Why stopgap bills only make the year-end spending rush worse

Fiscal year 2021 is now in the rear view mirror and putting the brinkmanship of our elected officials aside for a moment, it ended on quite a bang.

The annual fiscal year-end spending spree didn’t disappoint, especially when you look at the last three days of contract actions announced by the Defense Department.

• Sept. 28: 57 actions
• Sept. 29: 66 actions
• Sept. 30: 77 actions

Not all are new contract awards. A majority are modifications, extensions or options being exercised. We are seeing more sole source awards as well.

It’s understandable to see such activity. After all, agencies don’t want to have fiscal 2021 money left over and risk losing it. So they use it or lose it.

Everyone accepts this as a fact of life and just how business is done in the government market.

But is it a smart way doing business? No. Everyone knows the answer is "no."

That spending rush is exacerbated by the continuing resolution.

If Congress enacts a fiscal 2022 budget in December -- a huge “if" -- then a full quarter will already be done. That’s nearly three months of no new starts, no new initiatives, no new programs.

If continuing resolutions slip into January, the pressure only mounts. Instead of 12 months to carry out their budgets, agencies will have nine or less.

Some variation of this happens nearly every year, or it seems too.

Again, this is no way to run a government.

Other democratic nations don’t do it this way. There is no threat of a government shutdown. The government keeps working while the politicians go through their tantrums.

But this headlong rush is also no surprise as the fiscal year comes to close. In many ways, agencies have no choice. The system, and that’s my euphemism for Congress, is rigged against them. That’s a shame.