The Buzz

On the Move

Federal agencies relocated almost 60,000 white-collar workers in fiscal 2003, including more than 43,000 civilians and 16,000 military personnel, according to Office of Personnel Management figures gathered from more than 100 agencies.

The Agriculture Department moved the most employees, 7,275, followed by the Army with 6,830 and the Homeland Security Department with 5,633. More employee relocations occurred during the fourth-quarter of fiscal 2003 than any other, with 16,881 moves. The fewest occurred during the second-quarter, with 12,740.

Criminal investigators were relocated most often, with 3,939 moves, followed by 2,178 foreign affairs personnel. General Schedule employees accounted for about 76 percent of the moves. The most mobile grades were GS-12, with 7,843 employees, followed by 6,752 GS-11s and 6,731 GS-13s.

The relocation data was presented by Jerry Mikowicz, manager of OPM's salary and wage systems group, at a recent meeting of the Governmentwide Relocation Advisory Board. The advisory board, which is made up of government and private industry representatives, is preparing to recommend changes to federal relocation rules in a September report.

Asteroid-Blasting Agency

Scientists agree that the chance a huge asteroid will hit the Earth is relatively small. Of course, if it did happen, the results could be catastrophic. So Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., wants to take no chances. He's backing the idea of a whole new federal asteroid-response agency, according to a June report in Wired News.

The agency would have the authority to take action to throw an asteroid off course or blow it up if necessary, and would handle emergency response if those measures failed.

You might think the folks at NASA would be threatened by having another agency in the space-watching business, but apparently they're eager to have some help dealing with the asteroid nightmare scenario. "Right now, NASA has a charter to find and track these objects," Donald Yeomans, manager of the agency's Near-Earth Object Program Office, told Wired News. "But if we do find something, who do we call?"

Guarding the Net

Superstar center Shaquille O'Neal's Miami Heat fell just short of reaching the NBA finals this spring, losing in a closely fought series to the Detroit Pistons. Fortunately for the nation's law enforcement community, that will leave O'Neal plenty of time to pursue his other passion: helping officers hunt down sexual predators who target children online.

In March, O'Neal was sworn in as an honorary deputy U.S. marshal. He was already a reserve deputy with the Bedford County Sheriff's Office in Virginia, home to Operation Blue Ridge Thunder for the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force. O'Neal also is a spokesman for the Safe Surfin' Foundation, a nonprofit organization that educates the public about the Internet. And the Associated Press reported in May that O'Neal was working with Miami Beach Police investigators, learning the software and techniques they use to track down sexual predators.

"Today's criminals are hiding behind computer screens, fake names and fraudulent identities," O'Neal says. "I'm proud to help . . . law enforcement track down and lock up sexual predators."

Fresh Mint Competition

The U.S. Mint, responsible for creating coins, reopened a job competition involving forklift operators after the Office of Management and Budget urged it to do so. In April 2005, the acting assistant secretary for management at Treasury, the Mint's parent agency, reversed a decision to award the contract to an in-house team, according to documents provided to Government Executive by the American Federation of Government Employees.

When the contest, which involves about 60 forklift operators in Denver and Philadelphia, closed in September 2004, there were no private sector bids. The contracting officer investigated the lack of private interest by contacting four potential vendors, and determined none were suitable because they rent equipment rather than supply operators. The officer recommended accepting the in-house bid. Acting Assistant Secretary Jesus Delgado-Jenkins, who has since left the department, approved it in February 2005. He rescinded it two months later after OMB "provided direction to the department," according to his April 2005 memo.

OMB typically does not get involved in agency decisions regarding specific competitions. The U.S. Code specifies that OMB's Office of Federal Procurement Policy should not "interfere with the determination . . . of specific actions in the award or administration of procurement contracts." But OMB spokeswoman Sarah Hawkins says, "When activities in a competition are highly commercial in nature, OMB often recommends reopening . . . if the private sector decides not to bid."

ON THE RECORD: Wayne White...

...retired from the State Department in March after a 26-year career in the Bureau of Intelligence and Research studying the Middle East. In late May, he sat down with National Journal to talk about Iraq.

On how the Iraq war has unfolded: Nobody predicted an insurgency this robust, widespread and serious. Nobody anticipated a scenario in which the entire country would have been looted from top to bottom, devastating the national infrastructure and putting the country into a state of chaos, and then totally alienating the Baath Party and substantial parts of the army. [The insurgency] is at a level where it can disrupt national life immensely. The insurgency may be able to replace its losses faster than the United States is replacing ours. [Our] replacements have to come from the United States. [For the insurgents] to replace someone who was just killed in a skirmish with U.S. forces, though, the replacement might live 200 yards away.

On the limits of U.S. military power in the country: I do not think there is a military silver bullet. You can increase intelligence collection; you can learn from your mistakes-but there are two problems with that. One, the insurgents are learning, too. Their learning curve may even be matching yours, so you cannot put too much emphasis on your own ability to adjust tactics. [Two], the primary reason there is not a U.S. military resolution: We do not have enough troops in the country. [When we went into Fallujah last November,] we had to strip out troops from other areas. The entire upper Euphrates, where Operation Matador is now occurring, fell back into the hands of the insurgents [during the Fallujah campaign]. Toward the end of the battle of Fallujah, the city of Mosul was overrun. We have a constant situation of robbing Peter to pay Paul.

On the view of the situation in the U.S. government: There are a number of pessimists in government who fear that this might become a civil war. It wouldn't look like the American Civil War. It might simply be Sunnis fighting on the edges of their area of dominance for disputed villages, Shiites doing the same, and the Kurds hunkering down in the North.

Let's Make A Deal

The Office of Management and Budget will require agencies to start analyzing their buying habits and using the data to cut better deals with vendors by Oct. 1.

In a May 20 letter to top federal executives, Clay Johnson, OMB's deputy director for management, said chief acquisition officers will work with chief financial and information officers to implement "strategic sourcing" plans.

Johnson defined strategic sourcing as "the collaborative and structured process of critically analyzing spending and using this information to make business decisions about acquiring commodities and services more effectively and efficiently." The process often involves using agencies' buying power to negotiate bulk discounts.

Agencies must identify three commodities that can be acquired more efficiently through strategic sourcing. By January 2006, chief acquisition officers must submit reports to OMB on savings generated as a result of strategic sourcing.

Some agencies already have started using strategic sourcing, which until now was voluntary. The Agriculture Department saves $2.5 million a year on office supplies through a negotiated agreement with its provider. Similarly, the Internal Revenue Service estimates that it saves $4 million annually on photocopiers through strategic procurement.