bob7947

Years ago, I read a Court of Federal Claims case in which a second party was trying to get payment from the CIA because he had contracted with a CIA agent in the field.  In the case, the second party could not prove the agent ever existed because the agent was using an alias.  It was an amusing predicament but I never posted it here.  I've searched several different times over the years but never could find it.  I would recognize it if I read it again.

Can comeone identify that case and let me know what it was?

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This Contract Disputes Act (“CDA”) case involves the arcane subject of pension cost allocations — a process of such complexity that, if it were just a game, it would make professional poker look like a round of go fish.  Notwithstanding that Textron AD’s counsel were dealt some bad cards in this case — Textron AD delayed submitting its required administrative claim until 2020 — they played a solid hand, giving this Court serious pause about whether the government held the winning trump card: an ironclad statute of limitations defense. Ultimately, however, the Court concludes that government was not bluffing: the statute of limitations indeed bars Textron AD’s complaint from moving forward.

Textron Aviation Defense LLC v. U. S., No. 20-1903C, August 12, 2022

It appears that this discussion has run its course.

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OMDAC-SWACA is yet another signal display of America's bizarre acquisition “system” at work. That system is comprised of statutes, policies, regulations, processes, procedures, websites, electronic “tools,” templates, contractual “vehicles,” acquisition “universities,” and an undevelopedbut-nevertheless-certified workforce. It is a one-half trillion dollar-a-year gravitational vortex of politics, ignorance, misplaced intention, adversarial legalism, and neglect, all centered on a black hole of incompetence. Special commissions, committees, panels, and acquisition reforms have not enabled us to escape it, nor will artificial intelligence. VJE

And here comes some more:

H. R. 7900 - National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023.  Passed House and crawled into the Senate awaiting further perfection.

S. 4543 - James M. Inhofe National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023.  Introduced in July 2022 and ready for more perfection in the Senate.

If that doesn't register, check out this page and read some of those GOBBLERS.  Most have no chance of becoming law buy some may.

THE MEANING OF “SHOULD”: Two Approaches. by Ralph C. Nash with an addendum by Vernon J. Edwards. 

Start with the low hanging fruit.  There is the Press Release that accompanies the bill.   Start with that.  He introduced S. 583 - PRICE Act of 2021 which became law and he mentioned in his press release.  Why?

There was a Business Meeting today in the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that included discussions on this bill among others.  Start at about the 17 minute mark.  Maybe Peters will elaborate on it there.  I believe he might mention that there will be markups of the bills in September.  That may be followed by a Senate report when and if it gets out of committee.

I wouldn't go any further than the press release and the business meeting at this time--unless the press release mentions something specific.  The bill only has about 2 months in this Congreess for anything to happen.  Then it has to be introduced in the new 118th Congress beginning next year.

[At about the 35 minute mark Senator Lankford mentions a couple things in the bill.  Apparently, he and his staff worked on it too.]

S. 4623:  AGILE Procurement Act of 2022.  Make sure you read Section 4.

Shortly after July 4, 1998, Wifcon.com began.  This is the end of its 24th year and the beginning of its 25th.  On July 8, 2023, it will be 25 years old.  I still remember writing this in 2013:

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As I mentioned in an earlier post, someone once told me that Wifcon.com was my legacy. I once had great hopes for a legacy. Perhaps, a great saxophone player belting out a solo in front of thousands of fans and seeing them enjoying themselves. Instead, here I sit in my solitude looking for news, decisions, etc., to post to the home page. For many years, my dog Ambrose kept me company. Now, my dogs Blue Jay and Lily stare at me and look for attention. With my sights now set realistically, I accept that Wifcon.com is my legacy. It's the best I could do.

And here I am in my solitude on a Wednesday night in July 2022 still looking for news, decisions, etc. to post to the home page.  With Blue Jay and Lily still by my side.

New this past week.

