Congressional leaders are suggesting names to serve on the Base Realignment and Closure Commission that will make decisions on the future of military installations.

President Bush must submit nominees to Congress by March 15, starting the clock on the contentious 2005 round of realignments.

The president chooses three of the nine commission members. The speaker of the house and the Senate majority leader each pick two and the House and Senate minority leaders name one apiece.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) said his nominees will be former Rep. James Hansen (R-UT), who served on the House Armed Services Committee, and former Transportation Secretary Samuel Skinner, who was also chief of staff for President George H.W. Bush.

The Homeland Security Department will no longer require employees and contractors to sign nondisclosure agreements, Federal Times reported.

Last year the department said employees and contractors must sign agreements that prohibited the disclosure of sensitive but unclassified information. Unions and civil liberties advocates complained about excessive secrecy.

In a Jan. 11 memo to the department’s senior executives, Undersecretary for Management Janet Hale said the signed agreements are no longer required and the existing agreements are no longer valid, the newspaper reported.

However, the new policy still allows employees to designate documents “For Official Use Only.” Critics said the broad but vague definition of “sensitive but unclassified information” means just about anything can be kept secret by anyone in the department.

House Republicans reappointed Rep. Don Manzullo (R-IL) to serve a third term as chairman of the Small Business Committee.

Manzullo said he will continue to promote his “American Jobs Agenda” which is focused on making the United States a more competitive place to do business while providing small businesses the tools they need to help create jobs.

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) will continue to head the Senate Small Business Committee.

Three small businesses and three large ones have been awarded an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract to support of the Navy’s strategic sourcing program.

Base period amounts for the small-business contracts are:

*Warden Associates, Springfield, VA, $11 million;

*OMNITEC Solutions Inc., Bethesda, MD, $11 million;

*Unity Consultants, Burke, VA, $13 million.

They will compete for task orders with E.L. Hamm and Associates Inc., Virginia Beach, VA; BAE Systems Analytical Solutions Inc., Huntsville, AL; and Grant Thornton, Alexandria, VA.

SBA has corrected the effective date for its subcontracting rule. (SAA, 1/7) The rule is effective Feb. 18.

Software maker Tsunami Research Inc. in St. Louis is changing its name, re-branding everything from its e-mail addresses to its front door. The Dover Lake Waterpark in Sagamore Hills, OH, renamed its Tsunami pool the Whitecap Wave Pool. Toyota has told Canadian dealers to remove the bumper badges from its 2005 Celica Tsunami Special-Edition. Other companies named “Tsunami” are considering “What’s in a name?” in the light of the Asian disaster, The Wall Street Journal reported.