WASHINGTON — The cost of building a digital system to gather, preserve and give the public access to the records of the federal government has ballooned as high as $1.4 billion, and the project could go as much as 41 percent over budget, according to government auditors.
The Government Accountability Office blames the cost overruns and schedule delays on weak oversight and planning by the National Archives, which awarded a $317 million contract to Lockheed Martin six years ago to create a modern archive for electronic records.
The Archives’ largest and most complex capital project ever has been plagued by problems, and it is still struggling to conduct effective oversight, auditors said Friday.
The Archives “has not been positioned to identify potential cost and schedule problems early and thus has not been able to take timely actions to correct problems and avoid program schedule delays and cost increases,” the GAO wrote in its report.
The Washington Post obtained a copy of the report ahead of its release.
The digital archive was identified last summer by the Office of Management and Budget as one of the government’s most troubled information-technology investments. The Obama administration has tried to shore up or eliminate projects at risk of failure.
After that assessment, the budget office directed the Archives to cut its losses with the electronic archive, which is scheduled for a rollout this fall. But the system will do far less than was advertised.
The Archives’ inspector general concluded last year that the system will lack a fully searchable database for the public. Searchers will be able to find subject lines but will not be able to search the full text of a document, Inspector General Paul Brachfeld said.
Archivist of the United States David S. Ferriero, responding to a draft of the GAO report in November, agreed with most of the findings and said his staff plans to address them soon. He disagreed with auditors’ estimate of the project cost, saying the cost of project management, planning and research should not be included.
The Archives is best known for the agency responsible for preservation of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and other historical documents.
When it’s fully implemented, the price could hit $1.2 billion to $1.4 billion. Ferriero put the current cost at $282 million.
