A Senate subcommittee heard testimony from government and industry representatives on outsourcing Thursday, Federal News Radio reports. Representatives from the Army, Homeland Security Department, Office of Personnel Management, watchdog groups, federal employee unions and private contracting firms attended the hearing. The Professional Services Council said in a statement that lifestyle costs, including post-retirement, are often [...]

Several federal leaders and executives agreed at a Thursday conference that agencies and private companies should have more dialogue for information technology acquisitions, Federal Times reports. Pete Tseronis, Energy Department chief technology officer, suggested agencies conduct agency-wide meetings to share ideas with contractors at the Acquisition Excellence conference in Washington. Tseronis said these meetings would [...]

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) called for a review of contractor expenses within the government workplace at a subcommittee hearing Wednesday. She said service contract spending has increased 44 percent from $181 billion into $324 billion throughout the last 10 years. Spending for federal employees has also increased 34 percent from $170 billion to $229 billion [...]

Hank Beebe, chief information officer for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, said Friday that cloud computing adoption requires a new information technology acquisition model. According to Fierce Government, Beebe made his announcement at the AFCEA DC event in Arlington, Va. on March 23. He said existing federal acquisition processes are restrictive due [...]

Both Congress and the Defense Department need to review acquisition laws and regulations, a House Armed Services Committee panel is recommending. In a report released March 20, the panel said the review should aim to simplify the acquisition process by either amending or eliminating regulations. The same day, Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs Administrator [...]

Government contracting firms who follow the General Services Administration’s multiple-award IT Schedule 70 could soon see changes, Federal Computer Week reports. Kay Ely, chief learning officer at the Office of Personnel Management and Schedule 70 contract director, outlined her top priorities in order to make the contract operations run more smoothly and attract more competition. [...]

Two senators introduced a bill Friday to lower the maximum amount for reimbursement of government contractor salaries. Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) introduced the Common-Sense Contractor Compensation Act to lower the maximum reimbursement rate and extend the limit to all contracting employees. Contracting firms have been allowed to charge the government $693,951 for the salaries [...]

The government will increase the amount of notifications it gives to contractors who hold spots on General Services Administration schedules, the Washington Post reports. As of Monday, new acquisition rules require agencies to notify companies on a given schedule of all opportunities ranging from $3,000 to $150,000. Agencies must allow the company to make an [...]

The General Services Adminstration has appointed Jim Ghiloni to lead the Integrations governmentwide acquisition contract, Federal News Radio reported. Federal Acquisition Service Commissioner Steve Kempf said in an e-mail that Ghiloni will oversee the final development stages and construction of the contract vehicle, according to Federal News Radio. GSA has set the contract’s ceiling value [...]

The House Small Business Committee passed 6 bills Wednesday through a voice vote to promote small business contracting. The 2012 Government Efficiency through Small Business Contracting Act imposes a quota that agencies must use small businesses for 25 percent of their contracting work. It also aims to expand the varieties of contracts by using the [...]