[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 7710 Introduced in House (IH)]
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118th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. R. 7710
To authorize and encourage the United States Agency for International
Development to pursue a model of locally led development and
humanitarian response and expand engagement with local partners and
increase its local partner base.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
March 19, 2024
Ms. Jacobs (for herself and Mr. Mills) introduced the following bill;
which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs
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A BILL
To authorize and encourage the United States Agency for International
Development to pursue a model of locally led development and
humanitarian response and expand engagement with local partners and
increase its local partner base.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Locally Led Development and
Humanitarian Response Act''.
SEC. 2. PURPOSE.
The purpose of this Act is to encourage the United States Agency
for International Development to pursue a model of locally led
development and humanitarian response and expand engagement and
partnership with local entities.
SEC. 3. SENSE OF CONGRESS.
It is the sense of Congress that--
(1) locally led development and humanitarian response is
linked to more efficient and sustainable development and
humanitarian outcomes, and is vital to building long-term self-
reliance;
(2) over multiple Administrations, USAID has sought to
achieve greater development outcomes through stronger local
partnerships, including through ``Country Ownership'', ``The
Journey to Self-Reliance'', and ``Locally Led Development'';
(3) USAID should increase direct funding to local entities,
including by increasing the amount of development and
humanitarian assistance to such entities;
(4) USAID should ensure its programming enables local
communities to exercise leadership over priorities, project
design, implementation, and measuring and evaluating results of
such programs;
(5) working with local partners often requires more time
and resources than traditional partners, including extended
availability of funds and additional staff resources; and
(6) increased flexibility is critical to enable USAID to
respond to local priorities and leverage local capacities,
including with respect to staffing, availability of funds,
program design, and acquisition and assistance processes, among
other areas.
SEC. 4. WORKING WITH LOCAL PARTNERS.
(a) In General.--To the extent feasible and appropriate, the
Administrator of USAID should localize USAID's partner base by
considering--
(1) simplifying and increasing access to USAID resources
for local partners in humanitarian and development sectors,
including local partners who have relations, agency, or power
structures in place that have produced, or can produce, strong
trust, accountability, and legitimacy in the communities or
networks such partners work in;
(2) diversifying award types to streamline performance
requirements and working with the Office of Management and
Budget to address threshold constraints such as fixed amount
subaward thresholds, category management award targets, and
other thresholds, policies, and contracting incentives that
pose a barrier to effectively supporting local partners;
(3) streamlining monitoring and evaluation, periodic
reporting, and other USAID reporting requirements;
(4) ensuring USAID staff is able and encouraged to conduct
regular consultation with local partners in local languages of
the host countries, making available solicitations for
acquisitions and assistance and accepting submissions in local
languages, video format, or verbal presentations, including
by--
(A) investing in translation services;
(B) hosting workshop-based engagements; and
(C) advertising solicitations in local trade
publications, local media including newspapers and
radio, local community centers, and local online
forums;
(5) allowing and promoting multi-year, flexible, tiered and
milestone-based funding for new programs and to bring
successful programs to scale;
(6) strengthening USAID staff and local partners' capacity
to undertake risk management and mitigation;
(7) supporting consistent and unimpeded access to full cost
recovery for local partners implementing USAID-funded
activities;
(8) assessing current definitions of ``local partner'',
``local ownership'', and ``localization'' used by USAID for
programming and reporting metrics, and updating the
definitions, as necessary;
(9) undertaking outreach campaigns and engaging with local
partners, formally and informally, to raise awareness about
opportunities, as well as how to apply for and manage awards in
compliance with applicable Federal regulations and USAID
policies, and ensuring such engagement is accessible to all
entities, including unregistered and informal organizations;
(10) strengthening oversight of capacity strengthening
components of awards to ensure United States and international
awardees are making good-faith efforts to strengthen local
organizations' capacities, including independent and external
evaluations to evaluate the mentorship process and regular
feedback loops;
(11) expeditiously solving the shortage of contracting
officers within USAID, including granting warrants to qualified
staff and providing appropriate training;
(12) addressing performance evaluation criteria to create
greater workforce incentives for USAID personnel to champion
locally led development;
(13) addressing internal delays and recipient organization
issues that result in the required extension of provisional
Negotiated Indirect Cost Rates (NICRAs);
(14) conducting NICRA seminars in local languages and
providing NICRA documentation in local languages; and
(15) ensuring that contracting officers and agreement
officers communicate to awardees who do not submit for a NICRA
that they are eligible for the de minimis indirect cost rate.
SEC. 5. INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF ACTIONS DESCRIBED IN SECTION 4.
Not later than 180 days after the date of the enactment of this
Act, the Administrator of USAID shall initiate policy actions,
including rulemaking if necessary, to institutionalize the actions
described in section 4 to the extent appropriate and feasible within
all relevant USAID internal rules and regulations, including the
Automated Directive System (ADS), the Acquisition and Assistance
Strategy, the Local Capacity Strengthening Policy, the Localization of
Humanitarian Assistance Strategy, the USAID Acquisition Regulation
(AIDAR), the Local Systems Framework, and the Private Sector Engagement
Policy.
