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Conflict of Interest, NASA, and CASIS

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
April 1, 2012
Filed under , , , , ,

Resignation Letter from CASIS Executive Director Jeanne L. Becker
“Unrealistic expectations have been levied collectively by Congressional staffers, by NASA (Mr. Uhran) and by ProOrbis. These pressures have placed unnecessary stress and hardship on CASIS, not only organizationally but also on management, forcing a defensive posture with constant focus on mitigation strategies to fend off political threats of the elimination of CASIS. … Now, for unknown reasons, following selection of that proposal and stand up of the organization, the Space Florida interim board persists in pursuing engagement of ProOrbis on behalf of CASIS, with CASIS management forced to bear the responsibility of mitigating ensuing organizational risks occurring as a result of the interim board’s actions. “
ProOrbis Statement re: CASIS Director Resignation
“However, since taking on this role, [Dr. Becker] has not engaged ProOrbis in the stand-up activities of CASIS as was contemplated. Issues of conflict of interest for all the principal parties were satisfactorily addressed in the Cooperative Agreement and provisions were put in place to mitigate any potential conflicts.”
Keith’s note: Jeanne DiFrancesco from ProOrbis developed a significant portion of the procurement package for NASA’s ISS National Laboratory non-profit partner: the National Laboratory Reference Model. Oddly, DiFrancesco and ProOrbis ended up as a major part of the winning team’s bid (CASIS). How is it that a contractor that NASA specifically uses to write part of a solicitation is then allowed to bid for – and win – the contract awarded in response to the very same procurement they helped craft? In Dr. Becker’s resignation letter, and ProOrbis’ response, this issue of potential conflict of interest was raised. Indeed, the core thrust of Becker’s departure, in part, seems to be her frustration in being unable to retain the non-profit status (and Intent) of CASIS against external pressures to engage in overt commercial activities via ProOrbis.
Curiously, NASA’s Mark Uhran and Jeanne DiFrancesco (Principal of ProOrbis, LLC and the President and CEO of ProOrbis Ventures, LLC.) are on the advisory board of U.S Rare Earths.. U.S Rare Earths is a for-profit mining company. How is it that one of the main government officials behind the CASIS procurement (still a NASA civil servant a manging various ISS activities) and a senior representative of the company that was part of the team that won the CASIS contract are allowed to participate in a external business activity?
Earlier CASIS postings

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

21 responses to “Conflict of Interest, NASA, and CASIS”

  1. no one of consequence says:
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    This is typical of DC politics – the side deals that come to dominate and grab for dollars/influence. The weaker the institution, the quicker the grab.

    My issue with the viability of CASIS over that of how current/past “national labs” are managed, was that it was too weak to be able to fight the monkey wrenching.  The other national lab management have been through considerable political intrigues over many decades, they have very thick skins and considerable, sharp teeth to bite back.

    Congress is to blame for this manipulation to preserve special interests with insisting on a weak institution.

    • Anonymous says:
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      Congress is to blame for this manipulation to preserve special interests with insisting on a weak institution.

      CASIS was doomed to fail, not only because of the chicanery that is coming to light, but for the fundamental fact, as you lay out, that without controlling the asset and or a budget for utilization, there is no way for them to be other than a marketing arm of the station program, and even that is the best case scenario.

      CASIS never made any sense and as much as I have always liked Mark Uhran, it is time for new blood in the chair at HQ.  Back in the day, Brian Kelly and the folks at JSC actually did a pretty good job in supporting commercial folks that came in the door down there and even George Abbey gets kudos in that regard as when he liked a project he put the entire center behind it.

      There are a lot of things that can be done on the station and the faster this debacle is put behind the agency the better.  Take that $15M per year and spend it on supporting utilization, not salaries of yet another powerless group.

      • Anonymous says:
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        Dennis, it is always interesting to see someone declare they like a person and then to “dis” and dump them in the same sentence.  It is like watching a movie where the hired assassin chats casually with his target, smiles, and without flinching puts one bullet in the head and another in the heart, and then leaves to get some lunch.  Then, your frankness does help the readers to calibrate on character.  Doesn’t the DSM list that as a sociopath’s behavior?

        As for NASA-HQ, we were under the impression that Brad Carpenter is the head of ISS and Station utilization?  So that would answer your new-blood wishing, correct?

