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Congressional investigators examining defense stimulus spending

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By John Nolan, Staff Writer 11:16 AM Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Congressional investigators are reviewing how the Department of Defense is spending billions of dollars in stimulus funding at military installations across the system.

Reps. Solomon Ortiz, D-Texas, and Randy Forbes, R-Va., asked the U.S. Government Accountability Office to examine, among other things, how the Defense Department identified the projects on which it is spending American Recovery and Reinvestment Act money, how it is tracking that spending, and how it is using nearly $12.6 billion to repair and modernize existing facilities, build new facilities and invest in energy efficiency.

The congressmen expect to receive GAO’s report in the spring of 2010, Ortiz spokesman Jose Borjon said Wednesday, Oct. 14. The GAO is the investigative and auditing arm of Congress.

“The president has made clear that every dollar spent under the Recovery Act must be done with unprecedented levels of transparency and accountability,” Ortiz and Forbes wrote in their letter to the GAO requesting the analysis. “It is critical that DOD ensures transparency and accountability over the use of the funds and appropriately measures performance to better ensure effective implementation of the act (law).”

Wright-Patterson Air Force Base has spent nearly $26.4 million this year through an existing agreement for base infrastructure projects with contractor APM LLC, including stimulus money that has driven the contract well above its stated annual maximum spending limit of $12 million.

The discretionary decision by the 88th Contracting Squadron limited spending of that stimulus money to APM and the subcontractors it chooses, rather than a competitive bidding process that could have opened the stimulus spending to more contractors in the region. Base contracting and engineering officials said they made the decision in order to meet tight time frames for committing spending of the stimulus funding.

The APM contract’s $12 million annual spending limit is a guideline, less important than the five-year contract’s $60 million spending maximum, Wright-Patterson administrators said. This year’s inflated spending will require the base to soon begin soliciting for a new infrastructure contract, the officials said.

The GAO has previously reported that the Defense Department has allowed some facilities to deteriorate by not spending enough on modernization and restoration. Ortiz and Forbes asked the GAO to investigate whether the department is using stimulus money to address those needs, and whether it is using the money for military family housing at a time when the armed services have begun turning that housing over to private management.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2242 or jnolan@DaytonDailyNews.com.

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