Summary

Most federal transportation funds are distributed to state and regional transportation entities by a legislatively set formula for different types of transportation. An exception to this rule is the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (USDOT) Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development (BUILD) Transportation Discretionary Grants program (formerly known as the TIGER program). The BUILD program is extremely flexible, with funding available for any kind of surface-transportation project and any government agency, and it the only transportation program that provides direct capital support to local transportation projects. This flexibility has made the BUILD program incredibly popular, receiving 10 times more applications than can be funded. However, the application process is extensive and can require outside assistance to produce, making the application itself too expensive for some areas to take on, especially considering the high level of competition. USDOT should create a simpler application that most public agencies can manage with internal staff to make the program more universally available to communities of all sizes and levels of capacity.

Summary

Artificial intelligence is increasingly being used to make decisions about human welfare. Automated decision systems (ADS) administer U.S. social benefits programs—such as unemployment and disability benefits—across local, state, and Federal governments. While ADS have the potential to enable large gains in efficiency, they also run a high risk of reinforcing the class- and race-based inequities of the status quo. Additionally, the use of these systems is not transparent, often leaving individuals with no meaningful recourse after a decision has been made. Individuals may not even know that ADS played a role in the decision-making process.

The Federal Government should take immediate action to promote the transparency and accountability of automated decision systems. Agencies must build internal technical capacity as well as data cultures centered around transparency, accountability, and fairness. The White House should require that agencies using ADS undertake a notice-and-comment process to disclose information about these systems to the public. Finally, in the long-term, Congress must pass comprehensive legislation to implement a single, national standard regulating the use of ADS across sectors and use cases.

Summary

COVID-19 is estimated to cost the global economy between $8 to 15 trillion USD¹, but it is not the first such outbreak, nor will it be the last. Since the 1970’s, 70% of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) have been at the human-wildlife boundary², with new infectious diseases emerging at a faster rate than ever before. Further, a common, defining feature of emerging infectious diseases is that they are triggered by anthropogenic changes to the environment. As natural environments degrade (specifically, due to climate change, loss of biodiversity and fragmentation of habitats, or invasive species), they are more likely to harbor infectious diseases and their vectors (animals or plants that transmit a pathogen)³.

This memo proposes a series of actions to shift the focus of our existing EID strategies from merely reacting to disease outbreaks – which is economically devastating – to detecting, addressing, and mitigating the major upstream factors that contribute to the emergence of such diseases prior to an outbreak, and would come at orders of magnitude lower cost. Recent analysis of the exponentially rising economic damages from increasing rates of zoonotic disease emergence suggests that strategies to mitigate pandemics would provide a 250:1 to 700:1 return on investment. Even small reductions in the estimated costs of a future pandemic would be substantial. This approach would have greater success at a much lower cost in reducing the impacts of EIDs.

The next administration should (1) launch a strategy aimed at strengthening biosurveillance systems at home and abroad through a global viral weather system for spillover, including harnessing technology and data science to create predictive risk systems; (2) eliminate existing barriers in international development and foreign policy between food security, global health, and environmental sustainability by establishing a coordinator for planetary health; (3) address and alter the incentive structures that facilitate spillover, and create new incentives for investments to reduce the risk for spillover through institutions like the Development Finance Corporation; and (4) through creating the world’s first climate & biodiversity neutral development agency, to ensure that our development investments aren’t facilitating spillover risks.

Summary

Never before have so many children in America used so much educational technology, and never before has it been so important to ensure that these technologies are secure. Currently, however, school administrators are overburdened with complex security considerations that make it challenging for them to keep student data secure. The educational technologies now common in America’s physical and virtual classrooms should meet security standards designed to protect its students. As a civil rights agency, the Department of Education has a responsibility to lead a coordinated approach to ensuring a baseline of security for all students in the American education system.

This policy initiative will support America’s students and schools at a time when educational experiences—and student information—are increasingly online and vulnerable to exploitation. The plan of action outlined below includes a new Department of Education educational technology security rule, training support for schools, a voluntary technology self-certification system, an online registry of certified technologies to help grow a secure educational technology market, and processes for industry support and collaboration in this work. Combined, these efforts will create a safer digital learning environment for the nation’s students and a more robust educational technology marketplace.

