Thread: Hoyer-linked firm wins $18M Recovery.gov contract

Stimulus funds going to Dem donors. Top donors getting sweet govt appointments. The cap and trade tax that wasn't even read before being voted on. There's some change you can believe in.


http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opini ... 53982.html

Updated: Hoyer-linked firm wins $18M Recovery.gov contract

By: David Freddoso
Commentary Staff Writer
07/09/09 8:28 AM EDT

ABC reports this morning that the Maryland firm Smartronix has won what seems like an enormous $18 million contract to re-design the Recovery.gov website. Approximately $9.5 million would be spent by January in order to make "Recovery 2.0" out of the site that is supposed to track the spending of federal stimulus funds in detail.

Smartronix, a medium-sized Maryland-based firm (over 500 employees) founded in 1995, boasts a large number of government clients, mostly military. The company appears to have just one important political connection: according to FEC records, Smartronix president, Mohammed Javaid, vice president Alan Parris, and partner John Parris have together given $19,000 to House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D) since 1999. There is no record of a Smartronix employee contributing to any other federal politician.

UPDATE: Smartronix got $260 million in other federal contracts

Smartronix has received more than $260 million in federal contracts since the year 2000, with the top awarding agencies being the U.S. Navy, Federal Technology Service, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Minerals Management Service, and the Office of Policy, Management and Budget (not clear which department or agency issued this contract), according to USASpending.gov.

Nearly $180 million of the contracts awarded to Smartronix during the period 2000-2009 were awarded on less-than-competitive basis, including $21 million for non-competitive awards. Another $33 million was awarded in competitive processes in which Smartronix was the sole bidder.

Ed Morrissey at Hot Air has more details on Smartronix government contract awards. --- Update by Mark Tapscott.

UPDATE II: Hoyer spokesman demands headline change

Stephanie Lundberg, Hoyer's spokesman, said the House Majority Leader had no involvement in the awarding of the contract to Smartronix, and that his office didn't even know about the award until last night, presumably as a result of a posting on the ABC News blog, The Note.

Lundberg also strongly objected to what she called "the suggestion in your headline that this was awarded to them because of Mr. Hoyer. He had no involvement whatsoever with this contract, and you should change the headline. That crosses the line." Lundberg also said Smartronix is "just a small company in our district, in St. Mary's County, they have no political involvement, they were just supporting their hometown congressman."

St. Mary's County, MD, is at the lower tip of the Southern Maryland peninsula and is home to multiple Navy facilities, including the Naval Air Station Patuxent. --- Update by Mark Tapscott

UPDATE III: USASPENDING.GOV much cheaper

Although the short timeline of the Recovery 2.0 project may render the comparison unfair, the site will be vastly more expensive than USASpending.gov, whose purpose is similar. The USA Spending site, which came about as a result of transparency legislation written by then-Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., and Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., tracks federal contract spending by state, zip code, and Congressional District, as well as by contractor and type of award. It also gives details down to the transaction level for contracts made in every year since 2000.

The software package for USASpending.gov was purchased from a non-profit budget watchdog group, OMB Watch, for just $600,000.

One thing the new Recovery site must do that USA Spending does not is gather information from contractors on how they use the money -- for example, how many jobs they create with stimulus money. But this information will be submitted by federal stimulus contractors through the web portal FederalReporting.gov, which has another contractor, CGI Federal.

Ed Pound, a spokesman for the agency that operates Recovery.gov, told The Examiner that Recovery 2.0 will have even more functions than USA Spending. He rejected any notion that the $9.5 million cost for the rest of this year, or the potential $8.5 million in optional renewals for the out years, is excessive. "I would personally describe that as nonsense," said Pound. "We are not interested in wasting the taxpayers' money."

Pound said that three companies bid on this particular project, which will develop a functional site "from scratch" by October 10 and maintain it thereafter. "We picked the very best of the three we had," he said.


Comments:

depaz

Jul 9, 2009

Looks like business as usual in DC . . .



Eggs

Jul 9, 2009

Smartronix President Mohammed Javaid.. got it.



Don L

Jul 9, 2009

Why,I do declare, is that a (D) behind his name that I detect?



ryukyu

Jul 9, 2009

Stimulus funds going to Dem donors. Top donors getting sweet govt appointments. The cap and trade tax that wasn't even read before being voted on. There's some change you can believe in.



TexGEOas

Jul 9, 2009

There is no such thing as an $18,000,000 web site. This is just another Government giveaway (to cronies). Follow the money. At $60 an hour, that's 144 YEARS of payroll!



AmericaFirst

Jul 9, 2009

I still can't believe it was first reported by ABC!



Interested Watcher

Jul 9, 2009

The other bids were significantly lower ... yet the award goes to unqualified vendor, without any track record of this work. This will get messier ...



