After a brief overview by CERF representatives, Mort Downey, Deputy Secretary, Department of Transportation (DOT), focused on the need for procurement reform. He cited such examples as alternative dispute resolution, negotiated procurement, best value procurement, and "other transactions" as the kinds of innovative practices and strategies that are essential for innovation in our nation's transportation infrastructure (For full text of his speech, see Appendix B).
Fenton Carey, Associate Administrator for Research, Innovation, and Education, Research and Special Programs Administration, followed with a detailed analysis of some of the challenges of bringing innovation into the transportation infrastructure sector. He contrasted a fluid national innovation process with a conventional linear model of research, technology development, and deployment. Carey focused on the many barriers to innovation, including not only the procurement process, and such related topics as product liability, specifications, technology certification, financing, regulations, institutional issues, and education and training. (For a complete set of his slides, see Appendix C).
Next James Lammie of Parsons Brinckerhoff, Inc., discussed innovation in the marketplace through effective procurement from the perspective of state and local agency policies and how they often work to stifle innovation. He emphasized that the promotion of innovation requires strong leadership to generate the necessary local agency cultural change. Lammie identified the major issue for procurement reform as the assignment of risk. Too often too much of the risk is pushed to just one of the partners in a project (For a more complete summary of his remarks, see Appendix D).
The next three speakers represented public agencies that have worked to reform traditional government procurement systems. Richard Dunn, General Counsel, Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA); Herb Baker, Space Shuttle Acquisition Team Leader, NASA; and Jane Monhart, Deputy Director, Contract Reform and Privatization Project Office, Department of Energy, reviewed the alternative procurement strategies pursued by their agencies. In response to the need to incorporate innovations into their everyday operations, some agencies have developed "other transactions"-a broad non-traditional procurement approach developed by DARPA and now being used throughout DOD and piloted by other federal agencies, including DOT. These were developed to help promote flexibility and innovation when selecting a contractor for a project and making procurement decisions during project execution that allow it to be carried out using the fastest, most cost-effective, and most technologically advanced methods while maintaining project quality and public safety. The three speakers presented case studies where "other transactions" were used for procurement of services, and the experiences of these agencies provided a wealth of success stories and lessons learned that are useful for all branches of government (These three presentations may be found as viewgraphs in Appendices E ,
F , and G ).
The six formal presentations were intended to set the stage for discussions among workshop participants of how procurement reform could be championed in the transportation arena. Workshop participants met in small groups, each structured with representatives of states, federal agencies, private industry, and trade associations. They identified the most important factors that stifle procurement reform and the ways it could be tailored to promote the use of new materials and processes in construction. The groups also suggested preliminary elements of an action plan for procurement reform. A summary of these discussions follows.
Return to Top
Next Section
