2.5%. The agency reported having 6,143 employees through the end of fiscal year 2017. The Administrative occupation category contained 4,974 employees, just over 80% of CMS’s total employee population. The Health Insurance Administration subcategory, with 2,809 employees, made up approximately 56% of the Administrative occupation category.    

Combined, the Administrative, Professional and Other White Collar occupation categories accounted for 158 out of 159 total agency loses between 2016 and 2017. The Administrative occupation accounted for 115 these loses and the Health Insurance Administration accounted for 75 of those, followed by the Miscellaneous Administration and Program occupation with 22 loses. The only occupation to add employees was Clerical, which added one employee during the same period.

Changes in IT Budget Request – Beginning in 2019 the Office of Management and Budget instituted changes to the reporting guidance for IT spending by the Executing branch agencies. Specifically, grants to state and local government for IT systems used to administer Federal benefits are no longer reported in the annual President’s Information Technology budget request (Exhibit 53), because it is the state or local government that is responsible for the development and maintenance of the system(s), not the federal government. On the civilian side of the Federal government, the impact of this rule is most widely felt by Health and Human Services – and its underlying agencies.

Specific to CMS, the Medicaid Management Information System (NM) was not included in the FY 2019 Exhibit 53. This programs is described in the FY 2018 Exhibit 53 as ‘the Transfer of funds to the States for the federal share of State Medicaid systems costs.’  The elimination of this program from the IT budget request equates to a $7.3 billion decrease in the overall IT budget.  

The Exhibit 53 is divided into two pools of monies. Operation and Maintenance (O&M) is money requested for existing programs, while Development, Modernization and Enhancement (DME) is money requested for new programs, and indicates the addressable market for IT vendors. In FY 2019, CMS’s top five programs based on requested DME are as follows.

• CMS Innovations Core Systems; DME: $87 Million - Total: $124 Million
• CMS Quality Payment Programs (QPP); DME: $62 Million - Total $73 Million
• CMS Federally Facilitated Marketplace (FFM); DME: $55 Million - Total $275 Million
• CMS New Medicare Card (Previously known as Social Security Number removal Initiative); DME: $40 Million    Total: $40 Million
• CMS Provider Enrollment (PECOS 2.0); DME: $28 Million - Total $28 Million

Changes in the Leading Contractors – There was a slight change in both order and the contractors that made up CMS’s top contractors between fiscal years 2016 and 2017. While General Dynamics maintained the top spot, DXC Technology Company and Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Carolina flipped spots with DXC landing in second. The Serco Group climbed into the top five, pushing out Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida. Together the top five contractors accounted for approximately 34% of all of CMS’s prime spending obligations, which was in line with 33% in 2016.

                             

Source: Deltek

To explore more in-depth federal spending and budget data as well as opportunities, contracts, and task orders specific to this agency please visit the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services federal Agency Profile or download the entire CMS Agency Planner.