Rep. McDermott Lauds Inspector General's Findings on NOAA's Flawed Decision to Move Marine Center from Seattle to Oregon
Press Release
Today, Rep. Jim McDermott praised a report issued by the U.S. Department of Commerce's Inspector General which found that National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) process for selecting a location for its Marine Operations Center--Pacific was mishandled and flawed. NOAA has entered into a long-term lease agreement with the Newport, Ore., but the Inspector General said in a letter: "Based on our review, we are unable to provide assurance that NOAA's award of the lease to the Port of Newport provided the most cost-effective solution for Marine Operations Center -- Pacific (MOC-P), or more generally for the government."
"I have long held that it was both bad judgment and bad policy for NOAA to ignore so many critical factors when deciding a location for its Marine Center," Rep. McDermott said. "Now both the Government Accountability Office and the Commerce Department's own Inspector General have confirmed what many of us have known for a long time: this process was badly botched from the beginning. As these new findings have shown, moving the center from Seattle to the much smaller Newport, Oregon, is not in the best interest of NOAA, the taxpayers, or the federal government."
In an earlier review of NOAA's decision to move the center to Newport, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) recommended that NOAA be more thorough in its process and recommended that it re-evaluate its decision. The GAO noted that Newport is located in a floodplain and that NOAA's review process ignored several other factors.
Among the problems outlined in the Inspector General's letter:
· "With respect to source selection, both we and the Department's independent review of NOAA's process found weaknesses and errors with NOAA's lease acquisition process for MOC-P;
· "In our view, the more fundamental problems pertain to NOAA's process prior to the competitive lease process. A primary cause of these problems is grounded in the fact that NOAA did not subject the MOC-P project to a rigorous capital investment planning and oversight process While the Department has a clear real property policy, NOAA did not follow it; and
· "NOAA's financial analysis of the four offers submitted in response to the (lease) solicitation did not assess the total cost to the government, and NOAA provided no evidence that it had thoroughly considered the operational and logistical implications of the relocation."
Congressman McDermott has consistently argued that the Seattle location offers NOAA and American taxpayers many unique advantages, including:
· Close proximity to NOAA's Northwest Regional Office, located in Seattle;
· Close proximity to the University of Washington and other collaborating scientific institutions and laboratories;
· Infrastructure of marine services (shipyards, suppliers, and skilled professionals) with an established and successful history of supporting NOAA vessels;
· Freshwater moorage, which reduces maintenance costs that would be incurred if the vessels were moored in a saltwater location; and
· No tidal action, which eliminates the need to frequently change the moorage lines, reducing labor expenses.
To view the letter written by the Commerce Department's Inspector General, visit: http://www.oig.doc.gov/oig/reports/marine_operations_centerpacific/index.html
To see the Government Accountability Office report, visit: http://www.gao.gov/decisions/bidpro/401837.htm
For more information about Rep. McDermott, visit www.mcdermott.house.gov.
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