Summary

To prevent another medical supply chain breakdown like the one experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Federal Government must create an emergency response plan to activate domestic, local medical supply manufacturing. A national network of small-to-mid-size manufacturers and prototyping labs — a U.S. Prototyping and Manufacturing Reserve — should be formalized and incentivized to act as first responders for emergency innovation and medical supply manufacturing needs.

To properly equip the Reserve, the Federal Government should build a comprehensive library of open source medical and emergency supply “blueprints” — a U.S. Digital Stockpile — that consists of manufacturing requirements to enable distributed local emergency production. Combined, these new national security resources will facilitate rapid local response to both regional disasters and international supply chain disruptions.

Summary

The next administration should capitalize on recent interest in cycling spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic by committing to triple the share of commutes made by bicycle from 0.5% in 2019¹ to 1.5% by 2024. This goal is achievable through policies that make cycling safer and more affordable.

Other than walking, cycling is the least pollutive mode of transportation. Led by the Department of Transportation (USDOT), the next administration can encourage a nationwide shift from driving to cycling by adjusting various policies related to cost, road design, and automobile safety. USDOT can further encourage biking by holding states accountable for reductions in automobile vehicle miles traveled (VMT), greenhouse-gas emissions (GHG) from transportation, and traffic fatalities among cyclists and pedestrians.

Challenge and Opportunity

The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted many Americans to begin riding bicycles and electric bicycles (e-bikes) in order to exercise, enjoy the outdoors, and maintain physical distancing while traveling. Cities including Los Angeles and Houston have seen significant upticks in cycling in 2020, while bikeshare systems in Las Vegas, Chicago and New York set new ridership records. A sustained move toward cycling could reduce GHG emissions from transportation, the sector that is the largest source of GHG emissions in the United States. Pedal bikes produce less than 1/15 as much GHG/mile as taxis or ridehailing services (e.g., Uber and Lyft), and around 1/10 as much a private electric automobile. Lifecycle emissions from bikes and bikeshare are nearly as low as pedal bikes, and e-bikes in particular could replace short automobile trips in urban areas.

These data indicate that tripling the share of commutes made by bike from 0.5% today to 1.5% could, by displacing driving, reduce GHG emissions by the equivalent of 3.8 billion car trips annually. A mode shift toward biking would also improve health and reduce urban congestion (because a bike requires less street space than an automobile).²

However, there is no guarantee that the current uptick in cycling will endure. Prior “bike booms” in the United States—in the 1890s, the mid-1930s, and the early 1970s—all ultimately faded. 

Part of the challenge is that the federal government has historically done little to encourage biking. In fact, federal policies frequently impede cycling by making the activity more dangerous, especially as automobiles have grown heavier and taller (e.g., guidance that speed limits be set according to the “85th percent rule,” which pushes them higher). From 2009 to 2018, cyclist fatalities grew 38% to 1,100 annually, more than eight times the number of Americans killed from rail collisions, to which USDOT allocated $245 million in FY 2020. 

By implementing policies that make cycling safer and cheaper the federal government can pave the way for sustained growth.

Plan of Action

The next administration should take immediate steps to reduce the risk of injury or death to cyclists while reducing the financial cost of cycling. The next administration should also incentivize transportation projects that reduce VMT and GHG emissions, which will boost proposals that encourage biking. Recommended actions are presented below.

