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We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

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Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#151

Post by somebehemoth »

ctdonath wrote: post #139
Shivetya wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/canadian-firm-hired-to-build-t... Based on that article, the OP is wrong, the six hundred million is across all contracts, the ACA site which most people are aghast at is just under 60 million of that.

Non-sequitur. That others got other contracts is not relevant to the point that this contractor got this $60M contract without a bidding process when there was no reason to not solicit bids from others. (As others note, seems it was a lot more than $60M.)

Given that the title of the article that started this discussion is, "We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404". I'd say it is fair to point out that actual cost was ten times less than is claimed in the article. I agree that no-bid contracts are bad, but they certainly are not unprecedented. I guess I am just not getting the outrage other people seem to have here. Maybe because I am not against ACA?

Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#152

Post by hga »

iharris wrote: post #144
ktavera wrote: post #83

For all of you that didn't know, this project was never put out for bid with an RFP. It was sole-sourced to CGI Federal without any competitive bids. "Federal health officials have not yet explained why CGI was given the contract or why it was awarded on a sole-source basis." http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/some-say-h... [Edit to add source]

It's worth noting that CGI was also responsible for the ill-fated long gun registry in Canada, which was recently canceled due (in part) to massive cost overruns [1] and inability to cope with large numbers of users. [1] http://en.Wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Firearms_Registry#Cost...

As an US RKBA activist since the early '70s (sic), I watched it from a distance in horrified fascination, and the Wikipedia section you cite matches my memories, that while the IT component was nasty and much bigger than expected/hoped/etc., it wasn't what crushed the registry. The job, including most especially human processing effort, was just massively larger than anticipated and was therefore not even vaguely covered by the statutory fees.

Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#153

Post by JPKab »

evilduck wrote: post #95
dfc wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some sharp people working the Federal side, but it really is awful. What are you referring to with "it"? The folks at your company who do federal IT work? Government IT employees? Federal IT consulting?

Yes. Been there, done that. Never again. Federal government consulting firms hire warm bodies at the lowest price possible. They are the people who employ the college students from Java shops (because a degree is a must, of course) who barely learn Java and then grow up to never touch another programming language in their life. Knowing anything from MS or Oracle is double plus good for your resume. You're totally rep…

Reading your comment, I felt like I was reading my own thoughts written down by someone far more eloquent than me. Thank you. To anyone reading this, evilduck has a perfect description of why I constantly tell my company "no" when they try to put me on this shit.

Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#154

Post by walls »

3minus1 wrote: post #136
pkfrank wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Also, a lot of people have mentioned cronyism, which I think is baseless. CGI Federal already had contracts for Medicare.gov and CMS.gov, so when CMS had to build healthcare.gov, CGI was an obvious choice. You may be correct, but arguing that "because we generally get these contracts, we were an obvious choice" does little to defuse assertions of cronyism.

> "because we generally get these contracts, we were an obvious choice" There are good reasons a government body might want to give a contract to someone they worked with before. There's a previous track record of success, and they know that the company already has expertise/solutions for their specialized requirements (i.e. section 508 compliance).

> There's a previous track record of success

Where? Definitely not the Canadian Firearms Registry, or the sites listed previously.

Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#155

Post by jljljl »

This seems a little confusing to me. I'm using the site linked in one of the previous comments:

http://usaspending.gov/explore?tab=By+Prime+Awardee&fiscal_y...

This shows the $634M headline number as the amount of contracts paid to CGI Federal over a ~6 year period. It is filtered based on solicitation number HHSM500200700015I.

A little googling returns the following page: https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=f1522d0...

  "The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) intends to modify the PECOS contract to 
  support the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) requiremnts for the 
  Development, Maintenance and Enhancements of HITECH Registration, Attestation and Inquiry Functionalities.  
  This work is already on the contract, the modification will incorporate costs for the option years."
So there's not really a lot of detail on what the HHSM500200700015I solicitation actually entails, and I haven't found a clear description everywhere else. It looks like it could cover a pretty broad set of work. For example, the ACA was signed in March 2010, but there's contracts tied to this solicitation number that go back to 2008-2009.

A few of the news sites linked below imply that the $634M covers the total number of Medicare and PECOS contracts awarded by HHS to CGI, and that the ACA website cost only $93M, which makes it seem cheap compared to the private sites listed in the Digital Trends article:

http://washingtonexaminer.com/canadian-firm-hired-to-build-t... http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2013/10/09/3-million-obamacare-w...

Before we all explode in outrage, are we sure that we are reading the details of this correctly?

Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#156

Post by josefresco »

wikiburner wrote: post #98
spiffyman wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think anyone's denying that this launch is a failure. It's clear as day. josefresco's point, though, seemed to be that this particular quote could easily have been politically motivated. None of the articles you link restate that 'single digits' claim. One of them even states the number could be upwards of 20M. Just saying: take the 'single digits' claim with a grain of salt. You don't need to buy every ridic…

Hey spiffyman, reasonable points, but it really looks to me like josefresco is implying that the launch is getting unduly harsh treatment in the media, but maybe I misread it. Also, regarding the 20 million figure, here's the quote: Seven percent of Americans report that somebody in their household has tried to sign up for insurance through the health care exchanges, according to an AP-GfK poll. While that's a small…

"The CBS video also claims there have been only "a handful" of sign ups, and it's getting reported in lots of other places. It could be inaccurate, but these are mainstream outlets reporting this, not Breitbart or Drudge. "

This. A Washington Post reporter talks to one random (and anonymous) insurance guy (with who knows what kind of political baggage) who gives them a single quote. They run with it, other news organizations re-run it (repeat x100) assuming it's fact because the Washington Post is a "mainstream" outlet right? And them whammo you have a whole group of people thinking that under 10 people were able to signup for health care. Even if they don't literally think this, the PR damage is done. The perception is now cemented that the launch is a failure because of a "Washington Post report" (sounds official doesn't it?)

Just because a news organization is "mainstream" does not mean it does not carry with it a truckload of bias (see FoxNews/MSNBC).

Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#158

Post by sigzero »

3minus1 wrote: post #136
pkfrank wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Also, a lot of people have mentioned cronyism, which I think is baseless. CGI Federal already had contracts for Medicare.gov and CMS.gov, so when CMS had to build healthcare.gov, CGI was an obvious choice. You may be correct, but arguing that "because we generally get these contracts, we were an obvious choice" does little to defuse assertions of cronyism.

> "because we generally get these contracts, we were an obvious choice" There are good reasons a government body might want to give a contract to someone they worked with before. There's a previous track record of success, and they know that the company already has expertise/solutions for their specialized requirements (i.e. section 508 compliance).

I don't think you are going to win any points here considering the outcome.

Re: We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404

#159

Post by hga »

brown9-2 wrote: post #147
ScottWhigham wrote: post #85

This is what frustrates me about many of our non-USA HN'ers here: every time the state sponsored health care issue comes up, the non-USA folks can't wait to talk about how their country has it, or how it costs this little to get coverage for this or that problem in their country, and then they wonder why "you Americans" put up with the system you have currently in place (self-insured, no state plans - pre-Obamacare).…

If the argument though is "we can't have nice things because we screw it up", perhaps we need to look more at why America tends to screw these things up instead of taking away the lesson that we shouldn't try to have nice things.

While many of us would argue with the "nice things" concept (ScottWhigham grossly overestimates the nation's enthusiasm for socialism at the beginning of this thread), it doesn't take away from his point that it's stupid to try such grand projects while we have a demonstrated inability to do them.

I mean, the government is taking control of 1/6 of the nation's economy, why ever did the Obamacare enthusiasts think this would work even vaguely well???

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