 | |
 |  |
 |  |
| DEA drug fighting plane doesn’t fly, but costs soar |
| By Joe Davidson |
 A DEA counter-narcotics airplane sits on jacks in Delaware after never getting off the ground for its intended operations in Afghanistan.
The boondoggle of the week award goes to the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Defense Department.
They
joined forces to combat illegal drugs in Afghanistan, but ended up with
an expensive plane that, like their grand plans, won’t fly.
But the cost has soared.
The
plan was for DOD to modify a DEA plane to be used in counter-narcotics
operations in a combat zone. DEA purchased an ATR 500 aircraft in
September 2008 for $8.6 million. Eight years later, the cost of the
program has ballooned without the plane ever getting off the ground for
its intended mission.
The
Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General (IG) determined
“collectively, the DEA and DOD spent more than $86 million to purchase
and modify a DEA aircraft with advanced surveillance equipment to
conduct operations in the combat environment of Afghanistan, in what
became known as the Global Discovery Program. We found that more than
7 years after the aircraft was purchased for the program, it remains
inoperable, resting on jacks in Delaware, and has never flown in
Afghanistan.”
In a report released Wednesday,
the IG delivered a list of problems with the program, including
repeated missed deadlines and vastly blown budgets. Even if the plane
magically flew tomorrow, it would be too late for the DEA mission in
Afghanistan. The agency ended its aviation operations there in July. Now
DEA plans to use the aircraft in less hostile places like the
Caribbean, Central America and South America, with June being the
earliest projected date.
“However,
even if they can meet that new target date, DEA and DOD officials
estimate that the aircraft will not be completed with all previously
agreed-upon modifications,” Christine Hinton-Martinez, leader of an IG
team of auditors based in San Francisco, said in a podcast.
Army
Lt. Col. Valerie Henderson, a Pentagon spokeswoman, said DOD
“eliminated funding for the program in the Fiscal Year 16 budget,
however we continue to manage a firm-fixed-price contract that requires
the upgraded aircraft be delivered by June of this year.”
When
the Federal Insider asked DEA to comment, the response was short
boilerplate: “Reviews by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) are
necessary and important, and DEA welcomes recommendations that make us
better. DEA agrees that it can and should provide better oversight of
its operational funding. We are reviewing policies and procedures to
ensure the limited resources allocated to DEA are utilized in the most
responsible and effective way possible.”
|
| ||||||||||
In
a more detailed response to the inspector general’s office, DEA pointed
its finger at DOD, which supported the program with $29 million.
DEA
said it “had previous positive experiences utilizing DoD contractors
for modifying DEA aircraft.” The “significant difference” this time was
previously “DEA utilized its own funding, and therefore, had the
latitude to be more involved in the modification process. Based upon
that previous experience, DEA had no indication that the Global
Discovery modification would encounter the significant delays and
problems that ultimately occurred.”
DEA
must have had a clue at some point. The report says the project was to
have been finished in December 2012, “but it has missed every intended
delivery date that has been established.”
Problems
with the project go beyond the delays and cost overruns and start with
the airplane’s purchase. The IG said DEA did not fully comply with
acquisition regulations and did not consider “the time and cost it would
incur to establish an infrastructure of pilots, mechanics, trainers,
and spare parts required to operate the aircraft.”
DEA
awarded a $1.9 million contract in December 2012 to build a hanger
specifically for the ATR 500 at the Kabul International Airport, but the
IG said the plane “will most likely never be housed in the hanger.”
By
October 2014, DOD officials considered dumping the program, according
to the report. About $65.9 million had been spent at that point and
another $6 million in repairs was needed.
“Yet, at that time,” said the IG report, “the market value of the ATR 500 was only $6 million.”
The inspector general’s office provided information about the DEA aircraft in a multimedia presentation at this link.
Read more:
No comments:
Post a Comment