Safety 

Under the next administration, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) should implement the following specific measures to reduce biking deaths and injuries:

• Direct states to share locations of all traffic collisions resulting in death or serious injury, flagging those involving cyclists and pedestrians. NHTSA and FHWA should use the data to create annual High Injury Network maps. 
• Direct states to submit up-to-date maps of all bicycle infrastructure, including protected and unprotected bicycle lanes. USDOT field offices should audit this information, and states should receive annual grades for their efforts to reduce pedestrian and cyclist crashes. 
• NHTSA should update the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) to include metrics such as serious injuries and the presence of protected or unprotected biking infrastructure. 
• NHTSA should publish revisions to the New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) that credit automakers for vehicles that minimize risk to vulnerable pedestrians and cyclists, through crash-avoidance technologies as well as through designs reducing likelihood of serious injury or death in the event of a collision. 
• FHWA should issue guidance to states prohibiting them from setting “negative safety goals” that lead to annual increases in pedestrian and cyclist fatalities that are treated as successes. 
• FHWA should eliminate the outdated “85th percentile rule” as a recommendation in the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD).
• FHWA should issue guidance encouraging the use of federal funds on temporary “popup” projects designed as pilots for future infrastructure investments. 
• USDOT should require states to demonstrate provision of access and safe accommodation for non-motorized users (i.e., cyclists and pedestrians).

Affordability 

The next administration should take the following actions to make biking more affordable to all Americans: 

• The U.S. Trade Representative should make bicycle and bicycle components exempt from Section 301 tariffs, which would reduce the cost of importing items like children’s bikes and lithium batteries from China. This would reduce the cost to consumers of purchasing and maintaining a bicycle as well as the cost to businesses and cities of operating public bikeshare services. 
• The administration should support passage of H.R. 7330, which would make bicycle and bikeshare expenses eligible for pre-tax commuter benefits. The administration should also support revising IRS 30D, the Plug-In Electric Drive Vehicle Credit, to extend subsidies to e-bikes as well as electric automobiles.

Other actions 

The next administration should take the following additional actions to further encourage a conducive environment for biking at the state level: 

• Re-establish GHG reduction as a performance measure for transportation and issue annual ratings of state performance. 
• Revise the Surface Transportation Block Grant Program to include goals of reducing VMT. 
• Issue USDOT guidance on Section 109 of the US Code pertaining to federal-aid highways that clarifies that maintenance projects must demonstrate access for all transportation modes (e.g., protective infrastructure for cyclists and pedestrians). 
• Support the language in H.R. 2 that the FHWA adopt “fix it first” principles favoring road maintenance over new construction.

Conclusion

Locking in the sharp growth in cycling spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic could enable the American transportation network to become safer, cleaner, and more efficient, especially in urban areas. The next administration should capitalize on this opportunity through a suite of complementary actions that make biking less dangerous and more affordable. These actions will encourage those who recently began cycling to continue, while compelling millions of additional Americans to begin using a bicycle in place of an automobile.

Summary

Seven years after the creation of the U.S. Digital Service (USDS) and 18F, the Federal Government still struggles to buy, build, and operate technology in a modern, scalable way. While there have been small success stories, most government technology and delivery practices remain antiquated and ineffective. Critical systems underperforming during the COVID-19 crisis is the latest example of technology and delivery failing to meet the needs of Americans. The federal government will spend $90.9 billion on information technology (IT) projects in fiscal year (FY) 21, an increase of $15.3 billion since it began to embrace the digital-services movement in earnest in FY14 in response the high failure rate of federal IT projects. Yet the public is not receiving the value expected from this substantial investment in technology. Between 2003 and 2012, only 6.4% of IT projects with a budget of over $10 million were considered successful. 41% were complete failures that had to be scrapped and started again. There is no evidence that performance has improved on a large scale since FY12.

In spite of efforts to implement transformative technological practices, most government systems still fail to meet modern standards or expectations. The next administration should undertake a series of actions outlined in this memo to scale proven IT modernization strategies across the Federal Government to improve its structure and culture, and buy, build, and deliver technology that meets the needs of Americans today and into the future.

Summary

In his posthumous op-ed, House Representative John Lewis wrote, “Democracy is not a state. It is an act,” and challenged all Americans to “do [their] part to help build…a nation and world society at peace with itself.” In our generation, where technology is integrated into virtually every aspect of public and private life, preserving the American democracy must involve ensuring that digital tools and platforms are employed in service of our communities, facilitating the productive and equitable exchange of information and opportunity, rather than being hijacked to sow misinformation and discord. In recent months, we have observed ample examples of both cases. Young Americans are using technology to raise awareness of ongoing racial justice issues, which have led to significant policy shifts. However, at the same time, members of the public are sharing falsehoods about the COVID-19 global pandemic, costing lives and extending economic devastation.

