Editorial: NOAA contract shows need for scrutiny
Federal contracts, by nature, are hotly contested in communities where jobs and other substantial economic impact are at stake. It’s therefore imperative that agencies follow the procurement rules meticulously, and that decisions be based on the taxpayers’ best interests.
That point may not be fully understood by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, whose selection of Newport, Ore., for its Pacific Marine Operations Center has been spanked by the Government Accountability Office and drawn added fire from a Senate subcommittee.
Sixteen months ago, NOAA issued a solicitation for offers to provide the offices, warehousing and pier capacity needed for the center that had been at Seattle for more than 60 years before being severely damaged by fire. Four communities responded, among them Newport and Bellingham.
After evaluating a wide range of considerations – such as cost, environmental concerns and proximity to NOAA facilities in Seattle – NOAA picked Newport, even though its location within a flood plain required the agency to determine if there was a “practicable alternative.” When that didn’t happen, runner-up Bellingham protested, and the GAO rejected NOAA’s efforts to rationalize the omission away.
NOAA officials say they now are doing what the GAO has recommended, re-evaluating the situation with an eye to alternatives, but some senators allege the flood plain issue is just part of a broader pattern of NOAA’s sidestepping criteria that get in the way of a predetermined outcome.
One of those senators is Washington Democrat Maria Cantwell, whose constituent-interest perspective might make her own impartiality suspect. However, she is chairwoman of the subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries and Coast Guard, and she pointedly grilled Commerce Undersecretary Jane Lubchenco, who recently testified before it.
Cantwell is not the lone skeptic, however. She and the subcommittee’s ranking Republican, Maine’s Olympia Snowe, have asked the Commerce Department’s inspector general to take a deeper look at not just the Marine Operations Center lease but NOAA’s facilities acquisition management systems in general.
For Washington state, landing the lease and the investment and jobs that go with it would be a plus. But for this state, as for the rest of the nation, sloppy spending evaluations are unacceptable.
Correcting the system’s deficiencies is an urgent need.