General Services Administration

History

In 1947, President Harry Truman asked former president Herbert Hoover to lead what became known as the Hoover Commission to make recommendations to reorganize the operations of the federal government. One of the commission's recommendations was the establishment of an "Office of the General Services", to combine the responsibilities of the following organizations:

United States Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Federal Supply

U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Contract Settlement

National Archives Establishment

All functions of the Federal Works Agency, including the Public Buildings Administration and the Public Roads Administration

War Assets Administration

GSA became an independent agency on July 1, 1949, after the passage of the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act. General Jess Larson, administrator of the War Assets Administration, was named GSA's first administrator.

The first job awaiting Administrator Larson and the newly formed GSA was a complete renovation of the White House. The structure had fallen into such a state of disrepair by 1949 that one inspector said it was standing "purely from habit". Larson later explained the total renovation in depth by saying, "In order to make the White House structurally sound, it was necessary to completely dismantle, and I mean completely dismantle, everything from the White House except the four walls, which were constructed of stone. Everything, except the four walls without a roof, was finally stripped down, and that's where the work started." GSA worked closely with President Truman and First Lady Bess Truman to ensure that the new agency's first major project would be a success. GSA completed the renovation in 1952.

In 1960, GSA created the Federal Telecommunications System, a government-wide intercity telephone system. In 1962 the Ad Hoc Committee on Federal Office Space created a new building program to address obsolete office buildings in Washington, D.C., resulting in the construction of many of the offices that now line Independence Avenue.

Controversies

In July 1991, GSA contractors began the excavation of what is now the Ted Weiss Federal Building in New York City. The planning for that building did not take into account the possibility of encountering the historic cemetery for colonial-era African New Yorkers located beneath the footprint of the $276 million office building. When initial excavation disturbed burials, destroying skeletons and artifacts, GSA sent archaeologists to excavate—but hid their findings from the public. Revelation of the discoveries led to 18 months of activism by African-descendant community members, public officials, academics, and concerned citizens. Ultimately, GSA made public amends by funding extensive scientific research under the auspices of Michael Blakey; creating a new subagency, the Office of Public Education and Interpretation; truncating the building plan; and funding public reports on the story of the African Burial Ground. The efforts led to the creation of a new unit of the National Park Service, the African Burial Ground National Monument, at the facility. GSA fully funded that portion of the National Park Service until 2010, when GSA's formal involvement with the African Burial Ground ceased.

During President George W. Bush's Administration GSA Administrator, Lurita Doan, was forced to resign after GSA had awarded a sole source contract for $20,000 to her friend. Doan appeared to have violated the Hatch Act and was criticized for political activity while on the job. The investigating team recommended she be punished to the fullest extent, and she resigned soon after.

In 2012, U.S. representative John Mica, chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, called for a congressional investigation into the misuse of federal money by GSA. Lawmakers accused GSA of "lavish spending" following the 2010 Western Regions Training Conference at the M Resort in Las Vegas.

GSA spent $823,000 in taxpayer money toward the October 2010 convention, including $100,405.37 spent on employee travel costs for a total of eight pre-planning meetings, scouting trips, and a "dry run". The report also found excessive spending for event planners, gifts for participants, and lavish meals.

The conference had been the most recent in a series of similar lavish conferences organized by regions of GSA's Public Buildings Service (PBS, not to be confused with the public broadcaster of the same name). In May 2010 GSA treated 120 interns to a five-day conference at a Palm Springs, California, resort. An additional investigation led by Inspector General Brian D. Miller found 115 missing Apple iPods meant for an employee rewards program.

Organization

Structure

The administrator is a presidential political appointee and the chief executive of the General Services Administration. On April 12, 2021, President Joe Biden nominated Robin Carnahan to serve as administrator. She was confirmed by the US Senate on June 23, 2021.

The GSA consists of two major services: the Federal Acquisition Service (FAS), and the Public Buildings Service (PBS). In addition to these two major services, the agency also consists of twelve staff offices and two independent offices. The FAS provides both strategic and operational support for the acquisition of goods and services for other federal departments.

Past administrators

The following persons served as administrator of the General Services Administration:

Office of Government-wide Policy

Office of the Chief Financial Officer

Office of Human Resources Management

Office of GSA IT

Office of Administrative Services

Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Affairs

Office of Strategic Communication

Office of Small Business Utilization

Office of General Counsel

Office of Civil Rights

Office of Mission Assurance

Office of Customer Experience

Office of Inspector General

Civilian Board of Contract Appeals

Regions

The GSA conducts its business activities through 11 offices (known as GSA regions) throughout the United States. These regional offices are located in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Fort Worth, Kansas City (Missouri), New York City, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle (Auburn), and Washington, D.C.

