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most oi tne memoers or our Virginia delegation have diligently worked the Pentagon’s pork barrell in the Old Dominion’s behalf. A strong national defense means gigantic weapons and construction contracts, and the more of which can be awarded to Virginia firms, the better - and when it comes to the cost of these contracts, and the waste involved in them, well, the less said about it the better. It is all right to criticize waste in the abstract, but thhere is a sort of gentleman’s code against being too specific about it, especially when it involves a specific state’s share of the pork.
Over the past several weeks, however, Sisisky has suddenly emerged as not only a watchdog of defense spending, but as one who doesn’t hesitate to bark when he sees the hand of waste in the public purse.
According to Sisisky’s voting record, he is as defense-minded as the next guy, and he says he has no intention of hurting the state’s defense industry, but still he says he sees things which make him made.
For example:
• At Fort Pickett, in Sisisky’s home district, he found the Army had over estimated the cost of a $7 million dollar training complex by more than $2 million. The Army kept the change.
• A $38 millio medical facility in North Dakota was overpriced by at least $4 million.
• The initial outlay for a construction project at Travis Air Force Base, Calif., was estimated to be $52 milion. Under Sisisky’s probing, the cost tumbled to $5.5 million.
• He found the military was spending $8,500 per pupil space to build a dependents’ school in Europe, or more than twice the cost of building a similiar school in Virginia.
These and other discoveries by the Southside congressman led to a three-day hearing before the Military Installations and Facilities Subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee, of which Sisisky is a member. During the hearings Sisisky uncovered a stunning $143 million dollars in over estimated and over funded costs. He also learned that the military budgeteers consider estimate errors of up to 11 percent acceptable. This loose handling of public money shocked the businessman-tumed-congressman.
Sisisky is convinced that if this amount of savings can be achieved in the relatively limited area of military facilities construction, infinitely greater economies can be realized in the weapons systems contracts which absorb a far larger share of the defense dollars. Furthermore, he believes the savings can be made without the slightest compromise of national security.
“We saved $58 million when we found the military was planning to build dependent schools at bases in Europe where there are no military dependents,” he said. “We found they were spending $500 for claw hammers and $100 for 49-cent nuts and bolts. All these purchases should be put out for competitive bids.”
“When you are talking about an 11 percent over estimation on a construction budget of $8.5 billion, you are talking about a billion dollar waste. We chopped Reagan’s total defense budget of roughly $187 billion by about $11 billion this year just eliminating waste. We didn’t hurt defense at all.”
“And when they come back for the new budget next year,” he said, “we’ll be waiting for them.”
Having sighted the tip, Sisisky now wants to determine the size of the iceburg.
May his tribe increase!
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