Return to Article: Senate panel supports moratorium on competitive sourcing
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54532
Delivering service on federal installations will be a tremendous challenge for both in house and contractor providers. One major reason will be the aging work force and the fact that the younger generations are not entering these industries in sufficient numbers to back fill retiring workers. Regardles of the direction taken I would encourage decision makers to factor this consideration into their strategies.
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54340
This legislation is the charade, not A-76. Use of the word "outsourcing" to identify the A-76 program is political hooey from unions. For years and years, the "in-house" win rate by the Federal "MEO" bids has averaged near 80% on the many, many hundreds of A-76 competitions that have been completed. In addition, there has been so much "inside" gaming on A-76 competitions that many private firms will no longer futilely spend their staff resources and money on the expense of putting together and submitting proposals for A-76 competitions. The number of A-76 competitions resulting with private sector "no bids" (i.e., only the federal bid gets submitted) has skyrocketed in recent years. Moreover, cold hard historical numbers and facts clearly and decisively prove A-76 is NOT an "outsourcing" program. No..... what riles unions is that each time the government wins it is by virtue of having a "most efficient organization" (MEO) that is smaller than the original "announced" (pre-bid) organization. By their very nature, these pre-bid organizations are less efficient and more wasteful than the winning "MEO". Union officials don't care about that though, and will never admit to or acknowledge the truth that these improved FEDERAL efficiencies are and have been the predominant outcome of the A-76 program for years. These Federal MEO efficiencies have also been the true gift of the A-76 program to all American taxpayers, to whom the workforce ultimately owes allegiance.
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54230
As Union Chapter President I have been fighting against A-76 Competitive Sourcing competitions at the Department of Energy for many years. It now looks like we and the taxpayers are finally making some progress.
The supposed savings over time by outsourcing Federal work are grossly inflated by management in order to justify the A-76 program. Using DOE as an example, Federal expenses associated with running competitions are not accurately considered in the projected savings. In one competition NONE of the Federal travel costs and NONE of the salary/benefits costs directly associated with the competition were considered. This totally disregarded DOE's need to hire contractors and more Feds to complete work that would have been left undone by those Feds involved in the A-76 effort.
One competition was won by a contractor even though the Federal proposal costs were considerably lower than the winning bid. The reason, "the contractor's proposal had a much lower hourly rate for each employee." True but that was eclipsed by the fact that the proposal called for an even greater cost due to a higher total number of man hours to complete the work.
Hopefully this Congressional action marks the end to "Voodoo Economics."
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54137
When Congress starts demonstrating their concern for the taxpayer and government performance, maybe then they can get above their current 9 percent approval rating - the lowest in history. Pay-offs like this is why they are held in such low esteem. This morotorium will destroy government performance and the reputation of every federal employee.
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54135
Excuse me, CS on the West Coast, most Government workers are not incompetent. (Just about the same percentage as in the general workforce)I know, because I have been a government employee for 30 years. I have, until recently, taken a great deal of pride in my work. We employees can only do as good a job as we are given resources to do. When we are not given the time, tools, funding, authority, or clear guidance we need, it becomes impossible to succeed. Our organizations are in chaos due to being managed by self-serving, ill-chosen managers who change directions like the wind blows. We are set up to fail, and then blamed, and our jobs are outsourced. Contracting out our jobs is not the answer, believe me on that one. I've seen the results firsthand.
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54122
The "competitive sourcing" model is, at best, a complete waste of taxpayers' money. At its worst, it has compromised critical government missions.
Most of these expensive assessments don't result in competition. When they do compete, the Feds win nearly 90% of the competitions. In seven years of this administration forcing competitive sourcing, ask yourself if the government is more or less effective.
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54106
This legislation would be OK if all fed agencies instituted some form of NSPS. The fed workforce lacks accountability and removal is much to difficult. If the unions want an end they must be willing to clean up their act as well
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54101
Clara, I think beto is really making q statement on competitive sourcing acquisitions and not the other methods. I do not blame him for not competing for them. I have seen many government leaders not use the Circular as intended and disregard what is in the best interest of the program or organization. Let us get real; this argument is not over the merit of Competitive Sourcing it is about the mismanagement of it. I.e. poor government leadership.
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54099
beto, you must realize that the government has quite extensive small business laws, and that they have more than a fair chance at winning contracts because of that.
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54094
I am truly amazed at how many people believe what they read. Most of the statements made by those interviewed are not correct and are misleading. As a management analyst, I have used the competitive sourcing tool to assist agencies with improvements and savings. Competitive sourcing is not a problem; it is the Non- Accountable Federal decision makers that do not work. I am fine with doing away with competitive sourcing, but I want federal workforce that do the job in a cost effective mannor. yada yada yada....
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54093
I don't know if it's such a good thing! We all know that most of Government workers are incompetent.
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54087
Thank god. It is about time someone ended this charade.
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54084
My company has competed for these A-76 projects but will no longer do so in the future. Reasons? First, the rules governing this program are very complicated. They are vauge and not always available in one place. Second, they favor the government employees. Third, the government employees are eligible to hire consultants to help them at government expense. Approximately 90% of these competitions are won by the government employees. Under the current setup, a small business cannot reasonably expect to have a fair competition.
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54081
THANK YOU to all the Unions that have been lobbying Congress and have been persistent in pressing important issues such as this.
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