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FBI Scrutinizes Unlikely Veco Contracts
The FBI wants to know why oil services company Veco Corp. won federal contracts worth $170 million to provide the National Science Foundation with polar and arctic research support, despite having no experience in the field, the Anchorage Daily News reports.
Veco won the federal awards right around the time CEO Bill Allen oversaw the remodeling of Stevens' Girdwood home, another field in which Veco had no prior experience.
Stevens, who has long supported NSF arctic research, would have had authority over NSF funding as a senior member of the Senate Commerce Committee, though no evidence has surfaced holding Stevens responsible for directly securing the contracts for Veco.
The Daily News spoke with former chairman of the Arctic Research Commission, George Newton about the contracts:
Newton said that when it came time in 1999 to award a polar logistics contract, it was believed within the NSF and in polar research circles that Veco's relationship to Stevens' son might give the company an advantage.
Stevens' son, former Alaska Senate President Ben Stevens, was identified as one of the state lawmakers namelessly described in Bill Allen's bribery guilty plea. According to the plea, Stevens' company received $243,250 in "consulting fees" from Veco.
Over the years, Veco has won many federal contracts, but throughout the course of the Stevens scandal so far, it's been unclear what exactly the company has allegedly received in exchange for all of the nice gifts and favors sent the way of state and federal politicians. We asked what it is Veco receives back in June and noted the NSF contracts, but this is the first specific contract we've heard of facing FBI scrutiny.
As well they probably should, the people of Alaska are very shortly going to pay a rather stiff and humiliating price for allowing:
(a) Themselves to become overly dependent upon Ted Stevens' stature as the senior Republican in the U.S. Senate as primary means to generate a not-insignificant portion of Alaska's income and gross state product; and
(b) Their state to be subsequently exploited as a personal fiefdom by the Stevens and Murkowski families, their politial allies and business cronies, as though it was practically a birthright.
August 16, 2007 10:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Residents of Alaska get a oil revenue sharing check each year. For most people that is the government program they care most about. The average person doesn't see the benefits of the pork.
August 16, 2007 10:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
Kudos to the ADN for confirming that there is FBI interest in this contract arctic research contract. Didn't talkingpoints write about this contract months ago? It appears that the G-men are a big fans of Laura McGann.
August 16, 2007 11:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Kudos to the ADN for confirming that there is FBI interest in this arctic logistics contract. Didn't talkingpoints write about this contract months ago? It appears that the G-men are big fans of Laura McGann.
August 16, 2007 11:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
security code: taste
as in the this better be leaving a bad taste in the mouth of every Alaskan (who votes). This is your political monarchy you've chosen to leave in power.
Adios Senator Stevens. I can't wait til someone from VECO rolls on this clown. Don't bend over for the soap - even in the country club prison you're going to.
August 16, 2007 11:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
How were the National Science Foundation contracts recorded? I tried to find them in the FedSpending.org database but no luck. I did find $33 million in NSF contracts awarded to VECO USA between 2000 and 2006 but the work was to be performed in Colorado.
According to ADN, VECO formed VECO Polar Resources when the first Arctic contract was awarded in 1999 but VECO Polar Resources is not listed in federal procurement database at fpds.org.
The federal procurement database is notoriously cumbersome to use but even after persevering, I didn't find any big VECO contracts under any of the VECO entities listed as government vendors.
As an aside, the GSA paid $7.8 million in rent to L Street Partners which, according to FedSpending.org, is an affiliate of VECO.
August 16, 2007 11:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Got it! According to fpds.org, the second NSF contract was awarded to VECO USA Incorporated dba VECO Rocky Mountain Incorporated. The contract was signed in February 2005 and if all of the options are exercised, it is worth $93,3232,149.
August 16, 2007 1:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Re Laura's question "how did VECO benefit?" ---
I think Bill Allen and VECO were used by the Big Awl companies, especially those who are partners in Alyeska Pipeline, as their third party lobbying arm.
That way Exxon Mobil, Conoco Phillips, and BP, as well as their predecessors Texaco, Sohio, Mobil, Chevron, Conoco, Phillips, Arco, and BP, could let Bill do the bribing for them and have clean hands.
What VECO got was more and more oilfield work, including work outside Alaska.
Security code "degree", as in Stevens & Co. need to be indicted for first degree felonies.
August 16, 2007 2:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
HarpboyAK is on the right track.
As I mentioned a few weeks ago in a Kos diary (linked), Veco has, since their work on the oil spill in 1989, gotten a *lot* of work for which they had no previous experience.
Veco was the kind of contractor who built big steel warehouses and the like -- they weren't known for building engineered Arctic oil production systems, for example.
But for some damned fool reason, The Producers (BP, most notably) started passing contracts out to them for work just like that, putting them on the same footing as companies like Fluor, Brown & Root, Bechtel, or CH2MHill -- companies with decades of engineering and project management experience.
I wonder why Veco suddenly became so competent in 1990 or so....
August 16, 2007 9:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
This may give you some insight into VECO's rise. Check out the audio taped by FBI between Bill Allen, former CEO of Veco and admitted briber, and the President of Conoco Phillips concerning what they want done in the legislature. Listen for yourself to the corporate manipulation of democracy.
http://community.adn.com/adn/node/110527
September 22, 2007 11:20 AM | Reply | Permalink