I never in a thousand years imagined that I could force the Director of National Intelligence to make a statement about a document I obtained as a journalist. But it happened. Earlier this month, in Salon, I reported that 70 percent of the U.S. intelligence budget is spent on contracts, and cited a recent PowerPoint presentation by the DNI’s Terri Everett. Numbers buried in the presentation seem to show an intelligence budget of $60 billion – much higher than the unofficial estimates these days of $48 billion. Well, this week the DNI decided not to let those figures hang out there in the public domain, and issued a short statement.
Quote: “The slides and accompanying presentation were designed to illustrate general trends in Intelligence Community contracting for conference participants. They concerned overall procurement award trends; they did not address the issue of Intelligence Community contractors (personnel under contract), or the size of the Intelligence Community budget, in relative or actual terms.” So said Ellen Cioccio, Acting Director of Public Affairs, DNI.
Comment: Thank you, Ms. Cioccio. Now how about letting me speak to one of your procurement officers for the book I’m about to finish on outsourcing? So far, your office has turned down every request. Here’s my e-mail address.
Update: This story was posted on Thursday, June 21, 2007 at 13:53:39 pm EST. One hour and 48 minutes later I got my first hit from the CIA. Doesn’t take long.
Referring Link No referring link
Host Name relay1.ucia.gov
IP Address (purposely left blank)
Country United States
Region District Of Columbia
City Washington
ISP Central Intelligence Agency21st June 2007
15:41:53TimShorrock.com Blog Archive How to get the attention of U.S. Intelligence
Steve Aftergood reports:
ODNI DISMISSES INADVERTENT RELEASE OF INTEL BUDGET DATA
The recent inadvertent disclosure of intelligence spending figures concealed in an official PowerPoint briefing does not reveal the size of the intelligence budget, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) said this week.
Close scrutiny of a PowerPoint slide presented by ODNI official Terri Everett at a conference last month turned up budget numbers that were used to create a bar graph showing relative annual spending on intelligence contractors, and suggested that overall annual intelligence spending could be $60 billion or more. (Secrecy News, 06/05/07).
