Obama questions presidential helicopter project
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Monday that Lockheed Martin Corp's presidential helicopter program, hit by soaring cost overruns, was an example of the government procurement process "run amok."
Containing the spiraling cost growth of U.S. arms programs is one of the top goals of Obama's administration, which is grappling with the worst economic crisis in decades and is looking for ways to cut government spending.
Lockheed's program to build a new presidential helicopter fleet has surged more than 50 percent over budget.
"I have already talked to (Defense Secretary Robert) Gates about a thorough review of the helicopter situation. The helicopter I have now seems perfectly adequate to me," Obama said at a White House event on fiscal responsibility.
"It is an example of the procurement process gone amok and we are going to have to fix it."
Earlier, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, said legislation aimed at preventing chronic cost overruns in many Pentagon weapons programs would be introduced this week.
"It will create a presumption that a (weapons) system will not continue" if there is a cost overrun, Levin told a gathering at the White House looking at government procurement contracts.
"It breaks that barrier. That defense system will not be built," Levin said. "Enforcement teeth will be restored in a bill that we will be introducing today or tomorrow."
Under the existing Nunn-McCurdy law, the Pentagon must cancel any weapons program in which costs rise more than 25 percent unless it can show the program's importance to U.S. national security, the lack of a viable alternative, how reasonable new cost estimates are, and offer proof that the problems that led to cost overruns are now under control.
Separately, a congressional aide familiar with Levin's planned legislation said the bill contained "dozens" of provisions to help lawmakers crack down on cost overruns.
"We need to fix programs before they have runaway costs," the aide said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the bill.
(Reporting by Ross Colvin and Andrea Shalal-Esa; Writing by Julie Vorman and Ross Colvin; Editing by John O'Callaghan)
