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POGO Champions Accountability at National Conference
2008 Volume 12-1
In This Issue
POGO Champions Accountability at National Conference
Director’s Letter
Many Inspectors General Lack Essential Tools
Pandemic Flu Vaccine: It’s going to take more than an apple . . .
Congress Should Hear the Truth
Focusing on Wartime Contracting
MRAPed in Bureaucracy
Helicopter Report Update
New Development Director for POGO
A Special Kind of Election!
POGO Champions Accountability at National Conference
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On March 18 and 19, POGO's Executive Director Danielle Brian and General Counsel Scott Amey participated in the national conference of federal debarment officials. The conference honored "25 Years of Government-wide Suspension and Debarment." Not the Oscars® or Grammys®, but important nevertheless. Suspension and debarment are tools that should prevent the federal government from awarding future business to contractors and individuals who have questionable track records. Unfortunately, all too often those tools don't work, especially with the larger contractors.
POGO joined many key government, academic, and private sector figures and organizations that have contributed to shaping the federal suspension and debarment system over the past twenty-five years. Conference topics ranged from historical perspectives on government-wide debarment to challenges facing the contract-oversight community today.
Scott and Danielle were invited to share POGO's thoughts on why Congress and the public are unsatisfied with business as usual, and on the calls for improved integrity and credibility in federal spending. This topic is on point for POGO because contractor accountability and improved public access to government information have been core issues for us since our creation in 1981. We tackled this issue in our 2002 report Federal Contractor Misconduct: Failures of the Suspension and Debarment System, and through our Federal Contractor Misconduct Database (FCMD). The FCMD highlights companies that receive federal contract awards despite their histories of misconduct such as contract fraud and environmental, ethics, and labor law violations.
POGO will soon be releasing an updated FCMD—which will include the top 100 federal contractors and more user-friendly search features—and its accompanying report, which will include realistic recommendations for preventing risky contractors from receiving taxpayer dollars. POGO's FCMD helps government officials make better-informed spending decisions, and is especially vital because the government isn't performing this function. We believe our efforts will lead to improved contracting decisions and public access to information about how the government spends approximately $440 billion a year on goods and services.
Danielle and Scott also took time to highlight the benefits of greater transparency in the contracting world. POGO suggested improvements to the accountability system that would allow taxpayers to see what's going on behind closed federal office doors, and we hope to soon see those recommendations enacted.
Dear Friends,
Just as we dubbed 2007 "the Year of Oversight," POGO has dubbed 2008 "the Year of Accountability."
Accountability is essential at all levels of government. Because 2008 is an election year, the public has the opportunity to hold our elected officials—both those running for president and those running for Congress—up for scrutiny. Also on the accountability front, 2008 is the 25th anniversary of the Suspension and Debarment Act, as well as the 30th anniversary of the Inspectors General Act. As you read on page one, Scott Amey and I were able to celebrate the Suspension and Debarment Act (yes, we are serious nerds!) in Charleston with federal debarment officers. You'll also read on page three that, in honor of the IG Act's anniversary, POGO issued the first of two reports reviewing the Inspector General system. Our second IG report, on the accountability of IGs, will be issued later this year.
Accountability is not a one-way street, however: not only do we believe it's important to shine a light on our government, but we also believe POGO should be accountable to the public. In that vein, we are proud to announce that the Project On Government Oversight has received the highest rating possible (a 4-star rating) from Charity Navigator, America's largest independent evaluator of charities. Receiving four out of a possible four stars indicates that POGO excels, as compared to other charities in America, in successfully managing the finances of our organization in an efficient and effective manner. You can give to POGO with confidence knowing that your funds are well-used.
We look forward to another year of making our government a better one, and are happy to have you along with us!
Thank you,
Danielle Brian
Many Inspectors General Lack Essential Tools
POGO recently released the first of two reports on the Inspector General (IG) system. The report, Inspectors General: Many Lack Essential Tools for Independence, examines the system's best practices and weaknesses, and makes recommendations for improving the independence of these watchdogs.
In launching our review last fall, POGO discovered how difficult it is to find even the most basic information about IG offices. But POGO loves a challenge, so we created a questionnaire for the congressionally-created IGs. We garnered a 77 percent response rate. Based on those responses, our follow-up queries, and consultations with numerous experts, we learned a great deal of sometimes troubling information.
