Reps. Moran and Davis comment on Acquisition Reform

Check it out...both of Northern Virginia's representatives have a vision for acquisition reform. Rep. Davis believes

(Y)ou get the best acquisition officials you can find. If you give them a tool box of different contracting vehicles so that they can decide what’s best for the government, and you train them well and allow them to do their job, if you do that right — they will make a mistake once in a while — but most of
the time you’re going to get a good outcome.

Rep. Moran is taking a slightly different tack. According to this article, he believes that

Government contracting desperately needs oversight and reform, especially regarding the contracting workforce and small-business support.

He also says that more government employees should be scrutinizing contracts.

We have got, as far as I am concerned, to move people from the private sector into the public sector to provide those inherently governmental
functions

I guess we have a lot of reform to look forward to.

Proposed rule looks at small business and subcontractors

Here is a collection of articles that deal with a proposed FAR rule. As the introduction to the rule states,

Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 (FFATA) (Pub. L. 109-282) requires the existence and operation of a searchable website that provides public access to information about Federal expenditures

This proposed rule puts into place the FAR requirements to make this happen. Among the issues this raises is the public access to subcontractor information that has not be available in the past. This information will eventually be captured and searchable at federalspending.gov.

A secondary issue is that small businesses, which have received a pass on a lot of accountability issues, will be faced with the government wanting- and getting- more details about how they do business.

Emily Murphy, the General Services Administration’s former chief acquisition officer, says that the government will have more information than ever on small businesses, so they need to better manage their government contracts.

Murphy said many small businesses have not mastered the intricacies of their contracts. For example, FAR small-business set-aside provisions limit how much of the contract’s subcontracting work can go to large businesses.

That means more work for them, reducing their ability to be fully functioning business partners.

[Note: Rep. Jim Moran says that about "ninety percent of the companies receiving small-business set-aside contracts will go out of business." Another encouraging word.]

2008 Defense Appropriations Bill fills up, but not with money...

I wrote earlier about Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) wanting to reform acquisition in the 2008 Defense Appropriations Bill to be considered when Congress gets back to work soon. Now, Rep. Ike Skelton (D-MO) has his own ideas and is readying them for the same legislation. He hopes to form a Defense-Industry partnership that can solve some tough procurement issues- getting the military's equipment stocks built up and able to reinforce troops heading into harm's way.

To help take advantage of the country's industrial capacity, Rep. Skelton hope to use this council to "mobilize this nation and its industrial base" and "bold action is needed" to do that.

Rhetoric aside, we may need some sort of group to help, but adding to the appropriations bill in such a way just adds to the procurement confusion.

Contracting becomes a political issue

Using contractors to perform the government's work has become a political issue. Mrs. Clinton is calling on cutting 500,000 government contractor jobs. According to the article, this ups John Kerry's call to cut 100,000 contractors during the last election cycle.

Based on the reports, there wasn't a discussion of which, if any, government functions would be cut or if the federal workforce would increase to account for the lost contractor support.

Regardless, contracting issues are becoming issues of interest in political arenas. Stay tuned...

More acquisition reforms coming in defense spending bill

The operative word is more! This article says that there will be more attention to contracting and subcontracting contained in the 2008 Defense Appropriations bill, just now being staffed on Capitol Hill.

That is in addition to the other "reforms" that the "new" Congress has in mind.

For instance, the Accountability in Contracting Act is already in play (the Supplemental Appropriations bill- with it attached- is in the hands of the Senate). Now Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) on the House Appropriations Committee’s Defense Subcommittee wants more oversight. According to the article, his aim is

(m)ore government employees should be scrutinizing contracts

That should be good new for us, but I can't believe that means more people to do the scrutinizing. Maybe even more contractors to help with the scrutinizing.

Regardless, we need to watch for new developments.