DHS puts procurement house in order

The Homeland Security Department procurement is losing its baby teeth, moving briskly with border technology, a financial management project and two umbrella procurements on the heels of its recently signed fiscal 2006 appropriations bill. President Bush's signature making the bill law injects funds across the board into many of these projects. The blossoming of the department's IT procurement projects is a major step in DHS' transformation from a patchwork-quilt collection of 22 agencies to a unified organization with centralized contract control. Chief Procurement Officer Greg Rothwell said the agency would hire at least 400 new procurement officials in fiscal 2006, and "assimilate them to build a unified culture," at a recent event in Falls Church, Va., sponsored by market analysis firm Input Inc. of Reston, Va.