TSA criticized for excessive spending
Transportation Security Administration didn't follow
procedures with $1.2 billion contract, inspector says
about the slow pace of installation of
bomb-detection equipment in air
ports and have criticized TSA’s
spending practices.
Last week Ervin’s office issued a
report criticizing the TSA for an “un
necessarily expensive” banquet
marking its two-year anniversary.
The November 2003 celebration,
held at a lavish Washington hotel,
cost $461,745, including nearly
$200,000 for travel and lodging and
$85,000 for a party planner.
Ervin’s office spent 11 months in
vestigating the Boeing contract and
found the profit paid to Boeing was
“disproportionately high when com
pared to Boeing’s cost and risk and
compared to what other agencies al
low as profit under such contracts.”
For example, it found that while
Boeing incurred costs of $39 million
serving as project manager and su
pervising subcontractors around the
country, it received $82 million from
TSA to cover those costs, for a rate of
return of 210 percent.
Boeing spokesman Fernando
Vivanco defended his company’s
work. He said Boeing did a job that
“everybody said could not be done.
We are pleased to have helped the
TSA restore the confidence of the
traveling public.”
Boeing also has come under fire
for military contracts. Last year, the
Pentagon punished the company for
stealing trade secrets from rival
Lockheed Martin to help win rocket
contracts.
Boeing also lost an Air Force
tanker lease deal after an Air Force
employee, hired by Boeing, rigged
the contract to boost prices. She was
recently sentenced to nine months
in prison.
Ervin’s office made a series of rec
ommendations to TSA. Among
them, he said the agency should
come up with a plan to evaluate
Boeing’s performance and recoup
any unreasonable fees.
TSA responded that the agency is
reviewing the contract to make sure
any extra costs are valid.
BY KATHERINE PFLEGER SHRADER
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON — The Transporta
tion Security Administration has over
paid Boeing Co. by at least $49 million
on a contract to install explosive de
tection equipment at U.S. commercial
airports, according to an internal au
dit released Monday.
Homeland Security Department In
spector General Clark Kent Ervin
found TSA failed to follow appropri
ate procedures in awarding Boeing
the contract, worth $1.2 billion with
the possibility of lucrative extensions.
TSA gave Boeing at least $44 mil
lion in “provisional award fees” —
incentives designed to motivate the
company to perform at a high level
— without ever evaluating the job
Boeing was doing.
“TSA did not follow sound con
tracting practices in awarding and
administering the Boeing contract,”
the report concluded.
Boeing was awarded the contract
in June 2002 to install more than
7,000 explosive detection devices
and systems at 429 airports. TSA ini
tially estimated the contract was
worth $508 million and would last
seven months, with options to ex
tend it. But TSA modified the con
tract 54 times by December 2003, in
creasing the base value to $1.2
billion and the length to 18 months,
the report found.
TSA spokeswoman Amy Von Wal
ter said the contract and payment
structure were reasonable “given the
competitive market conditions and
the schedule-driven environment re
quired to meet the numerous con
gressional mandates which existed
during the first year of the agency. ”
Lawmakers have complained
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Continued from page 4
Rahim Alikhel, identified the election
worker as Dr. Sattar, a local physician
who had helped organize the vote
and was traveling to his clinic when
he died. The police did not give Sat
tar’s full name.
The other victims were the doc
tor’s nephew, his driver and two oth
er local men, Alikhel said.
The explosion was the latest in a
string of deadly incidents casting a
cloud over the election but failing to
knock it off course.
At least 12 election workers died in
the run-up to the vote, and three po
lice officers were killed on polling day
by suspected militants shooting at a
convoy carrying ballot boxes in cen
tral Uruzgan.
Despite poor weather and Taliban
threats of more attacks, an estimated
8 million Afghans cast their ballots in
a democratic experiment supposed to
cement the country’s re-emergence
since the Taliban fell in 2001 after a
U.S. invasion.
By Monday, Karzai was dominat
ing with 1.68 million votes, or 20.9
percent of the total cast, tallied. But
his closest challenger, Qanooni,
claimed to have evidence of organ
ized fraud favoring Karzai.
Official results are expected by Oct.
31, but the winner should be clear
this week.
While officials acknowledge minor
problems during the vote, Karzai’s
opponents allege ballot boxes were
stuffed with votes for Karzai in at
least four provinces.
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Continued from page 4
what the government is doing with the
unexpected oil revenues is much dif
ferent than during the first oil boom. ”
Bourland said the rise in foreign cur
rency reserves suggests the Saudi gov
ernment is banking much of the wind
fall and investing in foreign securities.
The increase in spending on train
ing young Saudis will help vocational
centers and colleges nationwide in
crease capacity by 250 percent over
the next seven years, said Saleh al
Amr, vice governor for development
in the Organization for Technical Ed
ucation and Vocational Training.
Omar Bafaqih and Mohammed al
Muhaidib, both technical college
Education:
Blair speaks
on reform
Continued from page 4
government approved his proposals.
Education Secretary Charles Clarke
seemed to approve the plan, telling
legislators Monday it offers a “cogent
ly argued, challenging and com
pelling vision for the future.”
Clarke said the government would
respond to the plan and make “posi
tive and detailed proposals” early
next year.
Prime Minister Tony Blair empha
sized that GCSE and A-level exams
would not be abolished if the propos
als are implemented.
“Let me be clear that the purpose
of reform will be to improve upon
the existing system, not to replace
it,” he said in a speech in Birming
ham, central England. “Reform will
strengthen the existing system
where it is inadequate.”
Explosion: Violent incidents
abound during election
They also complained that the sup
posedly indelible ink used at some
polling stations to mark voters’ hands
in an effort to prevent repeated polling
turned out to be easily washable.
Qanooni said at a news conference
that he believed he — not Karzai —
would be headed for the simple ma
jority needed to avoid a run-off if the
ballot had been fair.
“The newborn baby of democracy
in Afghanistan has been killed in front
of our nation and the international
community on the first day of its life,”
he told reporters at his Kabul home.
Almost all of Karzai’s 15 opponents
have complained of cheating to a panel
of three foreign experts set up to head
off their threat to boycott the results.
The panel has yet to report its find
ings. But Baheen, the election
spokesman, suggested Qanooni’s ac
cusations were groundless.
“There is no indication of what the
candidates are saying, that boxes have
been emptied and refilled,” Baheen
said. “There’s nothing like that.”
Few independent observers believe
Qanooni, a member of the ethnic
Tajik minority, could command a
country deeply fractured by years of
tribal and ethnic warfare.
Karzai enjoys strong support among
Afghanistan’s traditional rulers, the
Pashtuns, and is seen as a bridge to its
international backers and a leader un
tainted by its bloody past.
. Associated Press writers
Matthew Pennington and Amir Shah
contributed to this report
Oil: Spending increase to help
grow technical college capacity
students, are happy to see more gov
ernment aid for the vocational cen
ters. But investing the money may be
only half the battle in displacing the
foreign work force that came with the
last oil boom.
“When 1 quit university to enroll in
the technical college, people said 1
was a loser,” said Bafaqih, 26, an
electronics student who shocked his
family by pursuing technical training.
“It wasn’t easy, but I made it.”
Al-Muhaidib, a 23-year-old electron
ics major, has seen the same attitudes.
“People look down on Saudis in
overalls,” he said. “That mentality
has got to change and we can
change it.”