Government officials spend billions of dollars annually for countless reasons, but it’s likely not often that a federal department pays a contractor more than $200,000 to decide the requirements for being selected for the same award.
That’s what the Department of Labor did as part of its centennial celebration, according to a government watchdog.
“The first task was to develop a work plan that would include a list of steps for project tasks, discussion of content and deliverables, and a timeline for accomplishment of the project tasks and deliverables,” the Department of Labor Inspector General said in a Nov. 21, 2014 report.
“In other words, the first requirement of the statement of work was to develop the requirements,” the IG said, adding that “this was not appropriate because well-defined requirements in a statement of work are necessary for the department to hold a contractor accountable and ensure it receives the services for which it paid.”
But paying the contractor — in this case, Concepts, Inc., a Bethesda, Md., public relations firm — to decide what work it will do to be paid was only the first of a host of questionable decisions by Labor Department managers pointed out by the IG.
The contract involved two separate task orders, the first for $119,610 in February 2013 and the second soon thereafter for $89,359 to “provide strategic communications and marketing for [the] DOL Centennial.”
The department was created in March 1913. The centennial celebration envisioned by Labor Department public affairs officials was to include a full year of activities.
Both task orders were awarded by Labor Department public affairs officials under an open-ended procurement tool being used by the department’s Office of Disability Employment Programs.
One of the several problems with doing it that way, according to the IG, was ODEP’s procurement tool was intended for obtaining resources it needed “in continuing to support intergovernmental partnerships at the federal, state, and local government levels,” not for funding public affairs managers’ planning of a centennial celebration.
Other problems included the lack of significant competition for the award and the hurried way it was done, the IG said.
Federal procurement regulations require “acquisition planning for all acquisitions in order to promote and provide for full and open competition (or to obtain competition to the maximum extent practicable).”
There was no evidence of such planning in the award, however, and the IG cited an internal email from the public affairs office that “requested expedited service and a contract start date in 3 days.”
When the request for quotes was issued Feb. 6, 2013, it “required technical and price proposals to be submitted within 29 hours from when the RFQ was issued and included an apology for the short turnaround time.”
Congressional oversight committees and critics of wasteful federal spending can be expected to ask Labor officials why they waited until the last minute to plan the department’s 100th birthday.
Another strange twist in the centennial celebration planning award cited by the IG was the fact that “the initial task order issued to Concepts was a firm-fixed-price contract. The second, or follow-on task order, was issued as a labor-hour agreement.”
The IG said Labor Department officials offered no explanation for why they did so.
Federal procurement regulations don’t always require documentation when a simplified award process is used in unusual circumstances, officials are still required to “exercise sound judgment in selecting the most appropriate type of contract.”
The IG said its investigation found “no documentation indicating a reasonable basis” for the approach taken by Labor Department officials.
Even after going through the unusual award process, the IG noted that when then-Acting Labor Secretary Seth Harris spoke on the centennial date, he said nothing about the celebration plans.
In response to the IG report, Labor Department managers warned that “it is reasonable to anticipate that the readers of OIG audit reports lack subject-matter expertise, including the complexities of government contracting.”
While they “generally agree with the report,” they said several of its conclusions were “misleading and could leave the public with the impression that tax dollars were mis-spent …”
Concepts, Inc. has been the recipient of multiple Labor Department contracts in 2014, including in October a $1.84 million award from ODEP “to help The Viscardi Center and other partners promote a national employer technical assistance center and integrate its activities into ODEP’s policy and programmatic priorities.”
Go here for the complete IG report.
Mark Tapscott is executive editor of the Washington Examiner.
