July 25, 2007

$5 Billion Earmark Update

When I reported two weeks ago on an effort by U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minnesota, to pass legislation to kill the Defense Travel System, opening up a potential $5 billion in government business to Carlson Cos., a home-state company whose executives donate heavily to his campaigns, one facet of the story I didn't explore was the question of why U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, was co-sponsoring the same legislation.

Coburn has built a well-deserved reputation as a crusader against government waste and earmarks, but new information I've received indicates his motives in this effort may also be less than sterling. A travel industry management consultant emails:

The co-author with Sen. Coleman was Sen. Coburn, R - OK. One of his constituents is Sabre Holdings which has the online booking tool partnered with Carlson. Sabre spent vast sums improving its Oklahoma facility in recent years. Just Google it.

Attached is the press release from the Defense Travel Management Office on the Section 943 study of DTS. The report will reinforce what you have reported and add some new information.

Update: FederalTimes.com has a copy of the report and also reports that it endorses the Defense Travel System...

The Pentagon will move to require its civilian and military employees to use the Defense Travel System after an outside report won the department breathing room to fix the much-maligned system.

A Pentagon-commissioned report by the nonprofit Institute for Defense Analyses recommends that the department continue using the Defense Travel System (DTS) and that a portion of DTS used for travel accounting not be separated from the portion used to book trips, as critics have urged.

The institute completed in the report in March, but the Pentagon did not release it until this week, in response to a Federal Times request.

The study largely endorses the arguments of Pentagon officials responsible for DTS - including David S.C. Chu, undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness - who have pushed for improving the traveler interface of DTS, not overhauling the system.

A department spokesman said officials there consider the report a win for DTS, which critics call hard to use and not worth the nearly $500 million it has cost to develop. Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., with support from Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., earlier this year introduced a bill requiring Defense to scrap the travel-booking portion of system, which the senators labeled a “boondoggle."

But because the Pentagon agreed to a series of recommendations in the report, Coleman will not push to attach the legislation as an amendment to the 2008 defense authorization bill, a spokesman said.