Army Corps of Engineers: Improved Monitoring and Clear Guidance Would Contribute to More Effective Use of Continuing Contracts

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) is authorized under the River and Harbor Act of 1922 to issue contracts with a continuing contracts clause to carry out certain projects. This allows the Corps to award multi-year contracts without having received appropriations to cover the full contract amount. The Corps has used these contracts for decades, but modified their use in 2005, in response to congressional committee concerns that their use may have been ineffective. GAO was asked to determine (1) the number and dollar amount of continuing contracts the Corps awarded during fiscal years 2003?2005; (2) the circumstances in which the Corps used continuing contracts in fiscal years 2003-2005; and (3) how the Corps' process for approving and using continuing contracts changed since 2005, and whether the changes reduced the use of these contracts. For these objectives, GAO reviewed the Corps' contracting data, a random sample of 107 continuing contracts, and districts' requests to use continuing contracts