Return to Article: Contracting giant wins huge FAA job competition
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10131
As an FAA employee I found that the Flight Service people are perhaps the hardest working Specialists in the entire FAA. Their work is often non stop. They are not afforded the 1-2 hour breaks the other folks in Tower and Enroute get. The public just doesn't seem to care that these folks are on position for an hour, and on break for 1-2 hours. Example is NY Tracon. This is not unusual behavior, but this is the average through out the FAA at most towers and centers. That's right! we as taxpayers have folks making 50 bucks an hour, reading books, shooting pool or going online, while their buddies pick up the slack. The FAA Air Traffic division could probably signifcantly cut down on operational errors if the controllers would just sit down in their chairs more often, and do a good day's work! This is truly the biggest scam in the entire federal government!
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10050
Thank Goodness for Lockheed and GWB. Finally, we pilots will get to use automated equipment to file our flight plans and get our weather briefings like the rest of the civilized world. We won't miss the 15 minute briefings and copying information in pencil. Looks like FAA's weather breifing system finally made it to the 1990s! The only people who are disgruntled over this issue are the NAATS employees who have soaked the American public for years.
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9736
For a supposedly efficient company, Lockheed Martin "MISPLACED" application information on hundreds of FAA employees invalidating those applications until corrected. That thru the first come/first served rule out the window. People who in faith thought thier applications were in were told they could not be considered until the infomation missing was updated and that only those whose forms were "COMPLETE" were offered transfers, effectively insuring the rest only temporary jobs until their facilities close.
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9295
Attention Phil Boyer! You have been had. Within a year general aviation user fees will become a reality.
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9213
Sure hope that all the people that are writing about LOCKHEED taking over our jobs didn't vote for GWB, if you did then stop your complaining, you are only getting what you voted for, face it..half the people where I work did, and they still can't figure it out...you voted yourself out of a job.
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9163
These are the facts:
The incompetent bureaucrats that were unable to bring even a modicum of modernization to its FSS facilities still retain bureaucratic control. Despite having spent almost $500,000,000 in a failed effort, they are still at the helm or have been hired by Lockheed-Martin.
Lockheed-Martin has agreed to operate these facilities in accordance with FAA Order 7110.10. This order should have been scrapped long ago, as it is a significant barrier to FSS modernization. Some of it's requirements were established when the teletype was the pinacle of technology.
The Lockheed-Martin FS21 system must still interface with other antiquated government telecommunication systems. NADIN and USNS are equally outdated and in need of transformation.
The last two FAA administrators are not industry professionals. They are, in fact, established prefessional bureaucrats.
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8641
It's unbelievable how everyone has swallowed the lies that Marion Blakey and Russ Chew have spouted about Flight Service. They don't even know what we actually do. They have inflated our costs to make privatization look good! Lockheed will not be able to match our service while cutting employees and stations. Oh, by the way, the FAA is fighting our getting other ATO jobs. And the only people Lockheed are keeping are the ones whose stations are staying open. The rest of us are not guaranteed employment with them after our stations close. Nice huh? Figures lie and liars figure. That's the new FAA motto.
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8295
Is anyone going to protest this A-76? I thought even Angela Styles said it was rigged in favor of contractors.
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8201
A-76, A PROGRAM FOR THE RICH!
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8177
Government Consultant, please, once again, leave now and save us another day.
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8147
RE: figuring out the costs -
The way it works is that the gov't issued a solicitation that specified the service they wanted to purchse, not the number of stations, number of people, etc they wanted to hire. They key was the products/services desired. The private sector bidders then put together the proposals on how they would provide it, and the gov't did the same.
Your calculations, while correct, don't account for the key which is methodology. For example - I can have a workforce that I have to transport from their various homes to an organization's HQ. I can do it by issuing 58 motorcycles with resulting low per/vehicle and high per/person costs, do it with large tour buses with resulting high per/vehicle and low per/person costs, or various options in the middle like 16 passenger vans that split the difference.
I have no knowledge of the methodologies selected by either the gov't or Lockheed, but it sounds like Lockheed proposed a better methodology approach. One other possibility I have run into frequently on much smaller studies is the penchant of the gov't personnel to try to bid in things that are not in the statement of work because "we've always done it that way." When the gov't MEO bids personnel to accomplish a level of service not required by the solicitation, it usually loses.
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8131
I never understand the math used in these justifications, but it never was my strong suit. Maybe someone can help me out.
According to the article it cost $500 million to operate the stations in 2003 divided by the 58 stations that equals about $8.2 million per station.
Now they are going to pay $380 million a year to operate the stations, which looks like we are saving $120 million a year. But then the cost per station skyrockets to $19 Million ($380 million divided by the proposed 20 stations).
Could they not have closed the 38 stations themselves, offered the same placement benefits for affected employees and saved $311 million? Even if all the employees from the closed stations were retained it seems they would still well surpass the $120 million savings Lockheed is disguising.
I did not even attempt to figure out where the $2.2 billion number came from, but it sure sounds good.
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8121
This is a prime example of the contracting out issue.
The Deciding Official stated:
"With the economics of an industry in the midst of dramatic change," Chew wrote, "we have had to make changes internally to ensure that we are providing quality service in a cost-efficient manner"
And he stated it was a hard decision because I gather the MEO was strong and solid. Contractors win because they can undercut a bid by cutting salary and eliminating benefits. It really is very sad that federal employees lose jobs when they are in fact providing quality service in a cost-efficient manager. Who will check in a few years when this Contractor raises its rates because its bid was unreasonable.
Federal employees do it better, faster, cheaper, and with more esprit de corp for the mission. Here is another example of the deep philosophical antipathy toward the federal civil service. Eventually the only civil service people left will be contract managers.
Hopefully, the Lockhead Martin group has a good strong Union-- and the funny thing is that private sector unions have rights which public sector federal union's don't have. The FAA may rue the day when they made this function a private sector function just as the Navy rued the day it made its ship missile loaders private sector and they went on strike.
HR Specialist
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8120
So it has come down to this, why am I not suprised that one of the largest campaign donors to "W" Bush gets a prize section of the Fed Govt? Services rendered I'm sure. I don't see the Republicans zeal in privatizing the people who clean the offices in DC. No let's let another group of friends like Halliburton reap the wealth.
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8105
Wow. February 1 was the day the music died for the hard-working brothers and sisters in NAATS.
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8104
How is Lockheed going to provide Flight Service with just 20 stations? Guess this is goodbye to localized weather knowledge, hello to rent-a-controller. It's a shame the General Aviation community didn't make a bigger stink on this.
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