Army Cancels Contract for New Iraqi Prison ("Got to stop the bleeding")

Army Cancels Contract for New Iraqi Prison
By JAMES GLANZ
Published: June 20, 2006

BAGHDAD, Iraq, June 19 — The Army Corps of Engineers said Monday that it had canceled a $99.1 million contract with Parsons, one of the largest companies working in Iraq, to build a prison north of Baghdad after the firm fell more than two years behind schedule, threatened to go millions of dollars over budget and essentially abandoned the construction site.

The move is another harsh rebuke for Parsons, only weeks after the corps canceled more than $300 million of the company's contracts to build and refurbish hospitals and clinics across Iraq. A federal oversight office had found that some of the clinics were little more than empty shells and that only 20 of 150 called for in the contract would be completed without new financing.

But the prison, originally scheduled to be completed this month, appears to be the largest single rebuilding project canceled for failing to achieve its goals under the $45 billion American rebuilding program for Iraq. The corps said Parsons officials had recently estimated that it could not be completed before September 2008, and would cost an additional $13.5 million.

"I have other contractors that hold to their schedules," said Maj. Gen. William H. McCoy Jr., commander of the corps' Gulf Region Division. "And when they hold to their schedules, there's no problem."

In the case of the prison contract, General McCoy said, "I've got to stop the bleeding."

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http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/20/world/middleeast/20parsons.html?ex=1151380800&en=bdde8a45aa9eb57d&ei=5099&partner=TOPIXNEWS