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• VITA - Catch up on the controversy surrounding the Virginia Information Technology Agency and its computer contract with Northrop Grumman.
Lobbyists and executives for Northrop Grumman are quietly pressing General Assembly investigators to soften a report that was sharply critical of the company for failing to deliver computer services to the state on time.
Northrop Grumman representatives met privately yesterday for more than two hours with staff members of the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission to discuss possible revisions in JLARC's findings.
Multiple sources said Northrop Grumman, which publicly has declared the JLARC report largely one-sided, is arguing for revisions to the document, some of them technical.
Northrop Grumman was told, these sources said, that it would have to submit documentation to JLARC and its claims would be have to be confirmed by the entity for which the company works, the Virginia Information Technologies Agency.
It is not unprecedented for JLARC to modify its findings, though changes typically are limited to data and do not augur a shift in the conclusions of the General Assembly watchdog panel.
Northrop Grumman initiated yesterday's session in response to criticism by JLARC that it had resisted requests for information and not cooperated fully with investigators.
JLARC's director, Philip A. Leone, this week asked Northrop Grumman for its assistance in the next phase of the commission's inquiry -- due in December -- into the company's 10-year, $2.3 billion contract with the state for information-technology services.
Leone said of yesterday's session, "It was a constructive meeting, and they promised that they would abide by the commission's request that they cooperate throughout the study."
Northrop Grumman spokeswoman Christy Whitman said the company was accommodating JLARC. "This morning was the first of those meetings for an ongoing study," Whitman said in an e-mail.
While the JLARC study was sharply critical of Northrop Grumman and VITA, it said the largest single reason for the delay in completing the transition to a privately run IT network was poor planning by the company.
JLARC privately briefed company executives and lobbyists on its conclusions in advance of the report's release. Such sessions are customary -- another opportunity for the commission to verify its findings.
Before the report was made public officially, Northrop Grumman sent an e-mail to legislators saying JLARC had rehashed previously disclosed problems and failed to acknowledge improvements.
Among those attending yesterday's meeting was Ashley Colvin, JLARC's lead investigator on the VITA-Northrop Grumman contract; Carol Schmitt, a contracts specialist for the company; Michael King, an overseer of Northrop Grumman's IT business; and Robert Baratta, a Republican lobbyist hired by Northrop Grumman.
Contact Jeff E. Schapiro at (804) 649-6814 or jschapiro@timesdispatch.com.
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