U.S. to Increase Efforts to Collect Delinquent Debts

The Reagan Administration announced stepped-up efforts Friday to collect $68 billion in delinquent debts and government loans, with one official declaring that “Uncle Sam ain’t gonna be Uncle Patsy anymore.”

At a Justice Department news conference, officials said they will use four laws recently signed by President Reagan to toughen federal debt collection and better combat waste, fraud and abuse.

The new laws are the Federal Debt Recovery Act, the False Claims Act Amendments, the Program Fraud Civil Remedies Act and the Anti-Kickback Act.

Private Lawyers

The Federal Debt Recovery Act allows the attorney general to hire private lawyers experienced in debt collection to help government lawyers recover some of the smaller outstanding debts that borrowers have refused to pay.

Joseph R. Wright Jr., deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget, said this is the first time that private attorneys are being used by the government to collect debts.

The government recently began using private collection agencies to collect bad debts.

Wright said a total of $350 billion is owed to the federal government, of which $68 billion is delinquent. Of the delinquent debts, $28 billion, or about 41%, are loans to farmers, small businesses, veterans and students.

No ‘Uncle Patsy’

“Uncle Sam ain’t gonna be Uncle Patsy anymore,” Wright said to those who owe the government money. “It ain’t gonna be like it was in the good old 1960s and 1970s. It’s going to be very tough to get by with it anymore.”

Assistant Atty. Gen. Richard K. Willard described the package of new laws to fight fraud and collect outstanding debts as so good they are “like a wish list that the lawyers who prosecute these cases made up.”