Accountability Update: Is Anybody Listening?

Our recent blog post about accountability had some good discussions on the GS-1102 LinkedIn group (closed group) about who actually is responsible for accountability. Should it rest squarely on government? What responsibility does the contractor have when the government is asleep at the switch?

A recent issue seems to have blurred that line, prompting the people responsible for being taxpayer watchdogs to testify incredulously about the lack of concern and the seemingly “sweeping under the rug” of the topic of accountability all together.

John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction, recently took the Army Corps of Engineers to task for ineffective management and oversight of work by DynCorp, which is owned by affiliates of New York-based Cerberus Capital Management LP, from responsibility while long-standing deficiencies remained for work on a garrison at Camp Pamir in Kunduz province.

“The Corps’ own internal review says they didn’t make DynCorp pay to fix their shoddy construction, they didn’t collect the liquidated damages that DynCorp owed them, and they violated their own settlement policies,” he said.

“But they still think the settlement was ’proper and reasonable.’” Sopko said. “That wasn’t a settlement, it was a mugging.”

An isolated incident, and a difficult one no doubt, but it is nonetheless disconcerting when an agency seemingly ignores such damming evidence, but decides it is best to sweep it under the rug and move on.

Given the billions that have already evaporated into the sands of Iraq, yet more evidence of how the lack of accountability is hindering progress coming out of Afghanistan is not surprising.

Having performance conversations early and often is the critical component of performance measurement, and then executing lessons learned for continuous improvement. Most, if not all contracts require some rudimentary form of performance measure (i.e. weekly status reports, monthly reports, performance meetings, etc.).

Other than killing trees, what is the point of doing all this if we are not going to mutually benefit and ensure proper outcomes and meeting contractual requirements?

Your Taxpayer Dollar$ at Work: Final Iraq Audit Report Edition

The “final” report on Iraq reconstruction was released recently, and I have seen little media attention to the astonishing level of waste, incompetence, and outright theft that the report highlights.

How much money is unaccounted for? According to the report, nobody knows. After years of trying to account for the billions we poured into the rabbit hole of Iraq, the government can only say that billions were wasted, but not how much.

Some on the highlights from the report:

…"billions of American taxpayer dollars at risk of waste and misappropriation"...

..."The precise amount lost to fraud and waste can never be known," the report said….

The auditors found huge problems accounting for the larger sums and complex projects, but it was also the smaller sums that also added up to hundreds of millions of waste and fraud:

…"Given the vicissitudes of the reconstruction effort — which was dogged from the start by persistent violence, shifting goals, constantly changing contracting practices and undermined by a lack of unity of effort — a complete accounting of all reconstruction expenditures is impossible to achieve," the report concluded…

Although the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) has spent more than $200 million tracking the reconstruction effort, and producing numerous reports, some accountability has been realized. The OIG investigations resulted in 87 indictments, 71 convictions and $176 million in fines and other penalties.

Among those held accountable are civilians, military personnel, and contractors accused of kickbacks, bribery, bid rigging, fraud, embezzlement and outright theft of government property and funds.

Nonetheless, these actions are just a drop in the bucket trying to account for the outright criminal behavior and complete lack of governance and oversight of taxpayer funds.

One of the major overlying issues was the lack of trained, competent contracting personnel to oversee the mission. In some cases, invoices were reviewed months after they had been paid due to the lack of contracting officers.

The OIG highlighted a case in which the State Department had only one contracting officer in Iraq to validate more than $2.5 billion in spending. No contracting office representative, no help. Further, lack of any invoice review whatsoever was the modus operandi. It is easier to not ask questions, and sign the checks, as opposed to the improper micro-management of contracts on the other spectrum.

Further, the IG goes on to say:

…"As a result, invoices were not properly reviewed, and the $2.5 billion in U.S. funds were vulnerable to fraud and waste,"

"We found this lack of control to be especially disturbing since earlier reviews of the DynCorp contract had found similar weaknesses."

The report did highlight that some funds were recovered ($60 million), but how much was wasted? Again, nobody knows.

It is easy to sit behind a keyboard and Monday-morning quarterback these failures, given the level of violence and danger, shifting sands of priorities and goals, and difficulties in securing the country. However, these failures did not occur overnight.

Endemic waste, fraud, and corruption were rampant, and the lack of trained acquisition personnel was known, or should have been known. Where are the government leaders who allowed this to happen?

The OIG report is silent. Silence seems to be acceptance.