House, Senate Trying to Place Curbs on Competitive Sourcing

Once again, the Bush administration's initiative to study federal jobs and see what commercial activities can be turned over to the private sector is creating background noise, and some friction, on Capitol Hill.

Rep. Bernard Sanders (I-Vt.) recently surprised the administration when the House, on a vote of 238 to 177, accepted his amendment to stop the Federal Aviation Administration from going forward with a $1.9 billion contract that would allow Lockheed Martin Corp. to take over general aviation flight services performed by about 2,500 FAA employees.

"This privatization scheme is a bad idea," Sanders said during floor debate in the House on the fiscal 2006 transportation and treasury appropriations bill.

The bill's manager, Joe Knollenberg (R-Mich.), said Lockheed Martin has promised to offer jobs to displaced FAA employees, stressing that "the contract was fairly bid."

The spending bill also was amended by Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). His provision, accepted on a 222 to 203 vote, would prohibit the government from using the 2003 rewrite of Office of Management and Budget's rule book for contracting out federal services. Van Hollen said he wants OMB to "fashion a new set of rules that make sense for everybody."

Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Tex.) spoke against Van Hollen, saying that his provision would "wipe out the president's management agenda."

In the Senate, an appropriations subcommittee included a provision in the transportation-treasury bill at the urging of Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.) that would guarantee that federal employees could submit their best bids and would require contractors to show projected savings of at least 10 percent or $10 million.

Mikulski called the provision "the first step in leveling the playing field for federal employees." The provision was included with the support of the subcommittee chairman, Sen. Christopher S. Bond (R-Mo.).

Other bills also place curbs on outsourcing of federal jobs.

The House version of the Defense Department appropriations bill includes restrictions similar to Mikulski's and stipulates that a contractor should not gain an advantage in bidding because of savings that result from not offering health insurance to employees. The House's Defense authorization bill would require formal cost comparisons in most studies and expresses Congress's sense that Defense employees "should receive comparable treatment as contractors throughout the process of a public-private competition."

The House and Senate spending bill for the Department of Homeland Security would bar private contractors from doing work performed by immigration information officers, and the House version of the Agriculture Department spending bill would prohibit contracting for rural development work or farm loan programs without specific authorization from Congress.

Other House bills would limit spending on competitive sourcing at the Army Corps of Engineers and at the Forest Service.