TOPICS
TOPICS
Legislators rip DHS contracting practices
Lawmakers put Homeland Security Department officials on the spot at a Thursday hearing, pushing for assurances that widely publicized contracting problems highlighted in a new committee report would not recur.
The report on the DHS acquisition system, requested by House Government Reform Committee chairman Tom Davis, R-Va., and ranking member Henry Waxman, D-Calif., compiled information on 32 agency contracts that were identified as having significant wasteful spending or mismanagement. The contracts were worth a total of $34.3 billion.
Many of the contracts have been in the spotlight before. Among those highlighted were a $1.7 billion Federal Emergency Management Agency contract for trailers to house people affected by Hurricane Katrina, many of which have not been used; failures in the $10 billion US VISIT program implementation; and the purchase of radiation detectors that reportedly cannot distinguish between nuclear material and common household materials such as cat litter and bananas.
The committee report cited rapidly increasing contract spending at DHS, a rise in the number of contracts awarded noncompetitively and a lack of contract management stemming in part from a shortage of procurement personnel.
But in testimony before the committee, officials from the DHS acquisition team said the department's relatively recent creation and short deadlines, as well as sometimes overly broad contract requirements, were central to the problems.
David Zavada, assistant inspector general in DHS' Office of Audits, described the department, which was formed in March 2003 from 23 agencies, as "very young." He said officials are working hard to bring disparate cultures together, but know they must also be ready to perform their missions.
Zavada said the shortage of properly trained acquisition personnel was a critical part of the problem. "The combination of broadly defined contracts and lack of staffing, mixed with aggressive timelines, is a formula for a high-risk area," he said.
One line of questioning focused on a request for proposals for the Secure Border Initiative, which seeks "reliable ... cost effective solution(s) to manage, control and secure the border," but does not spell out the department's specific needs. At the time the RFP was released, Deputy Secretary Michael Jackson told companies, "We're asking you to come back and tell us how to do our business."
"That's not governing," Waxman said. "That's not planning. It's utter incompetence, and it's going to cost the taxpayers billions."
The committee report noted that in fiscal 2005, more than half of DHS contract dollars were awarded without full and open competition.
Michael Sullivan, director of acquisition sourcing and management at the Government Accountability Office, said no-bid contracts are sometimes necessary in exceptional circumstances, for example in acquiring a particular proprietary technology. He noted that competition is preferred.
The SBI contract, which nearing its September deadline for selection of a prime contractor, appears to be at the intersection of accelerated scheduling, broad requirements and still-emerging technologies -- giving it "tremendous risks," Zavada said.
Davis expressed little sympathy for the agency.
"DHS has been tasked with critical missions subject to hard deadlines," he said. "Addressing our myriad vulnerabilities requires the department to acquire complex, high-risk, state-of-the-art solutions likely to have problems even under an ideal management structure. With so much at stake, and so little room for error, the size or difficulty of the challenge can be no excuse for a failure to put an effective management structure in place."
COMMENTS
- Davis and Waxman aren't fooling anyone! Until two months ago Jim Williams headed US VISIT because Reps. Davis and Waxman approved Williams for that leadership post. All the problems Waxman and Davis cite with the program were their own doing! Williams answered to Davis and Waxman! As a reward for quashing competition in the US VISIT program to adhere to Davis and Waxman's special interest agenda, Davis and Waxman since have approved Jim Williams to head GSA FAS (merger of FTS and FSS) so that Williams will quash competition at the GSA as he did with US VISIT, taking over where David Safavian left off! I have a bottle of champagne in my refrigerator to be opened each time one of these three shady characters is indicted! Most importantly, the criticisms Waxman and Davis have of programs such as US VISIT were created by their own doings; they're the architects that fixed the DHS' programs so that the awards were made with little to no competition. The quotes in this article are crafty statements released into the press to detract from Davis and Waxman's own corruption! However, readers' memories aren't so short. Davis and Waxman installed Williams into US VISIT to carryout their special interest agenda and since it involved the releasing of incompetent technologies, Davis and Waxman moved Williams out of US VISIT to protect him, then assigned blame to people who hadn't anything to do with the shortcomings. The blame should be assigned where it is due: Davis and Waxman! Dawn Posted August 3, 2006 1:20 PM
- Wow, let the contractors write the SOW and tell the government what they need. What is wrong with that? Everything. The government writes a SOW to let industry know what we need. You can comply with it or not bid. Negotiations are expected of course but the government not the contractor decides if the SOW is being met. It seems that the contracting out of all government has now gotten to the point that industry runs the show. Just because DHS is full of incompetents doesn't mean we give the government away. We need to fix DHS from the top down not give responsibility away to contractors. GovExec.com reader Posted August 1, 2006 1:23 PM
- And this sad saga of waste and more waste at DHS goes on and on and on. Just a few short months ago we read about $100 extension cord rentals and crazy money spent at TSA to hire ex-convicts. TSA management spending millions on their own awards parties. FEMA is wasting millions and millions of dollars on unused trailers while the numbers of homeless in the United States continue to rise. One contract after another deemed wasteful at DHS while the rest of the government suffers a shortage of resources that is truly criminal. Please end our suffering and take DHS apart. This department is so managerial inept no amount of band-aides is going to fix it. It was incredibly harmful what was done to the Customs Service and having a financially weak CBP, ICE and CIS all fighting each other for resources is shameful. And while you are at it and considering saving money, please consider dismantling the Commerce Department as well. There is no logical reason for NOAA, NIST, PTO and Census to have to report to the former CEO of the Kellogg Company!!! The Commerce Department does more damage to these agencies than people even realize. HR Specialist GovExec.com reader Posted July 28, 2006 7:55 AM
