Strategic Plan: Fiscal Years 24-29

The Amtrak Office of Inspector General (OIG) Strategic Action Plan for Fiscal Years 2024-2029 outlines the mission, vison, and values; organizational goals; and actions that guide and drive our organization as we accomplish, with integrity, our mission to provide independent, objective, and non-partisan oversight of Amtrak’s programs and operations through our audits and investigations.

When the COVID-19 pandemic devastated Amtrak’s ridership and revenue, the company’s day-to-day operations and workforce were dramatically affected. For example, in February 2019, Amtrak was on pace to achieve its highest levels of ridership and revenue since its establishment in 1971. By March 2019, however, the pandemic had caused it to lose 97 percent of its ridership. Pandemic relief laws provided Amtrak a total of $3.7 billion in emergency funding, and in November 2021, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) gave it access to as much as $66 billion in funding for capital needs from FY 2022-2026—the largest investment in passenger rail since Amtrak’s establishment.

The economic impact of the pandemic—along with the influx of funding from pandemic relief laws and the IIJA—not only required Amtrak to pivot with extraordinary agility, but also required the OIG to follow suit. Accordingly, our Strategic Plan became an Action Plan driven by our operational need to adjust to the quickly evolving functional, fiscal, and organizational state of the company in the wake of these dynamic events.