To ensure that upcoming generations can positively leverage online spaces and rise above the ever-present call to division, digital citizenship—encompassing the critical competencies to discern fact from fiction, navigate relationships, and use technology to champion change—must be fostered, beginning in our schools where students already engage with technology regularly. The work to develop digital citizens and future leaders is underway in several states and districts, and there exists numerous ways that the federal government can supply further momentum—setting a national vision around digital citizenship, building the capacity of educators, and strategically investing necessary funds.

Summary

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the crucial need for science to inform policy. However, the science-policy interface has a broader history of systemic challenges spanning sectors, from climate, to energy, to water resources, to cybersecurity and beyond. The near-term policy window created by the pandemic offers an ideal time to act while the attention of policymakers and the public is focused on the key role of science in policy. There are five key areas of action to create meaningful progress in carving improved pathways for science advice:

1. Sharpening the focus of the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policy Act (P.L. 115-435) to define scientific knowledge as a key subset of “evidence” and develop formal structures for non-federal academic experts to participate in the development of the required agency learning agendas.
2. Widening the role of Federally-Funded Research and Development Centers., especially the Science and Technology Policy Institute.
3. Leveraging the Intergovernmental Personnel Agreement (IPA) to bring more non-federal subject matter experts into key government positions.
4. Reducing administrative barriers to the establishment of Federal Advisory Committees under the Federal Advisory Committee Act.
5. Revising the Broader Impacts Requirements for National Science Foundation grantees to include more direct pathways for the outputs of scientific research to reach decision-makers.

Grid modernization should be a major part of a national infrastructure-investment initiative. Effectively and efficiently modernizing the U.S. electric grid requires rapid deployment of innovative grid technologies. The next administration should establish a Grid Resilience Innovation Demonstration (GRID) Network, run in partnership between the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Department of Defense (DoD), to test and accelerate deployment of such technologies. The GRID Network would integrate and build on existing microgrids on federal installations and other relevant facilities, resulting in a group of geographically distributed test beds that can be managed and operated as a national user facility. The distributed nature of the network would allow test beds to ensure that solutions are compatible with a variety of grid technologies and operational structures and would also insulate the network from security threats, and other risks. Prioritizing establishment of the GRID Network early in the next administration will enable our nation to quickly realize the benefits of a modern electric grid, including enhanced resilience to natural disasters, entrepreneurship opportunities, and job growth. Failure to act will leave our national grid vulnerable to hostile actors, rob the country of needed shovel-ready construction projects and manufacturing jobs, and undermine U.S. leadership in electric sector innovation and the resulting impacts to our economy.

Challenge and Opportunity

The U.S. electric grid is a critical backbone of our nation’s economy, national security, health, and social interactions. Yet the current grid is ill-suited to modern demands. Our nation’s grid contains many critical components that were originally constructed in the early 20th century. The grid as a whole is based on an outdated structure that was not designed for today’s varying power demand requirements, such as for the internet data centers, or for the widescale integration of intermittent sources of electricity such as wind turbines and solar panels. The grid is also poorly equipped to withstand the many cyber, physical, and electromagnetic threats that exist today. 

These problems can cause extensive and expensive blackouts, such as the widespread outages across the Northeast in 2003 that cost $6 billion in damages. The possibility of foreign interference presents a threat multiplier. In 2015, a Russian assault on the Ukrainian grid cut power for six hours in the dead of winter. A similar attack on the U.S. grid is possible. In fact, the same malware the triggered the Ukraine attack has been found in US-based critical infrastructure facilities. 

There is a clear need to make the U.S. electric grid much more secure to thwart attacks, robust to withstand physical threats, resilient to ensure rapid and full recovery from adverse impacts, stronger to accommodate greater demands, and flexible to enable a broader deployment of clean-energy technologies.

