OPEN FORUM MEETING ON PROCUREMENT ISSUES WITH NASA ASSOCIATE ADMINISTRATOR FOR PROCUREMENT Contact: Barbara Kirkland, (713) 483-4512. Open Forum Meeting on Procurement Issues with the NASA Associate Administrator for Procurement. NASA will conduct an open forum meeting to solicit questions, views, and opinions of interested persons/firms concerning NASA's procurement policies and practices. The purpose of the meeting is to have an open discussion between NASA's Associate Administrator for Procurement and industry/public. There will be a presentation by the Associate Administrator for Procurement followed by a question and answer period. The meeting will be held on August 22, 1996, at the Teague Auditorium (Building 2) located at the NASA Johnson Space Center, 2101 NASA Road 1, Houston, Texas, from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. Doors to the auditorium will open at 1:30 p.m. Admittance will be on a first-come, first-served basis. Reservations will NOT be accepted. Questions for the open forum should be presented at the meeting and should not be submitted in advance. Position papers are not being solicited. In addition to the general discussion, NASA invites comments or questions relative to its ongoing procurement initiatives, some of which include: 1) Cost Control. NASA is developing this initiative to increase the emphasis on cost control with its contractors and within the Agency; 2) Source Selection. NASA is working to reduce the time and effort that contractors and source selection personnel spend on a contract; 3) Performance-Based Contracting. NASA's newest procurement initiative is focused on structuring an acquisition around the purpose of the work to be performed instead of how the work is to be performed, or broad and imprecise statements of work; 4) Change Order Reduction and Process Change. NASA is attempting to improve overall change order management through the use of better technical direction, realistic cost estimates and more effective and timely negotiations; and 5) MidRange Procurement Procedures. A test program for a third category of procurements (between the simplified acquisition threshold and $1,000,000 annually) has been implemented at all NASA centers. The NASA Headquarters Acquisition Division is participating in this initiative which grew out of the National Performance Review. This Procurement Reinvention Laboratory is one of several procurement reinvention labs underway across the Government. For further questions about the Open Forum meeting, contact the NASA Johnson Space Center Industry Assistance Office, 2101 NASA Road 1, Houston, TX 77058 or telephone (713) 483-4511.

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