How about a year with no contractor executive orders?

Over the past couple of years, federal contractors have become guinea pigs for all sorts of regulations the administration couldn’t get Congress to enact for the private sector. The trade groups and many lawyers representing contractors have objected, but to no avail.

The strictures have come in a series of executive orders from the Obama administration. Among the new overlays:

• Higher minimum wages in construction and services contracts (including subcontractors and sub-subcontractors).

• Having to report any possible or known violations of 14 labor laws somewhere in the company or among subs.

• Adding anti-discrimination provisions to protect people in the LGBT categories.

• Having contract awards subject to higher review if there is tax non-compliance, or a felony conviction within 24 months and the possibility of suspension or debarment.

As long-time attorney Tim Sullivan of Thompson Coburn told me, it all adds cost and complexity to doing business with the federal government. These orders and regulations require companies to establish elaborate compliance and training mechanisms. Big companies in regulated industries — and what industry is not being more and more regulated every day — have greater revenues over which to spread these costs. For small companies, the burdens become a barrier to entry to the federal market.

No one favors labor law violations or discrimination against people on grounds that have nothing to do with their ability to do the work. For all of these issues, statutes and regulations already exist. In reality, these orders and the regime they impose cause two things according to Sullivan, and I agree: A “gotcha” atmosphere and the squeezing out of the possibility of honest mistakes. Everything becomes punitive, subject to prosecution and damages.

Federal CIOs and program managers have talked for years about their partnership with industry, about the need for industrial expertise. Call me naive — use the comment button at the bottom of the page — but in my experience cheating and lying companies, at least in IT, professional services and the like, represent the rare birds. Maybe it’s different in construction or blue-collar services. I don’t know.

In procurement with public dollars, as in any organization-to-organization relationship, you balance partnership and trust with good controls, proper ethical distance and verification mechanisms. Those were all in place before this barrage of orders. How about we have a cessation of these executive orders in 2016 and just try to do business.

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