WEST POINT – The Department of the Army has announced it is dropping its plans to privatize public works employees at West Point.

US Senator Charles Schumer had pushed to prevent the privatization of the workers. In the House, Representatives Maurice Hinchey and John Hall also worked to prevent the conversion.

The government Accountability Office had protested the Army’s evaluation of proposals on the basis that the cost realism analysis on which the cost comparison relied was materially flawed.

The GAO declined to recommend a reevaluation.

“This is the final nail in the coffin of this deeply flawed study," said Schumer. “The A-76 process was obviously unsound and relying on its inaccurate data made no sense at all. During a time when we need to maintain as many jobs as possible, cancelling this study will preserve nearly 400 jobs at West Point and save taxpayers money.”

"Today commonsense won out over ideological stubbornness as the Army abandoned the senseless study that had been initiated by the Bush administration in an attempt to privatize hundreds of government jobs at West Point," said Hinchey. "More than 500 workers at West Point, who have done their jobs well for years, now have the comfort of knowing their jobs won't be outsourced to a private company in Georgia that would have cut their wages and benefits while padding the salaries of company executives. The entire A-76 process is broken and misguided and should be eliminated. “