Three companies have filed bid protests against GSA's $50 billion Alliant contract. A decision by GAO to deny or accept the protests could come as late as early December.
Sen. Charles Grassley has been pushing GSA and Sun to address concerns over the vendor's pricing strategy. But Sun has not provided data for an audit, he has asked GSA to cancel the award.
A test of GSA's program to speed the award process for schedule contracts is moving into its second phase, as agency officials see successes and the potential for more.
In its first score cards, SBA handed out 12 red scores, which show that agencies did not reach their annual small-business goals for 2006. There were five yellows and seven green scores.
The Army disagrees with a new audit that says it tied too many contracts together to form the $20 billion ITES-2S contract, which restricts small businesses from competing.
Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-N.Y.), chairwoman of the House Small Business Committee chairwoman, wasn't impressed with what Bush administration officials had to say at a hearing about small businesses in the Gulf Coast's recovery efforts.
SBA said the proposal would benefit businesses by cutting down on burdens when applying for assistance programs while keeping their status for a longer period of time.
GSA intends to issue a sole-sourcing purchase order to Eagle Eye Publishers for custom programming services as the agency works to put federal contract and grant information into an easily searchable public database.
SBA will implement an Electronic Procurement Center Representative system to help the agency analyze individual procurements and make it easier for agencies to identify small businesses capable of providing requested goods and services.
"We need to look at when and under what circumstances is it appropriate to be contracting and when is it not ... ," U.S. Comptroller General David Walker told a Senate committee.
Agencies have sent more contracting dollars to service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses than in past years, but they're still falling short, an SBA official told a House subcommittee.
In a July 10 memo, Paul Denett, administrator of OFPP, asked agencies to review their IT requirements and check GSA's Veterans Technology Services Governmentwide Acquisition Contract for services.
The government's procurement spending continues to climb, noncompetitive contracts occur more frequently, and waste, fraud and abuse persist throughout the departments, according to a report from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
While he stopped short of calling the federal procurement system broken, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) said the system is unhelpful and blamed the former Republican-led Congress for neglecting oversight.