SEC. 6. AUTHORITY TO ACCEPT APPLICATIONS, PROPOSALS, AND CONTRACTING
AGREEMENTS IN LOCAL LANGUAGES AND LOCAL LANGUAGE SUPPORT.
(a) In General.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law, USAID
is authorized to accept applications or proposals in languages other
than English if such acceptance eases the burden of a local entity
working with USAID and USAID is able to effectively evaluate such
applications or proposals.
(b) Local Language Support.--
(1) In general.--The Administrator of USAID shall conduct
an assessment of options to enable USAID to utilize local
languages to support local partners with award solicitations,
proposals and applications, evaluations, management, and close
out, including advising local partners on applicable United
States regulations and USAID policies and local country rules
and regulations common in such activities.
(2) Report.--Not later than 1 year after the date of the
enactment of this Act, the Administrator of USAID shall submit
to Congress a report on the assessment described in this
subsection.
SEC. 7. MODIFICATIONS RELATING TO THE CODE OF FEDERAL REGULATIONS AND
OTHER REQUIREMENTS.
(a) Increase in the De Minimis Indirect Cost.--The Administrator of
USAID is authorized to increase the de minimis indirect cost rate
provided for in section 200.414 of title 2, Code of Federal
Regulations, or any successor regulations, to 15 percent for local
entities receiving USAID assistance awards and to establish a similar
de minimis indirect cost rate of 15 percent for acquisitions awarded
under title 48 of the Code of Federal Regulations to local entities,
and to increase this threshold further should subsequent Office of
Management and Budget regulations recommend doing so.
(b) Exemption for Local Entities.--The Administrator of USAID is
authorized to exempt local entities, as needed, from the reporting
requirements of the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act
of 2006 (31 U.S.C. 6106 note; Public Law 109-282) to allow for a 180-
day delay in obtaining a unique entity identifier and registration in
the System for Award Management. This delay shall be no later than 30
days prior to the end of the award's period of performance.
(c) Local Competition Authority.--Notwithstanding any other
provision of law, the Administrator of USAID (or the Administrator's
designees) may award contracts and other acquisition instruments in
which competition is limited to local entities if doing so would result
in cost savings, strengthen local capacity, or enable USAID to deliver
a programs or activities more sustainably or quickly than if
competition were not so limited. Such authority may not be used to make
acquisition awards in excess of $25,000,000 and shall not exceed more
than 10 percent of the amounts appropriated to USAID each fiscal year.
(d) Use of National or International Generally Accepted Accounting
Principles.--The Administrator of USAID, in consultation with the
Administrator of the General Services Administration, the Secretary of
Defense, and the Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration, is authorized to allow foreign entities to use national
or international generally accepted accounting principles instead of
United States Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) for
contracts or grants awarded under the chapter 7 of title 48, Code of
Federal Regulations or chapter 7 of title 2, Code of Federal
Regulations.
SEC. 8. ANNUAL REPORT.
Not later than 180 days after the end of each fiscal year following
the date of the enactment of this Act, and annually thereafter, the
Administrator of USAID shall submit to the appropriate congressional
committees and publish on USAID's website a report on USAID's progress
to advance locally led development and humanitarian response, to
include the following elements:
(1) The amount of funding implemented directly and
indirectly by local entities in the previous fiscal year,
including all development and humanitarian assistance programs.
(2) An assessment of how USAID is enabling more local
leadership of USAID-funded programs, including recipients of
direct funding, subrecipients and subcontractors to an
international implementing partner, participants in a USAID
program, or members of a community affected by USAID
programming.
(3) An assessment of progress implementing the Acquisitions
and Assistance Strategy, including updated information on the
ratio of the USAID Acquisitions and Assistance workforce to
award dollars managed with comparison to other relevant
agencies; the Local Capacity Strengthening Policy; the Policy
on Locally Led Humanitarian Assistance; and any other relevant
strategies and policies.
(4) An assessment of how USAID is using new authorities
granted in sections 6 and 7 and an assessment of the impact of
these authorities on USAID's ability to work with local
partners.
(5) An assessment of how many organizations with a
Negotiated Indirect Cost Rate (NICRA) cognizant to USAID are
utilizing provisional NICRAs for over 48 months without a final
NICRA and steps that USAID can take to reduce the extension of
provisional NICRAs beyond 12 months.
SEC. 9. REPORT ON CONTRACTING OFFICERS.
Not later than 180 days after the enactment of this Act, the
Administrator of USAID shall provide a report to the appropriate
congressional committees on the recruitment and retention of
contracting officers and agreement officers at USAID and
recommendations to improve contracting/agreement officer recruitment
and retention.
SEC. 10. DEFINITIONS.
In this Act:
(1) Appropriate congressional committees.--The term
``appropriate congressional committees'' means--
(A) the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the
Committee on Appropriations of the House of
Representatives; and
(B) the Committee on Foreign Relations and the
Committee on Appropriations of the Senate.
(2) USAID.--The term ``USAID'' means the United States
Agency for International Development.
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