One surprise was the degree to which many IGs at the smaller government agencies are kept under the thumb of their agency chiefs. Some agencies don't even allow IGs to post their own reports on their websites without prior approval! Another surprise was just how lacking in resources those IGs are. For instance, quite a number of the IGs lack their own in-house counsel and are dependent on the agency general counsel for advice. This is a clear conflict of interest because, while it is the general counsel's job to protect an agency, it is an IG's job to sometimes point to its flaws.
Many of the issues we found were specific to the smaller-agency IGs, but we also uncovered issues that span the entire IG community. POGO concluded, for example, that the IG system would benefit from the reinstatement of an IG candidate selection committee. POGO also concluded that Congress would benefit from seeing whether agencies are fully funding IG budget requests. Other recommendations include creating a pool of auditors, investigators, and lawyers from which IGs could draw; and removing the White House's Deputy Director of the OMB as the head of the IGs.
Later this year, we will release Part Two of our investigation, examining IG accountability and effectiveness.
Pandemic Flu Vaccine: It's going to take more than an apple . . .
The current government plan for producing pandemic flu vaccine doesn't reflect the potential urgency of the situation. In a new report, Pandemic Flu: Lack of Leadership and Disclosure Plague Vaccine Program, POGO draws attention to the Administration's failure to name a permanent director for the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) more than a year after its creation by Congress. In addition, a lack of sufficient disclosure has beset the program to date.
Experts can't predict when the next pandemic will begin, but they fear it could cause hundreds of thousands of deaths in the U.S. and tens of millions of deaths worldwide. A vaccine will limit the harm caused by the influenza virus when it appears and spreads.
The success of the government's vaccine program depends in large part on the strong leadership of BARDA. Yet, the Administration has allowed the position of permanent director to go unfilled. "The failure to appoint a permanent director, who could marshal the international scientific and business communities and other key players to speed up a viable vaccine production program, is inexcusable and dangerously short-sighted," said POGO's Dr. Ned Feder.
The government's current timetable for vaccine production is far from reassuring. At best, it will be 2012 before manufacturers are fully ready for a pandemic, and even then it will be six months after the start of a pandemic before they can produce enough vaccine.
In addition, POGO strongly recommends that all relevant documents in the pandemic flu vaccine program be promptly disclosed, including the extent of plans to rely on foreign sources of materials for vaccine production. Such disclosures would allow experts outside the government to identify problems and possible improvements to the program before it's too late.
Congress Should Hear the Truth
Richard Barlow is a national security whistleblower who worked as a counter-proliferation officer at the CIA and the Office of the Secretary of Defense. In the late 1980s, his work led to the arrest of two of Pakistan nuclear mastermind A.Q. Khan's associates for illegally working to obtain nuclear weapons technology. Barlow discovered that top executive branch officials knew of Pakistan's nuclear ambitions, and were lying to Congress about it.
Barlow was fired and stripped of his security clearances when he merely suggested to his bosses that Congress should know the truth. The implications of this can't be overstated. The foundation of our democracy is the balance of power, and when the executive branch is allowed to lie to Congress, that balance of power is broken.
Numerous investigations have confirmed Barlow's allegations and the subsequent retaliation. Yet, to date, efforts to address the allegations and retaliation have been stymied by both Congress and the executive branch.
For instance, in 1998, executive branch officials invoked the State Secrets Privilege to block nearly all evidence that would prove Barlow's case. More recently, anonymous members of the Senate Judiciary Committee placed a hold on a bill providing relief to Barlow, essentially sending it to its death.
Through this case, POGO is continuing its efforts to remind Congress that it is an equal, not subservient, branch of government. We've made some progress, at least in this case. It appears Congress is finally poised to resolve this blight on congressional history.
Focusing on Wartime Contracting
In January, a group of freshman Senators passed a bi-partisan bill creating the long-overdue Commission on Wartime Contracting. The new Commission is modeled on the Truman Committee from World War II, named after its first chairman, then-Senator Harry S. Truman. Senators Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and Jim Webb (D-VA) spearheaded the new Commission's creation, with the support of POGO and other groups.
The Commission will focus on systemic problems with contracts awarded to companies in the Iraq and Afghanistan war zones. Waste, fraud, and abuse have run relatively unchecked there because government oversight agencies are stretched to the limit, contracts were awarded without adequate taxpayer protections, and Congress has ignored the problem for years. The Commission will also assess the impacts of contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan in order to positively contribute to how the federal government approaches future contracting.