H. R. 8325 - Preventing Personal Conflicts of Interest in Federal Acquisition Act

I did this chart so that you could see what the GS-1102 contracting workforce looks like according to age.  The source for this information is the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) which has its latest data as of 9/26/2021.  

As of 9/26/2021, there were 40,619 people in the GS-1102 series.  Of that total, there were 21,851 women and 18,768 men.  The average time-in-service for the GS-1102 workforce was 13.1 years.

If you compare the total in the last line of this table to the 40,619 number you will find there is a difference of 9 people.  I suppose it was caused by a rounding error by OPM.

The top row shows the age groups that OPM uses.  The vertical column which I labeled "Time in Years" shows time-in-service of that age group.  For example, in the 30 - 34 age group, there were 698 people with 3 - 4 years in service.

9 hours ago, formerfed said:

It’s just political noise.  Mid term elections are coming up and the Administration has dwindled the list of topics where it’s down to Federal contracting after almost two years.  This is just more “look what we are doing for the country.”

I think a more proper focus for a management agenda is modernizing the contracting process to make us competitive internationally. 

I was thinking about modernizing the contracting process when I looked at the baloney last night.  This morning I looked at the clean version of H. R. 7900, the House NDAA for 2023.  I mention clean version because it just started the amendment process yesterday.  It was reported out of House committee on 7/1/22.  Theoretically, during the hearing process, one of the representatives on the committee identifies a real need that requires the law to be changed.

Title 8 is the annual dumping groung for bad contracting ideas.  Bad, in the sense that we don't need another piece of legislative garbage clogging up the contracting process.  It didn't take me long to find one.  Here it is

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SEC. 803. PREFERENCE FOR DOMESTIC FOODS FOR MILITARY WORKING DOGS.

    (a) In General.--Chapter 287 of title 10, United States Code, is 
amended by adding at the end the following new section:
``Sec. 3906. Preference for domestic foods for military working dogs
    ``With respect to the acquisition of food for military working dogs 
by the Defense Logistics Agency, the Director of the Defense Logistic 
Agency shall give a preference for the acquisition of food that is 
manufactured or produced--
            ``(1) in the United States;
            ``(2) by an entity that is based in the United States; and
            ``(3) using only ingredients and materials that were grown, 
        mined, manufactured, or produced in the United States.''.
    (b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of chapters for chapter 287 of 
title 10, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the 
following new item:

``3906. Preference for domestic food for military working dogs.''.

Now, I have 2 dogs that rule my house.  They want something, they get it.  They are a Princess and Prince.  But, do we need to have a legislative requirement to instruct DLA to buy Made in America dog food.  We need someone to read this and get so angry that they begin reforming the process.  As for me . . .

On 6/23/2022 at 1:39 AM, Vern Edwards said:

The cohort of federal procurement professionals is aging, while agencies face challenges competing with the private sector to recruit younger workers.

There are more people 70 and older than there are people under 25 years old working in federal procurement, Field said at the Professional Services Council’s Federal Acquisition Conference on Tuesday. Overall, only 7% of the acquisition workforce is under 30 years old.

'These statistics make a pretty compelling case to make our workforce a top priority—both the pipeline, the recruitment, the development, and the retention,” she said.'"

Emphasis added.

Vern posted the above a few weeks ago.  As you can see from our poll of Wifcon users, this has spread to Wifcon.com.  Of 23 votes cast in our unscientific poll to date, all 23 votes are from users who are 30 and above.  Even more scary is the fact that about 44% of us are 60 years and above.  It isn't as if there is no new blood here because I continue to add new members every day -- from the government and industry.

Over the past few years, I have found less and less information to post on the daily Home Page.  It hasn't happened overnight.  Rather, it has happened over the years.  I've been adding more and more sources to search for information that contracting individuals might find useful.  Quite franly, the amount of information out there has declined from that in the past.  It's as if no one cares about you.

