Federal Procurement Chief Outlines Priorities.

• Author: Book, Elizabeth G.
• Position: Angela B. Styles of Office of Federal Procurement Policy

Bush administration supports continuation of public-private competitions I

Government procurement policies will not change drastically in light of the planned "war on terrorism," a senior procurement official told defense industry executives.

"The Defense Department hasn't said yet that they need more acquisition authority, so we are not going to do anything right now to change our policies. We have a wait-and-see attitude," said Angela B. Styles, the president's appointee as administrator for the Office of Federal Procurement Policy.

The OFPP is part of the Office of Management and Budget.

The OFPP, which has been without an administrator since June 2000, is undergoing change and reforms, she said. Styles spoke recently at a luncheon with defense industry representatives. She is responsible for advising the administration on government-wide procurement initiatives.

The Bush administration's priorities in procurement policy involve competitive sourcing, which is based on public-private competitions. The White House also seeks to improve the level of government performance and to return the government to the principles of competition, she said. Styles mentioned that one of her planned initiatives is to phase our the mandatory source status for the Federal Prison Industries (FPI), a policy that has been criticized by the business community for being anti-competitive and detrimental to small, niche-type suppliers.

Under a law in place since the 1930s, if the federal government wants to buy any product that FPJ produces, it must purchase the product from FPI. FPI is a quasi-governmental organization that manufactures items at facilities manned by federal inmates.

Styles wants to allow the private sector to compete for these contracts. Currently, if a federal agency wants to use a private sector source for a product that FPI produces, they have to submit a waiver to the FPI. "Our office will work to phase out the policy," she said. The Competition in Contracting Act, which deals with this issue, is favored by the current administration.

Styles said another OFPP priority is to change the way that rules are published in the Federal Register. The Federal Register, a government-wide publication, is used by the agencies to publish rules and regulations, which are governing tools for the federal agencies. They do not have to be codified by Congress. "There is a lack of quality and logical analysis in what we see published in the Federal Register,"...