Program Review Board (PRB) Minutes – February 15, 2004

Attendees:
* Rodney Bent Chairman/Director Office of Management and Budget
* Frederick C. Smith Deputy Senior Advisor for the Office of Security Affairs
* Chris Milligan USAID
* Andy Bearpark Director, Office of Operations & Infrastructure
* H. Dean Pittman Governance
* MAJ Todd Gondeck Coalition Joint Task Force – 7, Comptroller
* Taif Sami Iraq Ministry of Finance Representative
* Christopher Segar Representative of the United Kingdom Government
* Heidi Venamore Representative of the Australian Government
COL Kay Sommerkamp CPA – General Counsel
Jesse Pruett Program Review Board - Regional Programs Manager
COL Jim Behring Comptroller’s Office
COL Tony Bell CPA – HCA
Reed Werner CPA – Office of Management and Budget
COL Eric Engelbrektsson CPA – Office of Management and Budget
Dr. Emad al Aani Ministry of Electricity Representative
Nick Horne CPA – Ministry of Electricity
Joel Berwick CPA – Ministry of Oil
COL Matthew Mulhern CPA – Ministry of Finance

*Voting Members


The minutes from the PRB meetings of 8 February 2004 were approved.

The following Program Review Board Requests were presented to the Board for recommendation to the Administrator:

#641 – 500 MW Power Station at Mussayib - $283,000,000 – Representatives from CPA Ministry of Electricity and Ministry of Electricity, respectively, briefed the board. The Ministry of Electricity (MOE) has requested the above amount from their 2004 Revised Capital Budget to cover a contract with Southeast Texas Industrial Services Inc. (STIS) for the provision of 500MW power to be on-line by June 2004. Specifically, the contractor will provide combustion turbines that will be placed adjacent to the existing Mussayib Thermal Power Station to begin feeding power directly into Baghdad by said date. The request was approved with the following contingencies: (1) that MOE and the Ministry of Finance (MOF) coordinate what fuel(s) will be used to power the turbines in the interim period before natural gas is able to fuel the electrical generation; and (2) that the Ministry of Electricity submit their 2004 capital spending plan to the MOF. The UK representative noted that in circumstances of real urgency, as in this case, it might be necessary to contact directly a limited number of companies known to be able to do the job, projects funded by the DFI should in the normally be open to international tender.
APPROVED – DFI.

#642 – FAO Purchase Orders – $19,065,802 – A representative of the CPA Contracting Activity briefed the Board. The Ministry of Agriculture has requested the above amount to pay for three purchase orders that were assigned to CPA by the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) without the Office of Iraqi Programs encumbering appropriate funds. The suppliers have already initiated delivery and/or delivered on these purchase orders and the CPA-Comptroller cannot pay these purchase orders until funds are made available. Approved – DFI.

#643 – Imported Power from Turkey – $4,608,719 – A representative of CPA Ministry of Electricity briefed the Board. The Ministry of Electricity has requested the above amount to import electricity from Turkey into Northern Iraq at $0.066/kWh. Contract performance commenced on the 1st of January and Iraq has already been invoiced for the month of January, which needs to be paid by the end of February. APPROVED – DFI.

#630 – Witness Protection – $16,500 – A representative of the CPA Ministry of Justice briefed the Board (discussed at PRC). The Ministry of Justice has requested the above amount to pay an invoice to Neareast Security Services for witness protection. The General Counsel deemed that the designated funds for payment (i.e., seized assets) are appropriate to cover the said contract. Based on this legal reading, the request will be honored and funded. APPROVED – SEIZED.