State and Local Procurement

The National Association of State Procurement Officials is proud to make State and Local Government Procurement: A Practical Guide, 2nd Edition, available to government decision makers, educators, the business community, and others interested in learning more about how responsible public purchasing should be conducted. Whether you are a seasoned procurement professional or new to the field, this should be considered your tool of first resort for public procurement. This edition of NASPO’s flagship guide to public procurement features many changes and additional content, including updates to the emerging issues section and new chapters on e-procurement and IT procurement.Like the 2008 edition of this book, this 2nd Edition seeks to identify the current and rapidly changing forces that are challenging the role of the state or local government procurement officer and to suggest ways in which that government ought to address them. The text also describes principles and practices that are at the heart of a procurement system that must remain both flexible and accountable. According to U.S. Government Spending, state and local governments will spend an estimated 3.2 trillion in 2014. With procurement officers at the center of many of those expenditures, they must find new ways to offer effective service and quality to their user agency customers.The goal of this book is for the reader to come away with two key conclusions. First, challenges for state chief procurement officers continue to rapidly change and state central procurement organizations must adapt to these changes. In order to support the state and local mission, it is vital to focus on the entire supply chain and the changing needs of the marketplace to be successful.Second, a central procurement office cannot provide the effective leadership required to meet today’s complex procurement needs if located several layers below the jurisdiction’s highest-executive level. This isn’t a self-serving conclusion of NASPO. The objective and respected United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) made that point, as will be discussed in more detail in Chapter 2.