mr. werfel -- okay. i think you've been a very good witness and i appreciate your forthcoming. we invited mr. zens down and for some reason he couldn't make it, and as i understand it, he is responsible for handling the ig portfolio for the white house. as i understand it, he's the executive chairman of the cigie, and the president's liaison to the ig community. what i'd like to know is who makes the recommendations for new igs to the president? i mean, somebody la to say to the president, and the reason i think we asked mr. zins to come up here is because he's charged with the responsibility of this coordination process. so i think that many of us thought that maybe he was the one or somebody working with him was the one that made these recommendations to the president. do you have any idea who makes the recommendations? bu i'm sure the president with a vast bureaucracy we have doesn't have time to go through everything and try to pick out somebody that's qualified. so somebody's making those recommendations. do you know who that is? >> well, first of all let me clarify, congre

mr. werfel? again, i hope we can make something positive out of this hearing. if you need additional help to move these along, anything we can do, i'll be glad to do. >> mr. connolly did you seek recognition? mr. connolly's recognized for 11 minutes. >> i promise, mr. chairman, i won't take that long and i thank you. i simply -- well, first of all, let me ask you, mr. werfel, you're in omb. did the administration increase the budget for inspector generals? >> what's gone on -- in some cases yes. for example i mentioned earlier the state department inspector general budget has gone from roughly $59 million in 2011 to $66 million in 2013. >> just looking at the global figure? >> well, globally, it has increased. it certainly hasn't decreased in any meaningful way. we're at $2.6 billion for igs in 2011. $2.7 billion for igs in 2012 and roughly $2.7 billion is in the president's budget for 2015. i think that's notable given that in just about every other area we're seeing significant cuts in discreti

mr. werfel? >> we have evidence of particular activities within the irs who have a clear, positive return on investment. >> so it puzzles me sometimes that despite our rhetoric about wanting to reduce the debt, wanting to make sure that we get government right-sized we're not willing to make the investments sometimes in proven entities that can recover either lost revenue or avoid inefficiencies and improper payments. you testified many times on the improper payment issue. very little pain associated with that, huge payoff. final point i want to make is, and then i will yield back, mr. chairman, but the chairman talked about gsa. i do not share the clarity of the chairman about some of the conversations he cited with respect to the white house. mr. miller, passing reference have you seen an ig report or the ig report, hardly means or is to be construed as recognition that full knowledge was made available, but i will point out, we had the ig from gsa here. we had the yowl going administrator who

mr. werfel. how long have you been in government, mr. werfel? >> 15 years. >> 15 years. do you -- do you think we've made public service more and more attractive by the day? >> it's a challenging time to be a federal employee. i think -- i have two reactions to that question. on the one hand, i feel that the challenges our country faces have never been -- never been more critical and never been more important. when i go to sleep at night, you know, i think about the immense challenge that the federal workforce has before it and how important that work is and it's energizing and motivating to know that when you're serving your country by serving the federal government that that has real meaning and purpose, and it can be a truly motivating factor. at the same time, it's important that we, that we are investing in our people effectively and by doing that recognizing the great work that they're doing. recognizing the important role that they play, and -- you know, there are circumstances in which sometimes the federal employee can be the punching bag. >> well, let me just a

mr. werfel. as i understand it, you and mr. zants are responsible to coordinate between various comptrollers or investigators in the government. is that correct? >> we have somewhat of a limited role on the council of i.g.s. we play more of an administrative role under the i.g. reform act. the sweet spot for the role of omb, myself, and acting director zions, is to work with the inspector general community, to understand what they're seeing, what trends they're seeing, what findings they're leading to, to help inform omb on the right policies to issue across government to help deal with those issues. that's the primary focus of our work with the i.g.s, is to learn from one another about how we can strategize together as omb to coordinate cross-government activities, and the i.g.s can learn from us so they can focus their investigations appropriately. >> let me ask you a question. mr. zants is the acting head of omb. right? >> that's correct. >> why hasn't the administration sent his name up for confirmation, or have they? >> at