Paperwork Reduction Act of 1980

Citation: Paperwork Reduction Act of 1980, 94 Stat. 2812, 44 U.S.C. §3501 et seq.

Replacing the ineffective Federal Reports Act of 1942, the original Paperwork Reduction Act of 1980 (PRA) was enacted largely to relieve the public from the mounting information collection and reporting requirements of the federal government. It also promoted coordinated information management activities on a governmentwide basis by the director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and prescribed information management responsibilities for the executive agencies as well. The management focus of the PRA was sharpened with the 1986 amendments, which refined the concept of "information resources management" (IRM), defined as "the planning, budgeting, organizing, directing, training, promoting, controlling, and management activities associated with the burden, collection, creation, use, and dissemination of information by agencies, and includes the management of information and related resources such as automatic data processing equipment." This key term and its subset concepts received further definition and explanation in the PRA of 1995, making IRM a tool for managing the contribution of information activities to program performance, and for managing related resources, such as personnel, equipment, funds, and technology.