Unlike the original Truman Committee, which was created at the onset of hostilities as contracting was ramping up, the Commission will face the daunting task of examining the current situation, as well as the past years of waste, fraud, and abuse that have yet to be untangled. Also adding to the challenge is that many services traditionally performed by government employees have been contracted out on a massive scale, and are more complex to investigate and audit than contracts for goods. "I realized we had the same problem in this war that Harry Truman found in World War II, except that it's on steroids. It's out of control," Senator McCaskill said at a press conference last year.
The battle for the Commission is not over yet. Although President Bush signed the bill into law, he issued a signing statement essentially claiming the right to ignore a law he'd just signed. Senators McCaskill and Webb, and POGO and other organizations, promptly challenged this shot across the fledgling Commission's bow, and we will continue to work to ensure that the Commission is a success.
MRAPed in Bureaucracy
Last year, Pentagon insiders disclosed unnecessary and fatal delays of requests for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAPs) and other equipment: Marines and Army soldiers had been asking for significant quantities of MRAPs since at least 2005, and perhaps even earlier. MRAPs are highly survivable against improvised explosive device (IED) blasts—the primary cause of American casualties in Iraq, and increasingly so in Afghanistan. For two years, these insiders reported that the requests languished within the acquisition system. Soon after the disclosures, some Members of Congress and reporters began to ask hard questions about just how rapid the Pentagon's "rapid acquisition system" is, spurring Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to take significant action.
After congressional and media pressure, Secretary Gates made the MRAP program the Pentagon's number one acquisition priority. "The MRAP program is perhaps the most significant rapid acquisition program the department has conducted since the end of World War II," John Young, Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Director of the Pentagon's MRAP Task Force, stated last summer.
Among the insiders with whom POGO has been working is Marine Corps science advisor Franz Gayl. We've been helping him publicly expose problems in the Marine Corps' rapid acquisition system after his attempts to remedy these issues within the Corps were stymied. Along with Senators Kit Bond, Joe Biden, John Rockefeller, and Edward Kennedy; and lawyers at the Government Accountability Project, POGO has been pushing for congressional hearings into the issues Gayl has raised, and into the reprisals taken against him for his patriotic whistleblowing. The Department of Defense Inspector General has agreed to investigate the issue, but hearings and a Pentagon-wide review will be necessary to achieve accountability and to avoid future tragic failures.
Helicopter Report Update
In response to POGO's report on the Air Force's Combat Search and Rescue replacement (CSAR-X) helicopter program, the DOD IG has begun a review of whether CSAR-X weapons system requirements were improperly weakened. Visit POGO's website to read our report, Rescue at Risk: Crucial Helicopter Requirement Weakened.
New Development Director for POGO
Chris Pabon, a native of Tennessee, has significant experience in fundraising for national nonprofit organizations. So how does someone from Tennessee move from the shadows of the Great Smokey Mountains to the shadow of our nations' Capitol? When he left, he just kept going until he found someone who, when asked what SEC stood for, said "Securities and Exchange Commission" rather than "South Eastern Conference."
Chris initially planned to stay in Washington, D.C. for only two years, and to then return home. But fate intervened. He kept finding jobs that played to his strength: raising money for good causes.
He joined the staff at Friends of the Earth, where he stayed for over a decade. Not only did he introduce the organization to dozens of new foundations, he successfully guided FOE's event planning, direct mail production, major donor programs, estate planning, and general membership. But after ten years in one place, Chris's feet began to itch again. Having been a long-time fan of POGO's, he decided to join our fight to increase transparency within a federal government that so badly needs some sunshine.
When not opening up new revenue streams for POGO or cheering for his beloved Vols and D.C. United, Chris teaches an evening fundraising course, and organizes monthly brownbags for 500 development professionals in the Washington, D.C. area. On weekends you can find him volunteering for the D.C. Humane Society. POGO is thrilled that Chris has brought his expertise and passion to our organization, and we truly look forward to a long and fruitful relationship.
A Special Kind of Election!
Are you a member of CREDO Mobile (formerly known as Working Assets)? Then take a moment to VOTE!
By filling out the 2008 Donations Ballot, you can vote to allocate this year's funding to the Project On Government Oversight. The distribution of funds is determined solely by how many votes each group receives. The more votes we get, the more funding we get. It's that simple.
Voting is easy. Simply go to www.workingassets.com/vote.
Thanks for participating!
