Critics cite ineptness at Walter Reed / Outsourced maintenance may be factor in substandard conditions, they say
Source: By Lisa Myers, NBC News Investigative Unit, Updated: 7:47 p.m. ET March 6, 2007
……. Critics say part of the problem may be an Army decision last year to contract out maintenance and support at Walter Reed to a private company, even though government workers argued they could do it better, and for less. "They were moving, come hell or high water, to contract these jobs out," says John Gage, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees. The contract went to a company — International American Products, or IAP — that played a major role in the ice fiasco during Hurricane Katrina, when trucks roamed the country, delivering little and running up costs to taxpayers.