Summary: GAO reviewed steps taken by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to strengthen its information technology (IT) investment management and acquisition capabilities. The Bureau took these actions to address recommendations made in an earlier report on the failure of the Automated Land and Mineral Record System (ALMRS) to meet BLM's business needs. GAO found that since 1999, BLM has been working to implement GAO recommendations to determine the usefulness of ALMRS and to assess and strengthen its IT investment management and acquisition capabilities. Although the bureau has not yet finished these efforts, it has begun to apply improved management strategies for selecting IT investments, develop processes and practices for controlling and evaluating investments, and build a more mature systems acquisition capability. However, before completing and institutionalizing new investment control processes, the Bureau has begun moving forward with an IT acquisition. As a result, BLM's efforts may be subject to the same project management and management oversight risks that adversely affected the ALMRS/Modernization.
