Contracting gone bad: One man's view
Last byte | A conversation with legal scholar and author Charles Tiefer.
The tremendousvalue of activecongressional oversight,especially when bothparties work at it.During the period from1984 to 1995, there wasa very lively procurementoversight effort byChairman Jack Brooksand ranking RepublicanFrank Horton of the[then] HouseGovernmentOperationsCommittee.They not onlyferreted outproblems ofwaste, fraud andabuse but alsodrew on theiroversight formany legislativeimprovements,starting with theCompetition inContracting Act of1984. That was a periodwhen Republicans feltproud to ferret out contractingproblems.The Bushadministration threwaway many of its opportunitiesto salvage somethingfrom the interventionin Iraq by a misguidedset of procurementpolicies. By solesourcing or otherwisenot competing work,contracts tended to gooverwhelmingly to thebig American companiesthat were politically loyal[to the administration].This froze out the contributionfrom Americansmall business and radicallyalienated businessesoverseas and potentiallocal support in Iraq. Our diplomaticisolation ? althoughfollowing somewhatfrom how we went intoIraq against the wishesof the rest of the world? owes a lot, unfortunately,to how our procurementpolicies bothfor military support andreconstruction seemedto the rest of the world.We appeared to be hoggingthe business opportunitiesfor big companiessuch as Halliburtonand Bechtel. Yes. The administrationsole-sourcedthe biggest reconstructioncontract toHalliburton on a patheticallyunjustified rationalethat it had thestanding contract to putout oil fires when, infact, during the PersianGulf War it was Bechtel,not Halliburton, thatput out the oil fires.From that corrupt rootgrew a whole rottentree. Similarly, the contractsthat supplied personnelwho ended upparticipating in theabuses at Abu Ghraibwere awarded in flagrantviolation of soundcontracting policythrough inappropriatevehicles managed byInterior Departmentpersonnel who couldn'tpossibly have a clue ofwhat disastrous problemswould ensue. A lotof the reconstructiongap ? that is, the shortcomingsand shortfallsof contractors doingreconstruction ? owe tothe inappropriate use oflarge-scale, design-buildcontracting when soundpolicy would haveparceled out the work tosmaller, nimbler companies.The list of abusesof contracting rulesgoes on and on. Overall, the IGshaven't been able tomeet the big challengesraised by the war in Iraq,homeland security after9/11 and the changes inacquisition practices thatcreate tough challengesfor auditing. Occasionally,they even run intosevere threats of politicalinfluence the way itseems to have occurredwith the GeneralServices Administrationand recently with theCIA.This administrationallows its political figuresto interfere withIGs and contracting officersin a heavy-handedway. On the other hand,an outstanding successhas been the special IGfor Iraq reconstructioncontracting, who hasdone an amazing job literallyunder battlefieldconditions.
To borrow from Shakespeare's "Hamlet," something is rotten in
Washington; at least, that is the view of legal scholar and author
Charles Tiefer. Tiefer, who earned his law degree from Harvard
University, knows federal procurement because he spent 11 years as
deputy general counsel to the House from 1984 to 1995.
He subsequently became a government contracting professor at the
University of Baltimore's School of Law. He is the author of "Veering
Right," in which he states that the Bush administration circumvented
Congress and manipulated the public to serve its own agenda.
Tiefer spoke recently with Deputy Editor William Welsh about contracting
practices in Iraq, acquisition management at the Homeland
Security Department and the effectiveness of inspectors general.
Q: What did you learn
from working as the
House deputy general
counsel?
Tiefer:
Q: Has the Bush
administration relied
too much on sole-source
contracting in Iraq?
What should it have
done differently?
Tiefer:
Q: What was the result?
Tiefer:
Q: Did the sole-source
awards violate any competition
laws?
Tiefer:
Q: Do you feel
agencies' IGs have
sufficient authority
and staff to meet their
responsibilities?
Tiefer:
Washington; at least, that is the view of legal scholar and author
Charles Tiefer. Tiefer, who earned his law degree from Harvard
University, knows federal procurement because he spent 11 years as
deputy general counsel to the House from 1984 to 1995.
He subsequently became a government contracting professor at the
University of Baltimore's School of Law. He is the author of "Veering
Right," in which he states that the Bush administration circumvented
Congress and manipulated the public to serve its own agenda.
Tiefer spoke recently with Deputy Editor William Welsh about contracting
practices in Iraq, acquisition management at the Homeland
Security Department and the effectiveness of inspectors general.
Q: What did you learn
from working as the
House deputy general
counsel?
Tiefer:
Q: Has the Bush
administration relied
too much on sole-source
contracting in Iraq?
What should it have
done differently?
Tiefer:
Q: What was the result?
Tiefer:
Q: Did the sole-source
awards violate any competition
laws?
Tiefer:
Q: Do you feel
agencies' IGs have
sufficient authority
and staff to meet their
responsibilities?
Tiefer:
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