Republican Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa is unhappy with the performance of the Defense Department’s chief watchdog, and for good reason. The Pentagon’s inspector general’s office didn’t investigate a single weapons contract or contractor last year, despite the historical problems the Defense Department has had with cost overruns and other troubles related to big-ticket procurement, according to Grassley’s office.

 

Instead of detecting waste, fraud and abuse, the IG left such investigations to the Defense Contract Audit Agency—which lacks independence and has struggled with its own performance issues.

 

In a report on the IG’s work, Grassley’s staff concluded that the inspector general’s office had “drifted away from its core mission of conducting contract audits” and chose “to move in an ill-advised direction” of performing “quasi-academic reviews of DoD policies and procedures.”

 

The IG also is doing less work with more staff. In 1995, the office and its 717 auditors produced 264 reports. Last year, a staff of 765 issued just 113 reports.

 

The new IG, Gordon S. Heddell, who came aboard last year, responded to Grassley’s concerns by saying he was “in the process of transforming” his office. The observations and recommendations made by Senator Grassley are relevant—and important—but they are only one piece of a much bigger transformation that I embarked upon well over a year ago when I was confirmed by the Senate as IG.”

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Lawmaker Finds Defense IG Is Doing Less with More (by Robert Brodsky, Government Executive)

Oversight Review of Audit Reporting by the Department of Defense, Office of Inspector General (Senator Charles Grassley) (pdf)

Pentagon IG Responds to Grassley Report (by Nick Schwellenbach, Project on Government Oversight)