CREW demands investigation of $74 million contract given to company fined for providing faulty helmets to US troops
Today, CREW sent a letter to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees requesting an investigation into a Department of Defense $74 million contract awarded to Sioux Manufacturing. The letter can be found here.
The New York Times reported that Sioux Manufacturing, which makes Kevlar helmets, has agreed to pay $2 million to settle a lawsuit alleging that the company had shortchanged the armor in up to 2.2 million helmets for the military, including helmets used by American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Yet, the Department of Defense, aware of both the problem with Sioux's helmets and the company's efforts to cover it up, awarded another contract to Sioux -- a mere 12 days before the lawsuit was settled.
Our letter to the Chairs and Ranking Members of the House and Senate Armed Services Committee concludes:
Outrage is the only reasoned response to learning that the Department of Defense is its responsibility to do its best to protect our troops. This is a situation that cries out for Congressional oversight and we hope we can count on you to immediate investigate this appalling turn of events.
This is an outrage.
helmets and corruption
do you actually expect anything diffrent from this bush administration. It holds values like corruption incompetence and malfesence above all else. I guess its a money thing.. hey pelosi how much are you makein off this war to justify keeping impeachment off the table ..this just makes my blood boil..peace and prosparity huh mr bush prosparity for your war profiteering friends and peices of iraqis hearts and minds splatteres all over thier streets
Ethics in the national government
The vast number of corrupt or incompetent or negligent contracts in Iraq and in the U.S. military poses a question: Are ethics and honesty still predominately in existence in our government? The malfeasance in the construction of the nearly one billion dollar U.S. Embassy in Iraq may well by symbolic of the larger rot taking place at the national level as the news media, especially television focus on junk news. Informing the citizenry of chronic irregularities in government is neither the job of the television media nor their goal. Their job is make profits and nowhere is it necessary to adequately inform the people of misdeeds of their government. The whole notion of public airwaves is not operative in any meaningful way. It is private airwaves nominally and gently regulated by government allowing the corporation to make immense profit at the public expense. Private sector enterprise is one thing, but public airwaves have greater obligation for the preservation of the democracy.
Henry Pelifian
http://uniskywriter.blogspot.com/
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Helmets
This is a classic government contract.
I'll bet it is a 8A Native American Business contract.
This is a company/contract set up under a law that allows the government ot enter into a no bid contract. While this saves on paperwork these contacts generally cost the government 20% more.
And in many cases the 8A company is native american in name only - often times these companies are little more than a store front in Alaska that subcontracts the work out. Basicallly a past through with a 20% surcharge.
And the thread count issue is a classic scam to cheat the government by the difference in thread count- is this case by 5%. The company is proably getting a giveback from the yarn supplier too.