Yet grid modernization is easier said than done. The U.S. electric grid is a massive, complex system that comprises various technologies for electricity generation, transmission, and distribution as well as multiple operators, regulators, and markets to ensure the continual flow of electricity. Few incentives or financially-attractive opportunities exist for grid stakeholders to demonstrate and deploy innovative models and technologies. And finally, the national-security benefits of a secure, robust, and resilient grid do not deliver direct, sufficient financial gains, creating a market failure that leaves the grid vulnerable to interference.

Plan of Action

The next administration should establish the Grid Resilience Innovation Demonstration (GRID) Network, a national-scale test facility designed to propel the nation toward a more secure, robust, and resilient grid that can strengthen economic and national security while enabling a clean-energy future. The GRID Network should comprise multiple, geographically distributed test beds that are widely accessible to institutions and researchers seeking to demonstrate technologies in prototypical environments. These test beds would be user facilities similar to those owned by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department of Energy (DOE).

The overall goal of the GRID Network would be to support development, demonstration, and deployment of innovations in grid operation and technology, which are needed to address the evolving energy needs and expanding risks. The types of innovations could run from small to large scale, and from technical to operations, for example, components for high-voltage transmission or distribution, smart meters and associated cyber controls, direct current connects and disconnects, and microgrid operations with a variety of sources, loads and sizes.

The GRID Network would focus on innovations at mid- to high technology-readiness levels, i.e., innovations that have already been demonstrated successful at a limited level and seem like promising candidates for scale-up and commercialization. GRID Network test beds would provide the capacity to test at all scales from individual components in situ up to full end-to-end tests from the electricity generator to the final use. As modernization of the grid continues to occur, the anticipated outcomes will continue to evolve, and this facility will enable more innovations to be developed rapidly and tested such that the decision and risk of implementation can be reduced, which in turn should facilitate deployment. After all, utilities and investors want proven technologies, not science projects. As a result, we will see a more resilient grid that is both more secure and more robust (i.e., less blackouts, more value, savings and/or avoided costs).

GRID Network test beds could serve as official sites for the government to validate and certify any concept or technology intended for use in national-security applications. Through partnerships with community colleges, test beds could also offer workforce-development opportunities and vocational training to prepare technicians to install and operate next-generation grid technologies.

Implicit in the proposed action is that there are innovative technologies and strategies for operation that could be tested and rapidly deployed. While this has not been demonstrated through a survey or collection of data, it is a reasonable assumption based on our knowledge of the research and development (R&D) that is being done in this area as well as some general issues that impact the rapid, successful advancement from R&D to demonstration and deployment (i.e., crossing the so-called “Valley of Death”). Having a user facility aimed at helping bridge that gap that is available to companies and researchers widely would encourage innovators and innovations to surface, as has been demonstrated to work well in the past in the DoD and DOE. A minimally viable prototype will be needed for testing, which focuses the role of the facility between “development” and “deployment.” The costs for testing would be covered by the government, and like the existing user facilities, access to apply for time on GRID would be open to all ideas through a merit-review process. As a result, innovators should be motivated to develop their ideas to a product or operations model that can be tested given the low or zero cost of testing because the value of a having a government-tested and demonstrated device or operating model will be very high.

As is typical for federally-funded user facilities, the GRID Network would be run by a private entity (e.g., an objective management organization) through a public-private partnership with government agencies: in this case, likely DoD and DOE. The partnership could be managed by either agency or by an external entity, such as the National Resilient Grid Authority (NRGA) conceptualized in a 2020 report from the National Commission on Grid Resilience. Existing microgrids and other assets at DoD and DOE sites could provide the foundation for the GRID Network. The GRID Network will also build on and enhance the grid-resilience and modernization efforts that were established and have been pursued at both agencies.

Establishing and managing the GRID Network would cost the Federal Government an estimated $25–50 million per year at the low end to $200–300 million per year at the high end. This funding range is consistent with the funding levels for similar research and development facilities that DOE and DoD have supported over the last 15 years. Funding at the high end would support more sophisticated, comprehensive testing equipment, would permit users to take more time to test ideas, and would permit testing of more high-risk, high-reward ideas. Funding at the high end would also support efforts beyond just testing, such as development of national standards and protocols for grid operations, pursuit of collaborative technologies that would benefit niche applications, such as defense resilience pilot projects, and technology certifications.