        As for your doomed-to-fail comment, organizations don’t fail, they are non-living structures; people fail.

        • Anonymous says:
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          You might think that but I truly do like Mark and he has tried for a very long time to make ISS utilization work. However, on any team, no matter how successful a coach may be, it is time to move on.  Joe Paterno did not learn that lesson.  That is especially the case when the coach has no money to hire a team or build any infrastructure.

          Organizations do fail, especially when the structure and concept of the organization precludes success.  CASIS had/has no power, no money, and no one who truly understands the power of what ISS has the potential to be.  

          If CASIS were to be successful it should have had a boatload of money attached to it to fund projects that would be done on the station.  Back in the 1990’s Shuttle/ISS utilization had several hundred million dollars a year, which Dan Goldin took for ISS construction.

          If we are going to do something like CASIS it has to have some financial muscle behind it.  Without that, the $15M per year is a waste of taxpayer funds.

          • Anonymous says:
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            I agree with your CASIS funding comment Dennis.  $100s of millions to do the job right in the 1990’s.  Now they think $15 million will suffice?  Ridiculous.

          • no one of consequence says:
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             Everyone can agree on CASIS … if all one has to do is shell out $15M and not step on any toes. That’s political accommodation in action.

            The problem is those that need to be accommodated. Focus the bright lights on them.

        • Steve Whitfield says:
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          organizations don’t fail, they are non-living structures; people fail.

          GA,

          Ask anyone who’s ever been laid off if they agree with that statement.

          An organization is the people who make it up, but there are many reasons, other than a failure on the part of its people, that can cause an organization to fail, a declining market being one of the more common causes.

          Steve

          • DTARS says:
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            What do they do on ISS again?
            They learn to live in space right?
            Do they grow all they own food up there?
            Do the build space ships up there?
            Are they fixing the gravity problem with rat wheels or spinning space craft.
            Do they use ISS as a center to go get junk from orbit to clean up and keep LEO a safe place to live and work in?
            Is flight to ISS going to be made cheaper to make ISS a platform to help us become a multi planet species??
            I’m Joe tax payer and I really don’t understand what they are doing up there?
            Sorry I have not been reading the details on this issue even though I have been reading NASA watch a year or two so maybe I should be quiet. But the less interested Joe knows even less than me. I suggest we start using ISS in a better way real fast and figure a way to turn it into a growing town/space port.

            Bewildered tax payer

            What to do now???

          • no one of consequence says:
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            Organizations are people.

            Organizations depend on other organizations.

            Failure occurs because a) organizations are designed for failure or b) organizations cause other organizations to fail or c) both.

            This is case C.

            add:
            DTARS,

            ISS is a redo of a failed Reagan SSF that couldn’t be financed US only. So it became an international “partnership” so Shuttle could do its one, only job … which was to build a station.

            After the fact, they are attempting to turn it into a research lab. Which then is being attempted to be turned into a “national lab” like the various accelerator or “rad labs”. Doing so while carrying Russian, European, …. baggage. Never designed for what it is intended for.

            Which is why many get frustrated with it, and just want to throw away several hundred billion dollars of station … which cannot be afforded to be replaced.

            This CASIS nightmare is because political fifedoms, contractors, authorities, etc … can’t get along, and they don’t want anyone to tell them what to do. So they emasculated anything that challenges them, so they can continue to play god … while not getting anywhere.

            CASIS is all about political viability of solving the dillemma of getting more out of the ISS. Not everyone wants that to happen, so thats why the nonsense continues.

            Why certain “butt’s” aren’t being kicked is that they are protected ones. These are the ones the taxpayer should have taken out to the woodshed. A long time ago.

        • kcowing says:
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          And it is always annoying to see people like you post under the cloak of anonymity and dump on people. Dennis and I use our real names.

      • no one of consequence says:
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         … there is no way for them to be other than a marketing arm of the station program …
        In DC, the rival sides to NASA funding think this is an advantage believe it or not. It isn’t.

        Any businessman worth their salt would say that they have a) no control over what they are selling, b) no control over customer requirements to make the “sell”, and c) no way of insuring that the customer ever got served. NASA, by its existence, is customer last … or worse … customer never.

        Yet Congress thinks this is rational. Urgh!!!!

