A 54-year old Virginia executive, Mark Farmer, was indicted in October for allegedly providing things of value to the former director of two Ohio Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Centers. The alleged quid pro quo was that, in exchange for these items of value, the VA director provided confidential information to Farmer about various VA construction projects. The charges in the…
According to a recent decision by the General Accountability Office (GAO) the answer is “No.” If you submit a proposal with a key personnel requirement, and one or more of your proposed key people are no longer available, your proposal is no longer technically acceptable. Booz Allen Hamilton Inc. (Booz Allen) just learned this the hard way when Paradigm Technologies (Paradigm) protested,…
A September 16, 2014 Government Accountability Office (GAO) (GAO-14-706) concluded that contracting officers (COs) are not properly monitoring subcontracting by 8(a) prime contractors to ensure compliance with applicable subcontracting limitations. Indeed, only two of the COs associated with the 10 contracts GAO reviewed had asked for and reviewed necessary information and made certain that the…
On October 10, 2014, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued its final rule, raising the minimum wage for employees of covered federal government contractors. The rule implements Executive Order 13658 which was announced by the president in February and published as a proposed rule by the DOL in June. While not all of the thousands of comments led to changes in the final rule, the DOL did address…
On June 14, 2014, Richard Melton, the former president of defense contractor Partz Network, was arrested and charged with allegedly stealing $3 million through fraudulent contracts with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). Most of the contracts were for replacement parts for military rolling stock – parts required to be manufactured by DoD-recognized qualified manufacturers. Partz…
The Department of Defense Inspector General (DoD IG) recently issued its Semiannual Report to Congress, covering the second half of FY 2013. The report summarizes the “achievements” of the DoD IG, as well as the military audit and investigative agencies. During the reporting period, the DoD IG identified $23.5 billion in potential monetary benefits and investigations conducted by the…
Over the last several years, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (“WHD”) has become much more aggressive in how it investigates and prosecutes worker misclassification, Service Contract Act (“SCA”), Davis-Bacon Act (“DBA”), and Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) issues. Government contractors, as well as private sector employers without government contracts, should take note of…
As we have previously reported, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) has had the health care industry in its sights for some time. While most health care providers have never heard of the OFCCP, a recent decision by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, UPMC Braddock v. Seth Harris (Acting Secretary of Labor), Civil Action No. 09-1210 (D.D.C. March 30, 2013),…
A decision by the District Court in the Southern District of Texas gives all companies another good reason (as if any were needed) to avoid criminal violations of statutes governing their conduct. In United States v. CITGO Petroleum Corp., No. C-06-563 (S.D. Tex. Sept. 14, 2012), the District Court reversed its prior decision and held that citizens harmed by a company’s criminal violation…
Taxpayers Against Fraud recently released information about fiscal year 2012 recoveries under the False Claims Act. The $9 billion collected in 2012 doubled that collected in 2011. The 2012 sum includes criminal fines and civil settlements from both federal and state FCA cases. The largest settlements were from the pharmaceutical and banking industries. Notably, 28 of the 30 largest settlements…
The Government’s continued emphasis on rooting out fraud, waste and abuse appears to be paying off, at least in terms of the increased number of contractors being identified as ineligible for federal government contracts.
According to a new report touted by Office of Federal Procurement Policy Administrator Joe Jordan, suspensions and debarments of contractors that violate federal contracting…
With all the media focus on the Affordable Care Act’s (“ACA”) regarding the individual mandate provision and the political impact of the recent Supreme Court ruling upholding the law on the November elections, a significant portion of the law has gone virtually without discussion – the enhanced enforcement tools in the ACA which will impact the health care industry for many years.
