AUSTIN – A renewed effort to evaluate state contracting oversight could end up illustrating an uncomfortable reality, former lawmakers and government watchdogs say: even the strictest of safeguards will not work if not taken seriously by agency officials.
Despite an avalanche of negative attention on high-dollar contracting irregularities, the state does have some controls in place, including a decade-old Contract Advisory Team and a two-decade-old Quality Assurance Team. Part of the problem, the experts say, lies with state officials who have ignored the rules or exploited loopholes.
via State contracting safeguards only as good as the enforcement – Houston Chronicle.