        … George Abbey gets kudos in that regard as when he liked a project he put the entire center behind it.
        Absolutely. He was scared to not attempt to reach for the best … because he feared what we’d get otherwise was the worst.

        I still want CASIS to succeed. Because the reality of the situation is … you’ll get something worse. By sticking the mud from this flap on all the staffers/senators/congressmen, they’ll find it harder to fake up another “consensus” camel again.

        I understand the desire to “do it right”. My sense of the situation is that they can’t/won’t right now, so its either a string of bogus failures or make CASIS work. I certainly advocated a very different approach before the choice, but no one else was interested in it because they could only agree on something that required perfect cooperation and self-control by certain entities who never had this before.

        So how do you make it work – have some ideas. You probably have not dissimilar ones if you still wanted it to work. Either way, a lot has to give if CASIS is to work. Just believing in Tinkerbelle like before won’t cut it.

        Apologies to Disney.

  2. Steve Whitfield says:
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    I’m no lawyer, but this fiasco seems clearly to be a conflict of interest, more so with new information.  So, exactly who is responsible for “fixing” this situation.  Does it go to court?  Who needs to be taking action here?

    There appears to have been no forward action by CASIS, supposedly because they were a brand new organization when they landed this job.  But this conflict business suggests to me that we’re going to go a lot longer yet before anything good comes of this.

    Is there nothing in the contract that boots these people out for improper conduct?  Who’s job is it to go after these people for the conflict?

    Steve

  3. Anonymous says:
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    Keith,
     
    “How is it that a contractor that NASA specifically uses to write part of a solicitation is then allowed to bid for – and win – the contract awarded in response to the very same procurement they helped craft?”
     
    A good question but very confusing.  In your note you state that a contractor, ProOrbis, was “allowed to bid for – and win” a NASA contract.   From press articles on the ISS topic, it looks like Space Florida and CASIS won the ISS Lab management award, not Pro-Orbis.   If Pro-Orbis won the contract, why are Space Florida and Becker resignations a topic?  If Space Florida and CASIS won the contract, why do you refer to ProOrbis as the winner of the solicitation?

    • kcowing says:
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      You might want to actually read the things I post (letters etc.) before you comment.

    • no one of consequence says:
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       … because the “muscle” of ISS utilization is being manifest in commercial contracts with the hope of using CASIS as a sham to get them.

      The problem with an organizational design like this. The congressional staffers who worked with Uhran knew this was likely outcome.

      E.g. something this weak just gets jerked around.

  4. Anonymous says:
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    What is this about a NASA civil servant amanging various ISS activities?   From what I can tell, “amanging” involves tours and travel in India.   How does tourism in New Delhi India relate to the ISS?  And for that matter, what does mining have to do with the ISS? 

  5. dogstar29 says:
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    All I can say is, Dr. Becker’s letter is astounding. Whether it is the whole story or not is anybody’s guess, but seldom indeed is our chance to see this much of the internal workings of bureaucracy.

  6. Anonymous says:
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    Keith, recommendation: review 18 U.S.C. § 208 and related regulations prior to casting aspersions as conveyed in the last note statement.

  7. Ray Hudson says:
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    More grist for the mill of an investigation into this whole mess. Well done, Keith.  Start the investigations with Mark Uhran & Jeanne DiFrancesco.  And as I posted before, Ms. DiFrancesco’s “reference model” that came before the CASIS proposal clearly showed she expected whoever won that solicitation to lease her special tools from her company. If Dr. Becker left because she was being forced to lease Ms. DiFrancesco’s toolset, one might wonder if Mark Uhran may have had a deal to take in some of that money going from CASIS to ProOrbis.  One wonders such things when you read the ProOrbis “reference model” product…

  8. Anonymous says:
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    We were driving along a Florida highway yesterday and noticed a group of blood-thirsty vultures circling high in the daytime sky.  As everyone knows, all you need to do is look immediately beneath a circling kettle of vultures and you will find their injured prey.  

    We neared the site and what do you know, there was CASIS, spasming dysfunctionally on the Florida roadside.   Gazing upward we could see the predators with their large sharp talons and unmerciful gazes eyeing their next meal.   Squinting, we could just make out the serial numbering on the tail of each bird.  They all had the same markings:  O-H-I-O.