As a result of a 1995 Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission decision, Kelly Air Force Base, Texas, is to be realigned and the San Antonio Air Logistics Center, including the Air Force maintenance depot, is to be closed by 2001. Additionally, McClellan Air Force Base, California, and the Sacramento Air Logistics Center, including the Air Force maintenance depot, is to be closed by July 2001. To mitigate the impact of the closures on the local communities and center employees, in 1995 the administration announced its decision to maintain certain employment levels at these locations. Privatization-in-place was one initiative for retaining these employment goals. Since that decision, Congress and the administration have debated the process and procedures for deciding where and by whom the workloads at the closing depots should be performed. Central to this debate are concerns about the excess facility capacity at the Air Force’s three remaining maintenance depots and the legislative requirement— 10 U.S.C. 2469—that for workloads exceeding $3 million in value, a public-private competition must be held before the workloads can be moved from a public depot to a private sector company. Because of congressional concerns raised in 1996, the Air Force revised its privatization-in-place plans to provide for competitions between the public and private sectors as a means to decide where the depot maintenance workloads would be performed. The first competition was for the C-5 aircraft depot maintenance workload, which the Air Force awarded to the Warner Robins depot in Georgia on September 4, 1997. During 1997, Congress continued to oversee DOD’s strategy for allocating workloads currently performed at the closing depots. The 1998 Defense Authorization Act required that we and DOD analyze various issues related to the competitions at the closing depots and report to Congress concerning several areas. First, within 60 days of its enactment, the Defense Authorization Act requires us to review the C-5 aircraft workload competition and subsequent award to the Warner Robins Air Logistics Center and report to Congress on whether (1) the procedures used provided an equal opportunity for offerors without regard to performance location; (2) procedures are in compliance with applicable law and the FAR; and (3) award results in the lowest total cost to DOD. Second, the act provides that a solicitation may be issued for a single contract for the performance of multiple depot-level maintenance or repair workloads. However, the Secretary of Defense must first (1) determine in writing that the individual workloads cannot as logically and economically be performed without combination by sources that are potentially qualified to submit an offer and to be awarded a contract to perform those individual workloads and (2) submit a report to Congress setting forth the reasons for the determination. Further, the Air Force cannot issue a solicitation for combined workloads until at least 60 days after the Secretary submits the required report. Third, the authorization act also provides special procedures for the public-private competitions for the San Antonio and Sacramento workloads. For example, total estimated direct and indirect cost and savings to DOD must be considered in any evaluation. Further, no offeror may be given preferential consideration for, or be limited to, performing the workload at a particular location. As previously stated, the act also requires that we review the solicitations and the competitions to determine if DOD has complied with the act and applicable law. We must provide a status report on the Sacramento and San Antonio competitions within 45 days after the Air Force issues the solicitations, and our evaluations of the completed competitions are due 45 days after the award for each workload. Finally, the act requires that DOD report on the procedures established for the Sacramento and San Antonio competitions and on the Department’s planned allocation of workloads performed at the closing depots as of July 1, 1995. DOD issued these reports on February 3, 1998. The Air Force cannot issue final solicitations until at least 30 days after these reports are submitted and all other requirements of the act are completed. We have had problems in gaining access to information required to respond to reporting requirements under the 1998 National Defense Authorization Act. Our lack of access to information is seriously impairing our ability to carry out our reporting responsibilities under this act. We experienced this problem in doing our work for our recent report to Congress concerning DOD’s determination to combine individual workloads at the two closing logistics centers into a single solicitation. We originally requested access to and copies of contractor-prepared studies involving depot workloads at the Sacramento Air Logistics Center on December 18, 1997. The Air Force denied our request, citing concerns regarding the release of proprietary and competition-sensitive data. It was not until January 14, 1998, and only after we had sent a formal demand letter to the Secretary of Defense on January 8, 1998, that the Air Force agreed to allow us to review the studies. Even then, however, the Air Force limited our review to reading the documents in Air Force