Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Media: Washington POst
Byline: Amit R. Paley
Date: 28 September 2006
A $75 million project to build the largest police academy in Iraq has been
so grossly mismanaged that the campus now poses health risks to recruits and
might need to be partially demolished, U.S. investigators have found.
The Baghdad Police College, hailed as crucial to U.S. efforts to prepare
Iraqis to take control of the country's security, was so poorly constructed
that feces and urine rained from the ceilings in student barracks. Floors
heaved inches off the ground and cracked apart. Water dripped so profusely
in one room that it was dubbed "the rain forest."
"This is the most essential civil security project in the country -- and
it's a failure," said Stuart W. Bowen Jr., the special inspector general for
Iraq reconstruction, an independent office created by Congress. "The Baghdad
police academy is a disaster."
Bowen's office plans to release a 21-page report Thursday detailing the most
alarming problems with the facility.
Even in a $21 billion reconstruction effort that has been marred by cases of
corruption and fraud, failures in training and housing Iraq's security
forces are particularly significant because of their effect on what the U.S.
military has called its primary mission here: to prepare Iraqi police and
soldiers so that Americans can depart.
Federal investigators said the inspector general's findings raise serious
questions about whether the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has failed to
exercise effective oversight over the Baghdad Police College or
reconstruction programs across Iraq, despite charging taxpayers management
fees of at least 4.5 percent of total project costs. The Corps of Engineers
said Wednesday that it has initiated a wide-ranging investigation of the
police academy project.
The report serves as the latest indictment of Parsons Corp., the U.S.
construction giant that was awarded about $1 billion for a variety of
reconstruction projects across Iraq. After chronicling previous Parsons
failures to properly build health clinics, prisons and hospitals, Bowen said
he now plans to conduct an audit of every Parsons project.
"The truth needs to be told about what we didn't get for our dollar from
Parsons," Bowen said.
A spokeswoman for Parsons said the company had not seen the inspector
general's report.
The Coalition Provisional Authority hired Parsons in 2004 to transform the
Baghdad Police College, a ramshackle collection of 1930s buildings, into a
modern facility whose training capacity would expand from 1,500 recruits to
at least 4,000. The contract called for the firm to remake the campus by
building, among other things, eight three-story student barracks, classroom
buildings and a central laundry facility.
As top U.S. military commanders declared 2006 "the year of the police," in
an acknowledgment of their critical role in allowing for any withdrawal of
American troops, officials highlighted the Baghdad Police College as one of
their success stories.
"This facility has definitely been a top priority," Lt. Col. Joel Holtrop of
the Corps of Engineers' Gulf Region Division Project and Contracting Office
said in a July news release. "It's a very exciting time as the cadets move
into the new structures."
Complaints about the new facilities, however, began pouring in two weeks
after the recruits arrived at the end of May, a Corps of Engineers official
said.
The most serious problem was substandard plumbing that caused waste from
toilets on the second and third floors to cascade throughout the building. A
light fixture in one room stopped working because it was filled with urine
and fecal matter. The waste threatened the integrity of load-bearing slabs,
federal investigators concluded.
"When we walked down the halls, the Iraqis came running up and said, 'Please
help us. Please do something about this,' " Bowen recalled.
Phillip A. Galeoto, director of the Baghdad Police College, wrote an Aug. 16
memo that catalogued at least 20 problems: shower and bathroom fixtures that
leaked from the first day of occupancy, concrete and tile floors that heaved
more than two inches off the ground, water rushing down hallways and
stairwells because of improper slopes or drains in bathrooms, classroom
buildings with foundation problems that caused structures to sink.
Galeoto noted that one entire building and five floors in others had to be
shuttered for repairs, limiting the capacity of the college by up to 800
recruits. His memo, too, pointed out that the urine and feces flowed
throughout the building and, sometimes, onto occupants of the barracks.
"This is not a complete list," he wrote, but rather a snapshot of "issues we
are confronted with on a daily basis (as recent as the last hour) by the
incomplete and/or poor work left behind by these builders."
The Parsons contract, which eventually totaled at least $75 million, was
terminated May 31 "due to cost overruns, schedule slippage, and sub-standard
quality," according to a Sept. 4 internal military memo. But rather than
fire the Pasadena, Calif.-based company for cause, the contract was halted
for "the government's convenience."
Col. Michael Herman -- deputy commander of the Gulf Region Division of the
Corps of Engineers, which was supposed to oversee the project -- said the
Iraqi subcontractors hired by Parsons were being forced to fix the building
problems as part of their warranty work, at no cost to taxpayers. He said
four of the eight barracks have been repaired.
The U.S. military initially agreed to take a Washington Post reporter on a
tour of the facility Wednesday to examine the construction issues, but the
trip was postponed Tuesday night. Federal investigators who visited the
academy last week, though, expressed concerns about the structural integrity
of the buildings and worries that fecal residue could cause a typhoid
outbreak or other health crisis.
"They may have to demolish everything they built," said Robert DeShurley, a
senior engineer with the inspector general's office. "The buildings are
falling down as they sit."
Herman said that he doubted that was the case but that he plans to hire an
architecture and engineering firm to examine the facility. He also plans to
investigate concerns raised by the inspector general's office that the Army
Corps of Engineers did not properly respond to construction problems
highlighted in quality-control reports.
Inside the inspector general's office in Baghdad on a recent blistering
afternoon, several federal investigators expressed amazement that such
construction blunders could be concentrated in one project. Even in Iraq,
they said, failure on this magnitude is unusual. When asked how the problems
at the police college compared with other projects they had inspected, the
answers came swiftly.
"This is significant," said Jon E. Novak, a senior adviser in the office.
"It's catastrophic," DeShurley added.
Bowen said: "It's the worst."
