Legislation would give A-76 appeal rights to federal employees

Defense Department employees would have A-76 appeals rights under a bill introduced Tuesday by Rep. Charlie Gonzalez, D-Texas. Currently, only private contractors have the right to appeal and have judicial reviews when their contract bid is rejected. Gonzalez's bill, H.R. 2227, would amend title 10 of the U.S. Code and give Defense employees appeal rights in conjunction with Office of Management and Budget Circular A-76, which requires that competition between federal employees and a contractor is held before any work is outsourced, with the work going to the lowest bidder. "The current A-76 process was written by and for private companies," said American Federation of Government Employees President Bobby Harnage, who said the new bill would give the employees "standing to challenge the improperly and unfairly run A-76 competitions." AFGE has taken five cases to court in the past year, including one involving Manassas, Va.-based EG&G Logistics, which won a contract in April 2000 to run a Defense Logistics Agency distribution depot in Warner Robins, Ga., after more than a year of public-private competition between the facility's employees and private firms. Approximately 450 depot jobs were to be outsourced under the competition. AFGE appealed the decision to DLA, claiming the cost comparison between the private firm's bid and DLA's bid was erroneous. When that appeal was rejected, AFGE took its protest to the General Accounting Office's comptroller general, who dismissed it last July on the grounds that the employees are not considered "interested parties" under the law. "Federal employees were about to lose their jobs and the union that represented them did not have prudential standing to be in court representing them," said Martin R. Cohen, AFGE's assistant general counsel for litigation. According to Martin, government employees want the same rights afforded to government contractors under A-76. "If a contractor loses to the government bid, the contractor has a right to go into the U.S. Court of Claims and appeal and get all kinds of related judicial consideration and temporary relief and we would like the same thing," Cohen said. "We are not asking for anything more than the contractors get, but we don't want less and right now we get dramatically less." In December, the Defense Department launched a review of all Air Force A-76 competitions because of a controversial public-private competition involving hundreds of jobs at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas. The Lackland contract award was reversed several times, prompting AFGE and lawmakers to question the fairness of the competition. Gonzalez, one of several legislators who called for the Air Force review, called the A-76 competition system unfair and said his legislation "is the first step toward leveling the playing field." "Private contractors bidding in A-76 competitions have an unjust advantage over the Civil Service employees whose jobs and lives are being impacted," Gonzalez said. "Simply stated, private contractors have more legal and appeal rights than those granted to the people competing to keep their jobs."