Walter Reed and Outsourcing

Get ready: The Walter Reed story is about to take a turn that will connect it with the Bush administration's "competitive sourcing" effort to put federal jobs up for bids from private firms. Army Times reported Saturday on a memo written last September by Peter Garibaldi, garrison commander at Walter Reed, to Maj. Gen. George Weightman, who was recently fired as head of the facility. The House Government Oversight and Reform Committee is interested in the memo for its hearing that's going on right now.

Key section of the story:

The memorandum “describes how the Army’s decision to privatize support services at Walter Reed Army Medical Center was causing an exodus of ‘highly skilled and experienced personnel,’” the committee’s letter states. “According to multiple sources, the decision to privatize support services at Walter Reed led to a precipitous drop in support personnel at Walter Reed.”

Jenny Mandel, who's been following the Walter Reed privatization for Government Executive for some time now, is at the hearing and will weigh in later today with a full report.