Last Friday, OMB released its plans for the Administration's management agenda for federal contracting.  I consider it BALONEY.  Actually, I have many more unkind thigs to say about it.  You may say Where is it? as you search.  I think it is objectives without stating the existence of a problem to correct

One of the current issues is that the contracting workforce is aging with only a small percent of young individuals in the workforce.  Although there are only 18 votes in the current poll, it appears that Wifcon members may have aged over the years too with NO members in the youngest group.

Please vote in the poll so we reach a larger number of members voting.  Age of members may result in changes to the Wifcon site.

The population of the United States is 74% the size of the European Union.  Additionally both the United States and European Union share many of the same government contractors.  Considering that, some of our members may be interested in what is going on in the other side of our shared pond.  Chapter 4:  ROLE OF DIGITAL PLATFORM FOR GOVTECH AND PUBLIC PROCUREMENT specifically covers procurement so I point it out.

Here is a link to The Digital Single Market and the Digitalisation of the Public Sector

In the Civilian Board of Contract Appeals there is a case:  Raj J. Patel v. U. S., CBCA 7419, June 24, 2022 with a complaint for the above.  You may figure it out.

Mine was just like this one  "red" but this is 1969 and 1986.  

ASPM #1. 1969

ASPM 1986

I think I read the 1986 version the most, especially Chapter 8.  I always liked this one under "Gamesmanship."

"The Here It Is Friday Afternoon and You've Got to Catch the Plane Squeeze"

OK, back to the topic.

Read it and weep.

Department of Defense, Office of Inspector General—Legality of Service of Acting Inspector General

When you log-in today, how about clicking your age on this poll.

Another new article from Vernon J. Edwards entitled :  OFPP: Dead Letters?

Commissioning of Virginia-Class Fast Attack Submarine Montana

I was updating the Home Page of Wifcon.com this morning when I found this.  I've never watched a commissioning of a ship before and I deleted all the political speeches before I started watching.  We can see it was a beautiful day at Naval Station Norfolk and I enjoyed the formality of the actual commissioning and learned from it.  I placed the post under Contracting Workforce to acknowledge the contracting workforces of Newport News Shipbuilding, its subcontractors and suppliers, and that of the Navy.

The actual commissioning begins at about 40 mimutes into the ceremony and lasts about 30 minutes more.  Of course, it you want to hear politicians talk, you can start from the beginning.

51 minutes ago, joel hoffman said:

Bob, I was thinking simply to answer yes or no to “Are you a current Federal acquisition employee?”   (Or “contracting employee”, if you prefer) And identify your age group. I think that would be simple. 

Then you, as the webmaster can analyze the data yourself to determine the age breakdown of current employees and the rest of the membership. Allows you to know the breakdown for the general membership and for the active federal employee contracting membership. You could share that with us occasionally. 

I thought about a number of simple ways to do it.  So far, we have 4 responses -- out of 7,000 registered users.

53 minutes ago, Voyager said:

Perhaps to drum up interest you could create a guessing function, where you guess our ages and we earn plush toy prizes if you miss.

I did something like that years ago.  I offered $50 or $100 for doing something.  Someone won and it took me forever to convince the winner that he was going to be getting the money.  That was the last time I tried that.

Joel, the reason I kept it simple is because I'm hoping more than a handful of members submit a vote in in the next year.

In 2016, I asked the same question of you.  After 130 votes over 5 years, our members showed a fairly even distribution in the age groups I listed.  I hope we can get more votes than the first one.  This poll will automatically close next year on 6/23/23.

All you have to do is look at the poll and click one group.  That's it.

If you want to talk about any results, you can do that too.  Only I have access to your display names and I haven't disclosed one in the 24 years of Wifcon.com's existence.

The Need to Reform the McNamara – O’Hara Service Contract Act

by Ike Brannon, The Jack Kemp Foundation

by Chad D. Cotti, University of Wisconsin - Oshkosh

Please read:  The Need to Reform the McNamara – O’Hara Service Contract Act