Nick Schwellenbach, Director of Investigations at the Project on Government Oversight (POGO), has just put out his last investigation--and it's a doozy. Nick, who is leaving POGO this week to go abroad, found that "a manufacturer of key safety and control components for U.S. Army helicopters supplied defective, failure-prone parts different than the ones the Army thought it was buying." Worse, the Army failed to take prompt action, meaning "millions of taxpayer dollars kept flowing to these individuals."
From the article:
The long period that elapsed between when the government learned of the company’s violations and when it took action illustrates the hesitance many U.S. agencies have in using a powerful set of tools available to protect taxpayer interests: suspension and debarment. Debarment is when the government blocks a company and/or individuals from winning new contracts. Suspension is a similar, but more temporary measure that occurs when the government has good reason to believe a company may have violated a law, regulation, or contract provision. Government reports last year by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Congress’s investigative arm; the Pentagon’s internal watchdog; and the Commission on Wartime Contracting all urged government agencies to suspend and debar contractors more often.
The company's owners strongly deny the investigators' and the Army's conclusions, and are fighting the proposed debarment.
Do you think the government is letting taxpayers down by failing to stop money from flowing into the pockets of crooked contractors?