Operations

Procurement and the GSA Schedule

The Federal Acquisition Service (FAS) provides products and services available to federal agencies across the U.S. government. The GSA assists with procurement work for other government agencies. As part of this effort, it maintains the GSA Schedule Program, which other agencies can use to buy goods and services. The GSA Schedule can be thought of as a collection of pre-negotiated contracts. Procurement managers from government agencies can view these agreements and make purchases from the GSA Schedule by following the appropriate procedures prescribed by Federal Acquisition Regulation, or FAR, Subpart 8.4.

The GSA Schedule is awarded as a prime contract entered into by the federal government and a vendor that has submitted an acceptable proposal. At the core of the GSA Schedule contract lie two key concepts: 1) Basis of Award customer or group of customers and 2) Price Reduction Clause. The two concepts are applied in concert to achieve the government's pricing objectives for the GSA Schedule program. Namely, the government wants to ensure that when the vendor experiences competitive pressures to reduce its pricing, then the government can benefit from these and be extended reduced pricing as well.

The Basis of Award customer or group of customers represents the customer or group of customers whose sales are affected on the same terms and conditions as those with GSA, and whose pricing is used: 1) as the baseline during negotiations to establish discounts offered to GSA, and 2) as a price floor that, when breached, constitutes additional discounting that triggers the Price Reduction Clause.

The Price Reduction Clause ensures that vendor discounting practices and GSA Schedule prices maintain a fixed relationship. The vendor specifies in its GSA proposal, and during negotiations of GSA Schedule contract prices, the discounts to be given to Basis of Award customer(s). If the vendor then provides a larger discount to a Basis of Award customer than what was agreed upon in the GSA Schedule contract (i.e., if the price floor is breached), then the vendor's GSA price will be reduced proportionately and retroactively.

Effective Price Reduction Clause compliance procedures will protect vendors if their discounting practices are fully and accurately disclosed in their original proposals to GSA and then are used as a basis for compliance over the term of the contract. Although not ideal, a compliance system implemented after a contract has been awarded can bring a contract into compliance, although sometimes at the expense of profits. If implementing a system in the middle of a contract period, inaccuracies that turn up should be corrected immediately, and the GSA contracting officer should be made aware of them. Price Reduction Clause compliance systems and procedures can range from simple to complex. A simple, manual system would be appropriate for a service contractor with standard labor rates that are not discounted. A complex system would be required for a reseller with thousands of products and discounting policies that differ among product groups.

Federal property and buildings

The Public Buildings Service (PBS) acquires and manages thousands of federal properties. In accordance with Title 40 of the United States Code, the GSA is charged with promulgating regulations governing the acquisition, use, and disposal of real property (real estate and land) and personal property (essentially all other property). This activity is centered in the GSA's Office of Governmentwide Policy. Policies promulgated by the GSA are developed in collaboration with federal agencies and are typically published for public comment in the Federal Register before publication as a Final Rule.

The Public Buildings Service provides offices for its customers (I.e., federal agencies) and provides United States courthouses at good economies to the American taxpayer. PBS is funded primarily through the Federal Buildings Fund, which is supported by the rent from federal customer agencies.

The Office of Property Disposal of the PBS manages the disposal of surplus real property. The Office is responsible for land, office buildings, warehouses, former post offices, farms, family residences, commercial facilities, and airfields located in the United States, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the U.S. Pacific Territories. Surplus property is made available to both government and private bidders and, in some cases, land sold for public purposes (such as parks or welfare) may be discounted by up to 100% of FMV.

Twenty-four GSA green buildings have earned LEED ratings. Some green offerings include green roofs, underfloor air distribution, use of renewable power from utility companies, and light shelves (located outside of the building that reduce the amount of heat radiating into the building from the sun while increasing the amount of natural light and high ceilings that help direct daylight deep into the work environment). The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 made available not less than $4.5 billion for measures necessary to convert GSA facilities to High-Performance Green Buildings, as defined in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (Public Law 110-140).

The Department of Energy's Federal Energy Management Program facilitates the GSA's implementation under the Act through project transaction services, applied technology services, and decision support services, deploying renewable energy technologies and cultivating change to embrace energy efficiency.

