Regaining Procurement Scruples

Scandal in government seems to be escalating at an alarming rate. And I'm not talking about such shameful incidents as the arrest of a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) deputy press secretary for allegedly trying to seduce a detective posing as a teen-age girl on the Internet. That's beyond alarming, yes. I'm referring to the scads of procurement debacles that have surfaced as of late, exposing government officials and company executives alike as lawless crooks.

That's harsh, I know, but it may be justified. People couldn't get away from the Safavian scandal last year, when the then-administrator of the Office of Federal Procurement Policy was arrested for allegedly lying and obstructing a criminal investigation into lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Many of the questionable activities Safavian is accused of happened prior to his post as top procurement official, when he was a lobbyist and then chief of staff at the General Services Administration (GSA), but what happened to him was still a major blow to the integrity of federal contracting.

If there's any solace for the public-sector channel, it's that contractors played no part in the situation with Safavian. Lobbyists and government officials carried all of the blame. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for most other scandals that have emerged. Washington, D.C.-based MZM and Poway, Calif.-based ADCS allegedly made many illicit payments to convicted Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.), who exerted improper influence in the awarding of Pentagon contracts.

And while Washington is typically the home of scandal, don't think the situation is much better at the state and local levels. Late last year, the top technology administrator of the Dallas Independent School District (DISD) was investigated for his frequent use of a luxury yacht owned by Houston-based Micro System, which won hundreds of millions of dollars in E-Rate contracts with the district. Now Micro System is under investigation for the incident as well, with subpoenas reportedly handed out for documents relating to a particular contract.

Cynics might call it typical dirty politics, and perhaps it's naïve to assume that the channel has any more scruples--or common sense, frankly. Still, with so many watchdog agencies in Washington, questionable activities are bound to be unearthed.

Regardless, the biggest question of all is how these incidents managed to get as far as they did and what needs to be done to avoid more of the same. There's a lot of talk of prosecution for those involved, but figuring out what holes in the system exist and how industry and government can work together to patch them up will be a far more challenging process. Constant reports of a lack of skilled procurement officials abound, but the problem appears to go well beyond knowledge of the process. What about ethics training? They may be getting some, but certainly recent events show more is in order.

Government does, at least, seem to be trying to engrain something of a moral fiber in the procurement process. At the federal level, the Justice Department created a special task force charged with combating fraud among defense and homeland security contractors, and just last month, the House Government Reform Committee proposed ethics legislation that, among other things, would bar procurement officials from working on contracts from their prior private-sector employers for two years after joining the feds. The committee also passed a separate bill that denies pensions to political appointees convicted of ethics crimes. Time will tell whether the legislation becomes law.

It's probably no coincidence that The Office of Government Ethics recently announced the Dallas Ethics Symposium, which includes a course detailing whether employees may accept gifts from or give gifts to each other, or accept gifts from outside sources.

In fairness, though, contractors need to shoulder some of the burden here. It takes two to tango in these scenarios, and often it's the contractor that dangles the carrot. In an already complex market that can easily trip up the best-intentioned, taking advantage of the system seems a slight to the many contractors that maintain a strict code of ethics and have respect for the taxpayers' dollars.