Into Thin Air
Let's put this into the "It's Not A Lot Of Money But" file.
The small U.S. office responsible for beaming news and other information into Cuba awarded no-bid contracts worth more than $1 million, without sufficient justification, according to a new GAO report.
Apparently the folks at the Office of Cuba Broadcasting (no, dear, I'm not making this up) felt they needed to ramp up radio and television broadcast rapidly after Fidel Castro fell ill. So they followed the lead of much of the rest of the federal government in recent years and simply awarded deals for the work, nevermind the regulations requiring competition and such. The manager of the awards was International Broadcasting Bureau, or IBB.
"In certain respects, however, IBB did not document in its contract files key information or assumptions underlying its decisions to not seek competitive offers, limit the number of potential providers it considered, or the basis used to negotiate the final prices for the services provided," the GAO report says.
Here's a line Government Inc. is especially fond of, though it makes us cringe:
"In addition, IBB did not actively involve its contracting office until just prior to contract award."
The Miami Herald jumped on the news.
"The GAO released the report as part of an ongoing broader probe into the management and broadcasting practices of the controversial Radio and TV Martà services. The GAO opened the probe in response to a request from Rep. William D. Delahunt, D-Mass., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on International Organizations, Human Rights and Oversight," the paper's story said.
"''It's important that we step back and look not just at an individual report,' Delahunt told The Miami Herald on Tuesday. 'But cumulatively, the MartÃs have been plagued by allegations of mismanagement and corruption, inefficiencies and ineffectiveness and thus we need constant monitoring and oversight of Martà operations.'"
By Robert O'Harrow |
July 18, 2008; 4:19 PM ET
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Posted by: ruth reed | July 23, 2008 10:51 AM
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after reading all these articles i am still searching for one that tells me some one in washington is doing a good job,they all need to be replaced with people that love this country and are willing to do the job they are getting paid to do and are not looking for their own advancement and and how to rip of the taxpayers pocket book