Hawker Beechcraft learned during the initial status conference at the Court of Federal Claims that the U.S. Air Force awarded the Light Air Support contract to the Sierra Nevada Corporation and its Brazilian manufacturer, Embraer.

During the hearing, the government revealed that the unannounced award apparently was made on December 22, 2011, shortly after the Government Accountability Office declined to review Hawker Beechcraft’s protest against its exclusion from the LAS competition.  Per federal regulations, federal agencies are generally required to make a public award announcement by 5:00 P.M. ET on the day of the award.

“This is yet another example of the Air Force’s lack of transparency throughout this competition,” said Bill Boisture, Hawker Beechcraft chairman and CEO.  ”With this development, it now seems even clearer that the Air Force intended to award the contract to Embraer from early in this process.”

During the hearing on December 28, Hawker Beechcraft requested that the court grant a temporary restraining order to preclude the Air Force from moving forward in the contract process.  The court agreed to establish an accelerated schedule for briefings on the temporary restraining order and the legal merits of the case.  A ruling on Hawker Beechcraft’s request for a temporary restraining order is expected as early as January 11.

The company still has no concrete reasons for the exclusion of the Beechcraft AT-6, having been denied explanation by the U.S. Air Force on two occasions.  The LAS contract, on track to benefit a non-U.S. company, is valued at nearly $1 billion of U.S. taxpayer money.

The AT-6 is a world-class, light attack aircraft that has been evaluated and proven capable through a multi-year, Congressionally-funded program led by the Air National Guard. Hawker Beechcraft and its industrial partners worked closely with the Air Force for two years to develop parameters for the LAS competition and invested more than $100 million preparing to meet the Air Force’s specific requirements for a light attack aircraft.  The benefits of the AT-6 include the following:

• The AT-6 is designed and manufactured in the U.S. to be used by the U.S and its allies.
• Keeping this contract in the U.S. will help preserve 1,400 domestic jobs at 181 companies in 39 states.
• The AT-6 draws its heritage from the airframe of the number one training aircraft in the world, the Beechcraft T-6. The company has built more than 725 T-6 aircraft, which are used to train every fixed-wing military pilot in the United States and are successfully operated by six allied air forces around the world. The graduation to the AT-6 light attack airplane would be a natural progression.
• The AT-6 is the sum of the Air Force’s proven T-6, A-10C mission system and MC-12W sensor suite.
• The weapons and avionics systems included on the AT-6 are familiar to NATO allies and have been proven effective on many continents and in other NATO aircraft.

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A federal bill introduced Friday December 16 to protect school children from dangerous, and sometimes deadly, restraint and seclusion practices has the support of the National Autism Association (NAA). The “Keeping All Students Safe Act”, introduced by Senator Tom Harkin, provides long-overdue protections to students across the country by prohibiting restraint and seclusion techniques that compromise health and safety.

It’s estimated that over the last five years, more than 200 students, many with disabilities, have died due to seclusion and restraints being used in schools. A 2009 Government Accountability Office (GAO) investigation reported that thousands of students have been physically injured and emotionally traumatized as the result of restraint and seclusion in public schools, and noted specific cases where students died from “mechanical compression to the chest,” or “smothering.”

The study outlined a sampling of other cases, including one schoolchild who died from hanging himself in a seclusion room, a four-year-old girl who was tied to a chair and abused, five children who were duct-taped to their desks, and a ten-year-old boy who was put in a seclusion room “75 times over a 6-month period for hours at a time for offenses such as whistling, slouching and hand-waving.”

“Students with autism and other disabilities are at significant risk for regression, emotional trauma, injury and death as a result of these harmful practices,” states NAA President Wendy Fournier. “Aversive interventions, restraint, and seclusion carry no therapeutic value, and basic protections are a must. We applaud Senator Harkin for introducing this critical piece of legislation.”

Specifically, the Keeping All Students Safe Act would:

Prohibit aversive behavioral interventions that compromise health and safety.

Prohibit physical restraint that is life threatening, including physical restraint that restricts breathing.

Prohibit physical restraint if contraindicated based on the student’s disability, health care needs, or medical or psychiatric condition.

Prohibit the use of seclusions and/or restraints in a student’s Individual Education Plan or any other behavioral plan.

Prohibit seclusion in locked and unattended rooms or enclosures.

Call for states to collect data on the occurrence of seclusions and restraints.

Call for schools to conduct a debriefing with parents and staff after a restraint is used and plan for positive behavioral interventions that will prevent the use of restraints with the student in the future.

Establish a state grant program to enhance the States’ ability to promote, within its LEAs, preventative programming and training for school personnel

To read the 2009 GAO report, visit http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09719t.pdf. To learn more about restraint and seclusion prevention, visit http://tash.org/tash-offers-free-parent-guide-on-restraint-and-seclusion-’shouldn’t-school-be-safe’/  or http://www.autismsafety.org/.

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