Bill Dupuy sounded much more knowledgeable about LANL than Bingaman did during the interview. Bingaman sounded at a total loss for words when Dupuy asked him, "Is privatization of Los Alamos National Labs working?" He basically just waffled and did not answer the question.
-Gus
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SANTA FE (2007-12-04) -- The question has to be raised - is privatization of the Los Alamos National Lab working?
The lab is planning to get rid of as many as 750 jobs - equal to $100 million off the budget. Perhaps coincidentally that number equals the profit the management company was promised to get for managing the lab under the new privatization set up, plus a good portion of the extra gross receipts sales taxes it has to pay because, unlike the previous contract holder, it is a for-profit partnership.
We put the question to New Mexico Sen. Jeff Bingaman - is privatization of the lab working?
-Gus
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Privatization at the Los Alamos national lab (Podcast)
By: Bill Dupuy
The lab is planning to get rid of as many as 750 jobs - equal to $100 million off the budget. Perhaps coincidentally that number equals the profit the management company was promised to get for managing the lab under the new privatization set up, plus a good portion of the extra gross receipts sales taxes it has to pay because, unlike the previous contract holder, it is a for-profit partnership.
We put the question to New Mexico Sen. Jeff Bingaman - is privatization of the lab working?
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7 comments:
Dupuy, as fine a gentlemen as I have ever met, spent some time working in Public Affairs at the Lab around 10 years ago. As a result, he knows the Lab better than most local news people.
Of course, that's back before PA, as we know it today, started to crater.
It depends on what you mean by "working". As far as the fat cats of LANS go, I think they all feel it is "working" very well, indeed.
The privatization was doomed to fail. They would have needed a leader with testicles, or ovaries, if they had wanted to improve the lab. They should have asked for the resignation of all managment from the division office and up. They could've done this on a rolling basis, going through division by division, firing and rehiring in some cases, and mainly leaving the secretarial staff in place who could have managed changing the lightbulbs and keeping the electricity on until competent mid and upper level management was found.
Politicians like Bingamin really have no clue about LANL and what is really going on inside this lab. He could find out, but I don't think he wants to be bothered about it.
Secretaries aren't allowed to change light bulbs.
That's KSL's $700 job.
Think about it. For KSL's fee of $500 to $700 to change out lightbulbs you could go out and buy a whole new fixture of very high quality and have a contractor put it up in your home. That's how absurd KSL fees are, and yet LANS seems to have no problem paying KSL to manage lab facilities! It is any wonder that auditors found over $41 million in KSL "overcharges" this last year? They are bleeding LANL dry.
Oh yea! it's working well, trouble is it costs 750 FTE's their jobs to pay for the corporate wealth program...and what do we get in return for this???? Not sure the government could do much better, they hide the added costs, at least these guy's tell us..
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