Federal vehicle fleet management

The GSA contributes to the management of U.S. Federal property, including a 215,000 vehicle motor pool.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (stimulus bill) included $300 million to acquire energy-efficient motor vehicles for the federal fleet. President Barack Obama announced that the GSA was to support the U.S. auto industry with orders for about 17,600 new fuel-efficient vehicles by June 1, 2009, on an accelerated schedule, with money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. GSA was to pay $285 million to General Motors Corporation, Chrysler LLC, and Ford Motor Company. It was to include 2,500 hybrid sedans—the largest one-time purchase yet of hybrid vehicles for the federal government—and each new vehicle was claimed to yield at least a 10% fuel economy improvement over its predecessor. GSA was to spend $15 million more that year on a pilot fleet of advanced-technology vehicles, including all-electric vehicles and hybrid buses.

Hybrids accounted for about 10 percent of the 145,473 vehicles the GSA bought during the fiscal years 2009 and 2010, after making up less than 1 percent of government vehicle purchases in 2008. As for specific models, President Obama took a buy-American stance. The U.S. government bought about two-thirds of the Chevrolet Malibu Hybrids sold during the past two years, and almost a third of the Ford Fusion Hybrids, but only 17 Toyota Prius hybrids and five Honda Civic Hybrids. Ground Force One, so designated when transporting the POTUS, is one of two armored buses procured in 2010 for the transportation of dignitaries under protection of the Secret Service, at a cost of $1.1 million each. The coaches were assembled in Tennessee on frames made in Canada.

Interagency Resources Management Conference

The Interagency Resources Management Conference (IRMCO) was a federal executive conference of the GSA, held annually between 1961 and 2011 as a multi-day offsite event. It gave awards to federal government teams that improved government operations or communications with the public. Its attendees included Senior Executive Service members from a range of agencies, along with members of industry. After IRMCO 2011, the GSA announced that it was discontinuing IRMCO because it no longer had a purpose. Instead, in 2012 the GSA held a one-day Acquisition Excellence event focused on efficiency.

Technology Transformation Services

The GSA established the Federal Citizen Information Center in 1970 (now USAGov) to connect the public to government information and services. In 2009, the GSA created the Office of Citizen Services and Innovative Technologies (now the Office of Products and Programs) to expand the effort to serve the public through technology.

In 2014, the GSA began managing the Presidential Innovation Fellows program and launched 18F with a team focused on improving the federal government's digital services. Between 2014 and 2024, 18F worked with 34 agencies on 455 projects, such as improving online permitting and complaint submission processes. 18F helped the Federal Election Commission move its website to the Cloud.gov platform, which FEC projected would save it $1.2 million annually.

The GSA established the IT Modernization Centers of Excellence in 2017 to accelerate the modernization of IT infrastructure and reduce legacy IT spending across the government. The Centers of Excellence are a fee-for-service consulting service. For example, they helped the Agriculture Department avoid $42 million in costs by closing data centers.

The GSA consolidated those offices into the Technology Transformation Service (TTS) in 2016, which became a sub-unit of the Federal Acquisition Service in 2017. Its mission was to improve the lives of the public and public servants by transforming how the government uses technology. TTS aims to meet the government's technology needs: acquisition, omnichannel experience, intelligent process automation, infrastructure optimization and cloud, accelerators and innovation, data and analytics, and identity management.

In 2019, TTS became responsible for shared services created in previous years by 18F: Login.gov, an identity provider, and Cloud.gov, a hosting platform. The following year, TTS's consulting teams experienced significant demand due to pressures on federal agencies to respond to the coronavirus pandemic. In 2021, GSA announced the creation of the U.S. Digital Corps, a two year fellowship for early career technologists with specialities in software engineering, data science, design, and cybersecurity, housed within TTS. TTS programs also included Data.gov. That same year, TTS began investing in automation of security authorization processes for the FedRAMP program. TTS and 18F assisted with the development of multiple websites and applications in 2024, including the IRS Direct File pilot, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency's get.gov, and the American Climate Corps. TTS also launched Notify.gov.

Section 1122 Program

Section 1122 of the 1994 National Defense Authorization Act enabled state and local government agencies to purchase defense and other federal equipment to support drug enforcement activity. In 2009, the reauthorization bill expanded the program to purchases for use in homeland security and emergency response operations. The program is owned and managed by the Department of Defense (DOD), and equipment is made available by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) and the GSA, as is also done under the 1033 program.