[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1993, Book II)]
[October 26, 1993]
[Pages 1824-1826]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks Announcing Federal Procurement Reforms and Spending Cut 
Proposals
October 26, 1993

    Ladies and gentlemen, the Presidential memorandum on electronic 
commerce which I have just signed is, as the Vice President said, a 
direct result of the work done by the National Performance Review. It 
will make our antiquated paper-based procurement system accessible to 
anybody with a personal computer. It will open up a world of 
possibilities to small businesses in America and drive down costs to 
taxpayers.
    This demonstrates why the National Performance Review has been and 
will continue to be a success. The NPR has become a true action plan for 
unprecedented cost cutting and reinvention across the entire 
governmental process. It's dedicated to reforms that will give us a 
Government that actually does work better and cost less.
    We want to give the taxpayer a more efficient Government, to reduce 
the deficit, to provide new resources so that we can also respond to 
urgent national needs. The proposals we announce today meet every one of 
those objectives. By sending to Congress a bill that produces billions 
in savings, we will now be able to finance an expansion of our anticrime 
activities at a time when the country desperately needs it. Reinventing 
Government is working, and I want to say a special word of thanks to the 
Vice President for his outstanding leadership on this project.
    Today I am sending to Congress a significant package of spending 
cuts, totaling $10 billion, based on the National Performance Review and

[[Page 1825]]

fulfilling a promise I made to further reduce the deficit by spending 
cuts in that amount--sending, excuse me, spending cuts in that amount to 
Congress that could be passed in this calendar year. The Government 
reform act phases out Federal support for wool, mohair, and honey; 
consolidates environmental satellite programs; streamlines the 
operations of the Departments of Agriculture and Housing and Urban 
Development; reduces costly regulation; and proposes other reforms 
reflecting more than 20 deficit-cutting recommendations of NPR. These 
cuts are part of our commitment to put our economic house in order.
    With the passage of the economic plan last summer containing about 
$500 billion in deficit reduction, we've helped to drive down interest 
rates to historic low levels to keep inflation down. This has meant more 
private sector job growth in one year than in the previous 4; increases 
in housing starts; and in mid-October, we know now that auto sales have 
climbed by 18.4 percent, the largest amount in several years. Orders for 
heavy equipment continue to rise. While we have still clearly got a very 
long way to go and many more good-paying jobs to produce, this recovery 
is beginning to shift into a more promising phase. That's why our 
progress on continued deficit reduction is very important. We have to 
maintain the Government's credibility in holding down the deficit and 
keeping interest rates down in order to provide a stable climate for 
long-term growth.
    We must now move to achieve real savings through procurement reform. 
While the private sector is becoming more flexible, more innovative, 
Government has become in many ways over the last 10 years even more 
bureaucratic. At a time when all businesses are looking for better 
suppliers and lower prices, the Government is too often losing suppliers 
and actually paying higher prices by putting up so many costly hurdles 
and requirements in our procurement system. Procurement waste is costing 
the taxpayers tens of billions of dollars, and it has to stop. We must 
fundamentally reform this system, saving billions of dollars and using 
that money in ways that meet the basic needs of the American people.
    Senator Glenn and Congressman Dellums and Congressman Conyers and 
the other distinguished Members of Congress who have joined us here 
today have introduced very important procurement reform legislation 
which will make it easier for agencies to buy the same commercial 
products ordinary consumers and businesses buy off the shelf. It will 
cut down enormously on paperwork. It will speed deliveries. It will 
provide new incentives for small businesses.
    At the same time, the Department of Defense has requested, with my 
support, immediate congressional authorization to undertake seven pilot 
projects to reform their own procurement processes. These projects will 
allow the Department to demonstrate innovative approaches to acquiring 
commercial jet aircraft and aircraft engines as well as items like 
clothing and medical supplies.
    Cost-saving innovations like these are critical to our ability to 
meet future military needs within our budgetary limits. I might say that 
the Department of Defense has been so confident of these things that, 
after we had completed our bottoms-up review, the leaders at the Defense 
Department said they thought one of the ways that we could actually meet 
our defense needs over the next 5 years within the tough budgetary 
restrictions imposed would be to require these kinds of procurement 
reforms. And I want to thank the Department of Defense for the 
aggressive attitude that they have taken toward this, and we all look 
forward to the results they will be achieving now.
    Procurement reform also will enhance national security. Procurement 
regulations today virtually force defense contractors to develop 
business practices and products that are unique only to the military. 
This division of industry in the United States into defense and 
nondefense sectors results in higher prices to the Government, less 
purchasing flexibility to the armed services, and too often actually 
denies our military state-of-the-art technologies found in the 
commercial marketplace. Today 5 of the top 10 U.S. semiconductor 
producers refuse defense business because of the burdens and special 
requirements the Government imposes.
    Finally, procurement can work by allowing the Government to run more 
like a business, buying products based on price and other important 
considerations such as how well a supplier has performed in the past. We 
want the marketplace, not the bureaucracy, to determine what we buy and 
what we pay.
    According to the NPR report, if Congress does its part in passing 
the legislation and we do our part in making it work, we could save more 
than $5 billion in the first year of this

[[Page 1826]]

reform alone. We ought to take some of that money that your Government 
has been wasting all these years and use it to uphold Government's first 
responsibility, which is to keep our citizens safe here at home. With 
that money, we can make our crime bill even stronger. We can make sure 
we put at least 50,000 police officers on the street over the next 5 
years. We can help States to build more boot camps so we can take young 
criminals off the street and teach them more respect for the law and 
give them a chance to avoid a life in prison and live a life of 
constructive citizenship. We can have more drug courts, like the one the 
Attorney General started in Florida and the one our administration is 
helping to launch here in DC, so we can stop sending tens of thousands 
of criminal addicts back onto the street every year where they'll commit 
more crimes if they don't get treatment first.
    I want Congress to pass this crime bill and pass the savings I've 
asked to help pay for it. I want them to know that if these cuts aren't 
passed, I'm going to come back with more cuts. And if those aren't 
passed, I'll come back with still more. I'll keep coming back until we 
have the money we need to make America safer.
    Procurement reform shares a common border with many of our most 
important goals: saving taxpayer money, reinventing Government, 
strengthening our military, improving our economy. But in a larger sense 
the steps we are taking here today are also about proving to the 
American people that we can honestly and seriously deal with the issues 
that matter most to them and that for too long too many have felt 
powerless to change. We can and will cut the deficit. We can and will 
run a Government that works better and costs less. We can and will turn 
those savings to helping America, including helping more Americans be 
safer in their homes and on their streets.
    I'd like to close by introducing to you Lieutenant Colonel Brad 
Orton. He has a story to tell that reveals the price we continue to pay 
by doing nothing in this important area. During the Gulf war, the Air 
Force placed an emergency order for 6,000 Motorola commercial radio 
receivers. But because Motorola's commercial unit lacked the record-
keeping systems required to show the Pentagon that it was getting the 
lowest available price, the deal reached an impasse. The issue was 
resolved in a remarkable way that Lieutenant Colonel Orton will now 
describe, involving the Japanese Government. This should never happen 
again.
    Today is about taking responsibility for doing better, working 
together to build a better America. We can do this, Congress, the 
administration, the American people.

Note: The President spoke at 10:26 a.m. in Room 450 of the Old Executive 
Office Building. The memorandum is listed in Appendix D at the end of 
this volume.