Scary Recovery Spending

A ProPublica story recently detailed nearly $30 million in Defense Department contracts awarded under the Recovery Act to companies while “they were under federal criminal investigation on suspicion of defrauding the government.” Some of the companies have since been placed in contracting timeout. Unfortunately, that’s the way the current system works, and with the urgency involved with distributing federal stimulus funds, taxpayer dollars are flying out agency doors to contractors that are being investigated by the government. On the bright side, I haven’t heard of any new money being awarded to contractors on the suspended or debarred list. 

If we had found an instance involving a top contractor being investigated for fraud or similar offenses, it would have been included in POGO’s Federal Contractor Misconduct Database. That begs the question — would it be included in the government’s forthcoming secret Federal Awardee Performance and Integrity Information System (FAPIIS)? Answer: nope. FAPIIS is the congressionally mandated database that is intended to provide government officials with better pre-award information to ensure that taxpayer money doesn’t go to non-responsible contractors. But unfortunately, the scope of FAPIIS was gutted by Congress and as a result, it will only capture a tiny cross-section of the contractors found guilty, liable or that have admitted fault, in criminal, civil, and administrative contract-related proceedings.

It’s kinda scary to think that agencies are still spending their normal appropriations while also spending the hundreds of billions that the government is using to stimulate the economy — all of this occurring with little federal oversight of those expenditures. What a ghostly thought!

-- Scott Amey