With IG report in rearview mirror, it’s time to let FirstNet pursue its plans

On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Inspector General (IG) office released the much-anticipated report regarding the FirsNet’s procurement and conflict-of-interest actions during the organization's first year of existence.

Considered in a vacuum, the findings in the IG report reveals issues that many believe should not happen in a normal federal-government environment.

Some FirstNet board members did not file public-disclosure forms in a timely manner, and at least one board member submitted inaccurate attendance records “to avoid filing the required public financial disclosure,” the IG report summary states.

In addition, one board member “inappropriately directed hiring actions” at a small-business contractor for FirstNet, according to the report. Later, the same board member directly assigned tasks to a subject-matter expert, who apparently began working on the tasks immediately after speaking to the board member—without the contractor knowing about it.

Finally, the IG report notes that $11 million was spent on sole-sourced contracts that lacked sufficient deliverables, “resulting … in unsupported costs to the government.”

It should be noted that a joint response from FirstNet, the National Telecommunication and Information Administration (NTIA), and the U.S. Department of Commerce disputed this finding, as well as the notion that the sole-source contractor agreements were inappropriate. In addition, the response notes that “there is no general prohibition on directing a contractor to engage with specific subcontractors or consultants, either as a condition of award or during contract performance.”

Disputes aside, many would argue that the findings in the IG report should not be acceptable in a normal government situation. However, what many people forget is that the FirstNet was not a normal government operation, particularly in its early days.

In addition to FirstNet not having its own staff—the first senior-level FirstNet official hired was General Manager Bill D’Agostino in April 2013, leaving board members to do a lot of work—there were questions regarding the appropriate style of operations for the fledgling organization.

In short, FirstNet’s governance structure and policies seemed to be uncharted territory for those in the government, something the IG report acknowledged, at least to some extent.

“Six months after the [FirstNet] board began regular meetings, senior NTIA and OGC [Office of General Counsel within the U.S. Department of Commerce] officials were still debating how best to routinely monitor potential conflicts of interest,” the IG report states.