(Alexandria, VA) – By calling for a pause in thefiscally-troubled procurement of space-launch vehicle cores, Senators CarlLevin (D-MI) and John McCain (R-AZ) could help to avert more “majormalfunctions” in the federal budget. That’s the opinion of the 362,000-memberNational Taxpayers Union (NTU), which has warned about the flawed financialtrajectory of the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) for several years.
“Last month’s critical report from the GovernmentAccountability Office (GAO) is only the latest authoritative confirmation thatthe entire EELV project needs a serious course correction,” said NTU ExecutiveVice President Pete Sepp. “Our members join with Senators Levin and McCain inasking Defense Secretary Panetta for a prudent time-out from further EELVacquisition plans before taxpayers are marooned with even worse liabilities.”
Asfar back as 2005, NTU raised concerns to Congress that EELV and the then-pendingUnited Launch Alliance (ULA, created to supposedly facilitate program savings) wasshowing “many telltale signs” of previous government contracts gone awry. AsNTU’s open letter sent to lawmakers six years ago concluded, “The AirForce’s newly-revised EELV acquisition strategy makes a bad situation worse fortaxpayers. … NTU urges you to support the elimination of the EELV subsidycontracts and instead return to price-competitive acquisitions.”
Sincethat time most of the reservations taxpayer advocates expressed about EELV andULA have come true. The cost savings envisioned by allowing Boeing and LockheedMartin to merge operations into ULA have not materialized: in the space of ayear the Air Force has raised its five-year budget plan projection for EELV by$3.7 billion, or more than 50 percent. EELV expenditures on a government-widebasis will amount to $15 billion between Fiscal Years 2013 and 2017, a sum thatcould “crowd out” other budget items. Meanwhile, a planned government buy of 40EELV “launch cores” threatens to lock taxpayers in to high prices while lockingout potential competition that could deliver fiscal benefits. GAO recentlyfound that the purchase “may be based on incomplete information” and that “costor pricing data for the EELV program are largely unknown.”
Sepp encouraged Levin’s and McCain’s colleagues inCongress to “support the EELV pause and ask hard questions about the program’sfuture. When it comes to the government’s space-launch strategy ‘missioncontrol’ means more collaboration among agency customers, more competition forfederal business, and more cost-consciousness from program administrators,” hesaid.
NTU is a nonpartisan, nonprofit citizen organizationworking for lower taxes, smaller government, and economic freedom at alllevels. Since its founding in 1969 NTU and its members have been involved in aplethora of discussions over defense purchasing policies, including in recenttimes the KC-45A program, the F-35 alternate engine, and the Medium ExtendedAir Defense System. Note: Formore on NTU’s work in this and other public policy areas, visit www.ntu.org.