Committee of Senior Budget Officials (SBO) Ms. Kelly Kinneen
1.
What is the mission and mandate of your Committee?
The mission and mandate of the SBO is to ensure fiscal sustainability and effective resource allocation through proper budgetary governance and management. In other words, the SBO fosters engagement with budget officials from Members and non-Members to work through complex budgetary issues, promote transparency, support multifaceted policy goals like addressing climate change and other activities, while encouraging a global dialogue. 2. You have been designated Committee Chair. What is your background and what has convinced you to take up this post? How do you consider your background and experience contribute to such a role and function? I have been at the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) since 2006. I started my career at OMB as an analyst on pension and retirement issues -- a primary driver of expenditures in almost every OECD country – which led to an interest in budget and fiscal policy more broadly. But even more importantly, I found at OMB an alignment between what I love to do – which is bring together people with disparate and even conflicting interests to solve hard problems – and the very role of a budget institution. My career at OMB has been a series of progression to roles that allow me to think enterprise and government-wide about how to create partnerships and collaboration amidst ever-present conflicts over constrained resources. I became OMB’s senior career budget official in 2017. As chair of the SBO, I have the opportunity to do much the same thing I do at OMB, but with budget officials from all over the world. 3. What is your main priority as Chair? In the near term, my main priority is to simply give senior budget officials a network to connect after the hardest few years that many of us have ever had. Budget institutions delivered historical levels of fiscal stimulus at incredible speed while still maintaining a responsibility for ensuring high levels of performance and transparency. To paraphrase an SBO colleague, "We used to have an ’off’ season. Not anymore." Having a forum (and time) to step back, reflect, and learn together has never felt so critical. 4. How would you define the added value of your Committee in relation to the work of the OECD in an international context? How does it differ from other international fora dealing with the same topic? The Committee acts to help countries to Spend Better. Current and emerging fiscal pressures will require many countries to examine their levels of spending and taxation, and prompt discussions about how best to reallocate funding from lower to higher priorities. This will test the quality of our budget institutions like never before. The Committee is an unparalleled forum for budget directors to engage in a frank and open exchange
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