offices and required that without further permission, no notes, copies, or other materials could leave those premises. The limited access provided came so late that we were unable to review the documents adequately and still meet our statutorily mandated reporting deadline of January 20. As of this date, we have been provided only heavily redacted pages from two studies. These pages do not contain the information we need. Further, the Air Force did not provide us even limited access to the final phase of the studies, which were dated December 15, 1997. Although we were able, with difficulty, to complete our report, we simply cannot fulfill our responsibilities adequately and in a timely manner unless we receive full cooperation of the Department. To meet our remaining statutory requirements, we have requested several documents and other information related to the upcoming competitions for the closing depots’ workloads. Air Force officials said they would not provide this information until the competitions are completed. However, we will need to review solicitation, proposal, evaluation, and selection documents as they become available. For example, we will need such things as the acquisition and source selection plans, the proposals from each of the competing entities, and documents relating to the evaluation of the proposals and to the selection decision. Appendix I to this statement contains our letter to the Senate Armed Services Committee detailing our access problems. Our basic authority to access records is contained in 31 U.S.C. 716. This statute gives us a very broad right of access to agency records, including the procurement records that we are requiring here, for the purpose of conducting audits and evaluations. Moreover, the procurement integrity provision in 41 U.S.C. 423 that prohibits the disclosure of competition-sensitive information before the award of a government contract specifies at subsection (h) that it does not authorize withholding information from Congress or the Comptroller General. We have told the Air Force that we appreciate the sensitivity of agency procurement records and have established procedures for safeguarding them. As required by 31 U.S.C. 716(e)(1), we maintain the same level of confidentiality for a record as the head of the agency from which it is obtained. Further, our managers and employees, like all federal officers and employees, are precluded by 18 U.S.C. 1905 from disclosing proprietary or business-confidential information to the extent not authorized by law. Finally, we do not presume to have a role in the selection of the successful offeror. We recognize the need for Air Force officials to make their selection with minimal interference. Thus, we are prepared to discuss with the Air Force steps for safeguarding the information and facilitating the Air Force’s selection process while allowing us to meet statutory reporting responsibilities. In response to congressional concerns regarding the appropriateness of its plans to privatize-in-place the Sacramento and San Antonio maintenance depot workloads, the Air Force revised its strategy to allow the public depots to participate in public-private competitions for the workloads. In the 1998 Defense Authorization Act, Congress required us to review and report on the procedures and results of these competitions. The C-5 aircraft workload was the first such competition. We issued our required report evaluating the C-5 competition and award on January 20, 1998. After assessing the issues required under the act relating to the C-5 aircraft competition, we concluded that (1) the Air Force provided public and private offerors an equal opportunity to compete without regard to where work would be performed, (2) the procedures did not appear to deviate materially from applicable laws or the FAR; and (3) the award resulted in the lowest total cost to the government, based on Air Force assumptions and conditions at the time of award. Nonetheless, public and private offerors raised issues during and after the award regarding the fairness of the competition. First, the private sector participants noted that public and private depot competitions awarded on a fixed-price basis are inequitable because the government often pays from public funds for any cost overruns it incurs. Private sector participants also questioned the public depot’s ability to accurately control costs for the C-5 workload. In our view, the procedures used in the C-5 competition reasonably addressed the issue of public sector cost accountability. Further, private sector participants viewed the $153-million overhead cost savings credit given to Warner Robins as unrealistically high and argued that the selection did not account for, or put a dollar value on, certain identified risks or weaknesses in the respective proposals. We found that the Air Force followed its evaluation scheme in making its overhead savings adjustment to the Warner Robins proposal and that the Air Force’s treatment of risk and weaknesses represented a reasonable exercise of its discretion under the solicitation. Although the public sector source was selected to perform the C-5 workload, it questioned some aspects of the competition. Warner Robins officials stated that they were not allowed to include private sector firms as part of their proposal.