Bush pick for federal procurement chief praised

Members of the federal procurement community on Tuesday praised President Bush's selection of an experienced contracting official to become the next federal procurement chief.

If confirmed by the Senate, Paul Denett would take over as head of the Office of Management and Budget's procurement policy shop. Robert Burton has been acting administrator of that office since the departure of David Safavian, who resigned abruptly last September and days later was arrested to face charges of obstructing justice and making false statements related to his previous role as chief of staff for the General Services Administration.

Denett, vice president of contracting programs at the Arlington, Va.-based management consulting firm ESI International, previously served as a senior procurement executive at the Interior and Treasury departments.

Steven Kelman, the Office of Federal Procurement Policy administrator under President Clinton and a professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, praised the nomination, noting, "He's exactly what we need at this point -- he's a career civil servant who's very knowledgeable about procurement."

Kelman said the challenges that would await Denett if the Senate approves him are defined largely by the series of scandals that have affected the contracting community over the past several years, including questions about Iraq and post-Katrina contracting, Safavian's conduct before joining OMB, and the steering of defense contracts to Boeing by former Air Force acquisition official Darleen Druyun in exchange for a position with the company.

"The procurement system, like other systems in government, has a mission to accomplish, and it also has various important ethical constraints," Kelman said. "All the attention to these various real and purported scandals over the past couple of years has gotten the procurement system out of whack, so it's been focused on not doing bad things rather than how to do good things better."

Kelman highlighted workforce training, bringing a new generation of procurement professionals into government and strategic sourcing -- a technique for analyzing buying patterns to get better deals on bulk purchases -- as areas where Denett would be likely to focus in his new role.

Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, welcomed Denett's selection.

"One good place for a new OFPP director to start would be to ensure that government contractors are compliant with their tax obligations," Kelley said. "We should expect that those companies awarded taxpayer dollars are held to the same standard of responsibility as the rest of the country," she added, referring to a March Government Accountability Office report that about 10 percent of federal contractors are delinquent on their tax obligations.

Terry Neese, president of Women Impacting Public Policy, an advocacy group for women and minorities in business, said she hoped Denett would listen to the concerns of small business owners. "I would hope that one of the first things he would do would be to call people like WIPP to the table, to find out the pros and cons of what's been happening in government procurement from a women's and minority perspective," she said.

Industry groups, which have said that leadership vacancies have hurt the contracting community, also welcomed the announcement. "Denett is an excellent nominee," said Stan Soloway, president of the Professional Services Council. "His extensive and hands-on government and industry experience would bring the right balance to this role in an important policy office. Paul's nomination comes at a critical juncture, and we thus hope the Senate will act on his nomination quickly."

Monday's announcement by the White House confirms rumors that have been circulating for months that Denett was under consideration. White House spokesman Alex Conant declined to discuss internal personnel deliberations that might have caused the delay in presenting a nominee, but said, "We're enthusiastic about the nominee, believe he can make important contributions and hope for a speedy confirmation process."