The U.S. electric grid must be modernized to enable more use of renewable energy, deploy storage, and assure we improve the resilience. A test facility, such as the GRID facility described above, could help with modernization and entice investments toward deployment of new technologies. As a result, federal investment in the GRID Network would pay off directly or indirectly in four key ways:

1. Modernizing the U.S. electric grid will create shovel-ready construction jobs across the country. Since the GRID facility would be oriented toward rapid development and deployment of innovations, the facility could help enable aggressive and comprehensive modernization of the electric grid, which would involve construction jobs.
2. Grid components that are critical to U.S. infrastructure and national security—ranging from sensors to transformers—must be made through a trusted U.S. supply chain. Investments in the GRID Network hence represent investments in American manufacturing.
3. The GRID Network will support user generation of intellectual property and associated small business start-ups because some of the innovations that are tested and deployed will be manufactured, distributed and installed by start-ups, which will strengthen the U.S. supply chain. This new wave of business activity will propel the U.S. economy for years to come.
4. Grid modernization is a huge effort that will cost at least $500 billion and likely $1–2 trillion. Investing in technologies that could facilitate modernization will retire risks for grid modernization as the decisions by the various grid operators will be based on testing at an applicable scale. As a result, the GRID facility should help ensure the costs for grid modernization are in the middle of the range rather than at the higher end or above.

Conclusion

The U.S. electric grid is a crucial piece of the nation’s infrastructure. If it fails, critical sectors such as finance, healthcare, transportation, defense, agriculture, and manufacturing are at risk of failure as well. Yet the grid remains unacceptably vulnerable to threats large and small. There is a real danger of attacks on the grid by adversarial nations, and natural disasters can wipe out large sections of the grid for hours, days, or longer. Even factors as seemingly trivial as mylar balloons, small arms fire, and broken tree branches can cause costly damage when they interfere with critical grid components. It is past time to create a more robust and resilient system. Creating a testing ground for innovative solutions in grid operations and technology is an important step: one that will not only shore up a glaring weakness in our national security, but will also boost our economy through shovel-ready construction projects, creation of new and good-paying jobs, and development of intellectual property.

Summary

The next administration should establish a national fellowship for scientists and engineers to accelerate the transformation of research discoveries into scalable, market-ready technologies. Entrepreneurship is driving innovation across the U.S. economy—with the troubling exception of early-stage science. Transitioning scientific discoveries from the laboratory into prototypes remains too speculative and costly to garner significant support from industry or venture-capital firms. This makes it difficult for many of our nation’s science innovators to translate their research into new products and puts the United States at risk of falling behind in the quickly evolving global economy.

Entrepreneurial fellowships for scientists and engineers have emerged as an effective strategy for translating research into new products and businesses, showing tremendous early impact and a readiness to scale. The next administration should advance this proven strategy at the federal level by creating a national entrepreneurial fellowship. This new entrepreneurial fellowship would leverage our nation’s investments in science to drive national prosperity, security, and global competitiveness.

Summary

The United States accounts for over 20% of global deaths related to COVID-19 despite only having 4% of the world’s population. This unacceptable reality is in part due to the tsunami of misinformation surrounding COVID-19 that has flooded our nation. Misinformation not only decreases current compliance with best practices for containing and mitigating the spread of COVID-19, but will also feed directly into resistance against future administration of a vaccine or additional public-health measures.

The next administration should establish an office at the Department of Health and Human Services dedicated to combating COVID-19 misinformation. This office should lead a coordinated effort that:

1. Ensures that evidence-based findings are at the core of COVID-19 response strategies.
2. Utilizes data science and behavioral analytics to detect and counter COVID-19 misinformation.
3. Works with social-media companies to remove misinformation from online platforms.
4. Partners with online influencers to promote credible information about COVID-19.
5. Encourages two-way conversations between public-health officials and the general public.
6. Ensures that public-health communications are supported by on-the-ground action.