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Correspondence

Date

Quarterly Report on Cost-Savings Accrued by Amtrak Operational Reform

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On January 18, as mandated by Congress in the Conference Report accompanying the Fiscal Year (FY) 2006 Appropriations Act for the Department of Transportation, we issued our quarterly report to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees providing the baseline from which we will measure Amtrak's FY 2007 operational reform savings and our assessment of the savings Amtrak achieved from operational reforms in FY 2006. We have set the FY 2007 operational reform savings baseline at $550 million. Amtrak proposes to achieve $61 million of this amount from FY 2007 operational reforms and $19 million from other savings. The remaining $470 million will need to come from a combination of the Federal appropriation for operating subsidies and further savings. Amtrak's $61.3 million in savings from operational reforms in FY 2006 contributed to its better-than-expected financial performance. Amtrak's $433 million operating loss in FY 2006 was $52 million below its FY 2006 operating grant appropriation of $485 million and $153 million below its own FY 2006 projection of a $586 million operating loss. As required by Congress, reports requested by the House and Senate Appropriations Committees are subject to a 15 day hold before being publicly released. In compliance with that requirement, the report was withheld from public release until February 5.