Standards in Journalism

Jul 9, 2009

MediaMatters.org has pointed out how dishonest and disingenuous this story is: http://mediamatters.org/blog/200907090022 "According to the report, over the last ten years three execs at Smartronix have donated, on average, $600 per-year to Hoyer, their local (and influential) Congressman. I kid you not. That's the newsworthy "link." "



Mediamatters is being dishonest

Jul 9, 2009

"According to the report, over the last ten years three execs at Smartronix have donated, on average, $600 per-year to Hoyer" Mediamatters is lying. Looking up campaign contributions on newsmeat.com and opensecrets.org reveals a heck of alot more money from smartronix to hoyer than 600 a year from 3 executives. From 2003-4 for example, the company donated 8 grand to Hoyers campaign. The president of smartronix alone gave 1000 here and there to Hoyers campaign



mediamatter is dishonest

Jul 9, 2009

Mediamatters is lying. Looking up campaign contributions on newsmeat.com and opensecrets.org reveals a heck of alot more money from smartronix to hoyer than 600 a year from 3 executives. From 2003-4 for example, the company donated 8 grand to Hoyers campaign. The president of smartronix alone gave 1000 here and there to Hoyers campaign



mediamatter is dishonest

Jul 9, 2009

Mediamatters is lying. Looking up campaign contributions on newsmeat.com and opensecrets.org reveals a heck of alot more money from smartronix to hoyer than 600 a year from 3 executives. From 2003-4 for example, the company donated 8 grand to Hoyers campaign. The president of smartronix alone gave 1000 here and there to Hoyers campaign



Kelly

Jul 10, 2009

Smartronix hmmmm these folks keep the computors and the security for gov websites and stuff? Ymmm hasent gov sites been hackingot alot latley? Like a bunch? Is Hoyers the one who wants to give a defense stystem contract to a company thta has never built one before? His picture looks like he is talking out the side of his mouth huh? Maybe both ends........what a mess



Janet S

Jul 10, 2009

Interestingly, Smartronix is redesigning a website...and they don't even offer website design as a service. Engineers putting together conceptual design,sitemaps and usability? It already sounds like a cluster. And I'd be shocked if Microsoft has ever spent that kind of money on their website...and theirs is massive.



Low Paid Designer - Programmer

Jul 10, 2009

Sorry guys I have been on both ends of running my own design web consultancy, designing, programming, developing interactive database with flash and managing all types of CMS packages for large international organizations that track every type of financial data. There is no way a site cold cost 18mil. I even went and checked Smartronix and they don't even have linked portfolios, well written case studies, no previous web design work, nothing in the private sector (non gov clients are very critical of deliveries). Their site is one of the ugliest sites I have seen built on ASP -ha? Smells like a stinking fish to me.



Just A Coincidence, Nothing To See Here People

Jul 10, 2009

From the article: Lundberg also said Smartronix is "just a small company in our district, in St. Mary's County, they have no political involvement, they were just supporting their hometown congressman." Yup, just a small business in the district that Mr. Hoyer just happened to pop into for a 'jovial' visit in October 08' http://www.smartronix.com/ABOUTUS/News/ ... fault.aspx We'll see how fast that page gets deleted from the Smartronix website. T minus 10, 9, 8...



Bababooey

Jul 10, 2009

Steny Hoyer, Dem Md, House Majority leader is responsible for the contract being awarded. Smartronix donated thousands to Hoyer's campaign. Hoyer is calling for stimulus II. Sounds like more Hoyer has more people to pay off! Hmmmmmmm, the things that make you say "Hmmmmmmmm".



John

Jul 10, 2009

Future news report from Hoyers' office. ACORN given $25,000,000 for bridge inspection. Hoyer spokesrobot states no political connection. This is about as transparent as a cinder block. "Change we can revile in"



Jeez!

Jul 12, 2009

$18 million for the Obama Administration to be its own watchdog reporter, come on! Where is the CANCEL button???



whitey

Jul 22, 2009

If you remember that this poor company now has to deal with lazy local, state and federal employees to get the job done, it's a bargain compared to what I'd charge.



Curel Smartronix

Jul 30, 2009

Smartronix should be shutdown for eating up our money. Any decent company would not take advantage of massive government money for a freakin website knowing that the website software was only bought for 600K.

Well I guess, 17M and 400K profit going to Smartronix president, Mohammed Javaid, vice president Alan Parris, and partner John Parris pockets who i bet are living low key in Saint Marys county.

Guys I wish you could find out why Smartronix recently changed there website layout(a month ago) to make it look more fancy when they had kept the same layout(old website) for more than 10 years.. just think!



Johny

Jul 30, 2009

alot of money going to waste



jksh

Aug 6, 2009

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cdoe@gmail.com

Aug 14, 2009

Looks like the indian mafia is in town. They will continue to grab more contacts with Vivek and Aneesh leading some initiatives.
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