Byline: Amit R. Paley
Date: 28 September 2006
A $75 million project to build the largest police academy in Iraq has been
so grossly mismanaged that the campus now poses health risks to recruits and
might need to be partially demolished, U.S. investigators have found.
The Baghdad Police College, hailed as crucial to U.S. efforts to prepare
Iraqis to take control of the country's security, was so poorly constructed
that feces and urine rained from the ceilings in student barracks. Floors
heaved inches off the ground and cracked apart. Water dripped so profusely
in one room that it was dubbed "the rain forest."
"This is the most essential civil security project in the country -- and
it's a failure," said Stuart W. Bowen Jr., the special inspector general for
Iraq reconstruction, an independent office created by Congress. "The Baghdad
police academy is a disaster."
Bowen's office plans to release a 21-page report Thursday detailing the most
alarming problems with the facility.
Even in a $21 billion reconstruction effort that has been marred by cases of
corruption and fraud, failures in training and housing Iraq's security
forces are particularly significant because of their effect on what the U.S.
military has called its primary mission here: to prepare Iraqi police and
soldiers so that Americans can depart.
Federal investigators said the inspector general's findings raise serious
questions about whether the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has failed to
exercise effective oversight over the Baghdad Police College or
reconstruction programs across Iraq, despite charging taxpayers management
fees of at least 4.5 percent of total project costs. The Corps of Engineers
said Wednesday that it has initiated a wide-ranging investigation of the
police academy project.
The report serves as the latest indictment of Parsons Corp., the U.S.
construction giant that was awarded about $1 billion for a variety of
reconstruction projects across Iraq. After chronicling previous Parsons
failures to properly build health clinics, prisons and hospitals, Bowen said
he now plans to conduct an audit of every Parsons project.
"The truth needs to be told about what we didn't get for our dollar from
Parsons," Bowen said.
A spokeswoman for Parsons said the company had not seen the inspector
general's report.
The Coalition Provisional Authority hired Parsons in 2004 to transform the
Baghdad Police College, a ramshackle collection of 1930s buildings, into a
modern facility whose training capacity would expand from 1,500 recruits to
at least 4,000. The contract called for the firm to remake the campus by
building, among other things, eight three-story student barracks, classroom
buildings and a central laundry facility.
As top U.S. military commanders declared 2006 "the year of the police," in
an acknowledgment of their critical role in allowing for any withdrawal of
American troops, officials highlighted the Baghdad Police College as one of
their success stories.
"This facility has definitely been a top priority," Lt. Col. Joel Holtrop of
the Corps of Engineers' Gulf Region Division Project and Contracting Office
said in a July news release. "It's a very exciting time as the cadets move
into the new structures."
Complaints about the new facilities, however, began pouring in two weeks
after the recruits arrived at the end of May, a Corps of Engineers official
said.
The most serious problem was substandard plumbing that caused waste from
toilets on the second and third floors to cascade throughout the building. A
light fixture in one room stopped working because it was filled with urine
and fecal matter. The waste threatened the integrity of load-bearing slabs,
federal investigators concluded.
"When we walked down the halls, the Iraqis came running up and said, 'Please
help us. Please do something about this,' " Bowen recalled.
Phillip A. Galeoto, director of the Baghdad Police College, wrote an Aug. 16
memo that catalogued at least 20 problems: shower and bathroom fixtures that
leaked from the first day of occupancy, concrete and tile floors that heaved
more than two inches off the ground, water rushing down hallways and
stairwells because of improper slopes or drains in bathrooms, classroom
buildings with foundation problems that caused structures to sink.
Galeoto noted that one entire building and five floors in others had to be
shuttered for repairs, limiting the capacity of the college by up to 800
recruits. His memo, too, pointed out that the urine and feces flowed
throughout the building and, sometimes, onto occupants of the barracks.
"This is not a complete list," he wrote, but rather a snapshot of "issues we
are confronted with on a daily basis (as recent as the last hour) by the
incomplete and/or poor work left behind by these builders."
The Parsons contract, which eventually totaled at least $75 million, was
terminated May 31 "due to cost overruns, schedule slippage, and sub-standard
quality," according to a Sept. 4 internal military memo. But rather than
fire the Pasadena, Calif.-based company for cause, the contract was halted
for "the government's convenience."
Col. Michael Herman -- deputy commander of the Gulf Region Division of the
Corps of Engineers, which was supposed to oversee the project -- said the
Iraqi subcontractors hired by Parsons were being forced to fix the building
problems as part of their warranty work, at no cost to taxpayers. He said
four of the eight barracks have been repaired.
The U.S. military initially agreed to take a Washington Post reporter on a
tour of the facility Wednesday to examine the construction issues, but the
trip was postponed Tuesday night. Federal investigators who visited the
academy last week, though, expressed concerns about the structural integrity
of the buildings and worries that fecal residue could cause a typhoid
outbreak or other health crisis.
"They may have to demolish everything they built," said Robert DeShurley, a
senior engineer with the inspector general's office. "The buildings are
falling down as they sit."
Herman said that he doubted that was the case but that he plans to hire an
architecture and engineering firm to examine the facility. He also plans to
investigate concerns raised by the inspector general's office that the Army
Corps of Engineers did not properly respond to construction problems
highlighted in quality-control reports.
Inside the inspector general's office in Baghdad on a recent blistering
afternoon, several federal investigators expressed amazement that such
construction blunders could be concentrated in one project. Even in Iraq,
they said, failure on this magnitude is unusual. When asked how the problems
at the police college compared with other projects they had inspected, the
answers came swiftly.
"This is significant," said Jon E. Novak, a senior adviser in the office.
"It's catastrophic," DeShurley added.
Bowen said: "It's the worst."