Seeking Great Ideas to SAVE Dollars

This week, the Attorney General joins President Obama in announcing the launch of the 2011 SAVE Award.  Unveiled in 2009, the SAVE Award (Securing Americans Value and Efficiency) collects ideas from thousands of federal employees about how the federal government can save money and perform better.  In an email to employees, Attorney General Eric Holder encouraged Justice Department  employees to participate in the annual contest: Now is the time to fix what doesn’t work and identify ways to work smarter. Over the past two years, federal employees have submitted more than 56,000 cost-cutting ideas through the SAVE Award. OMB narrows the list down to four of the best ideas. Those ideas are posted online and the American people vote for a winner who will come to Washington to present their fresh idea to the President. Since the creation of the award, Justice Department employees have come up with some great ideas. We’re proud that the 2010 SAVE Award winner was Bureau of Prisons (BOP) employee, Trudy Givens. Givens, a 20-year employee of the BOP from Wisconsin saw that no one was reading the hard copies of the Federal Register delivered to her office each day. She said it just didn’t make sense to print and send thousands of copies to employees when the Federal Register is available online. While that may sound small, those costs add up across the Federal government, and her idea is expected to save millions of taxpayer dollars each year. This year, we hope to find similarly great ideas from our employees. All federal employees are encouraged to learn more about the award at http://www.whitehouse.gov/save-award. Register and submit ideas online at http://saveaward2011.ideascale.com/ until July 29, 2011.