Recovery.gov's Multi-Million Dollar Redesign Project Had Few Takers

Nancy Scola | July 16, 2009 - 12:26pm | 3 comments | Email This!

Recovery.gov, it seems, had very few invitations to the dance to chose from.

InformationWeek's J. Nicholas Hoover has a great recapping of what we now know about the potentially $18 million contract to overhaul the site, and it seems that winning bidder Smartronix was one of only three firms to pursue the contract. Why might so few be interested in so much money? For one thing, only the 50-odd firms pre-approved under the government's Alliant umbrella contract could apply. For another, the deadline on the redesign is coming fast and furious: the law requires the site to be functional by October 11. For another, the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board has high hopes for the site: think the New York Times meets IBM's Many Eyes meets the CDC disease tracking site, with a dash of Edward Tufte tossed in. Seriously. The 47-page Statement of Objectives released by the RAT Board cites the design guru as an inspiration. (Full SOO is below.)

The Washington Examiner's Mark Tapscott is exploring the angle of whether Smartronix's donations to Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer has something to do with the awarding of the high-dollar contract, but that doesn't seem to be panning out.

We might know more soon. Information Week reports that both Smartronix and GSA are planning to release a "version" of the Recovery.gov reboot contract next week.

 

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Comments

RAT Board didn't release the SOO

by Luigi Montanez on July 16, 2009 - 10:38pm

The SOO was provided in hardcopy to Sunlight Labs by a GSA contractor and then Sunlight Labs Director Clay Johnson scanned and uploaded it to Scribd (check out the tags on the bottom of the page). The RAT Board has released no documents (other than press releases) regarding the Recovery.gov bid.

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This is the SOO that the RAT Board is linking to

by Nancy Scola on July 17, 2009 - 8:17am

Hey, Luigi. Appreciate your clarification. The confusion came because this is the SOO that the RAT Board is linking to from Recovery.gov. Check out their "Contract Awarded for Construction of New Recovery.gov" page. At the very bottom: "The Recovery Board's Statement of Objectives for this development can be found at: http://www.scribd.com/doc/16515421/RAT-Board-Solicitation." Which, of course, raises the question of why they're not making use of their own version of the document and instead depending on Sunlight's public copy.

That's pretty crazy

by Luigi Montanez on July 17, 2009 - 9:11am

I knew that Smartronix had linked to Scribd in their press release, but I didn't know the RAT Board did as well. The version Sunlight put on Scribd is a scan from a printout, so it's not as accessible as a PDF generated from the original document would be. It's unfortunate that the RAT Board seems to be content with the Scribd version.

It would be great if they published the bids, but those aren't subject to FOIA. The contract is, and Devaney has indicated that he wants to publish it even without a FOIA request, as soon as the mandatory "Award Dispute Period" is over, which is today. The strange irony behind that is the contract is forbidden to be published during the period when it is supposed to be able to be disputed.

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