Fort Detrick office makes contact

Its connections are key to landing deals on campus

Thursday, Nov. 10, 2005

Click here to enlarge this photo Tom Fedor⁄The Gazette John S. Gregg says his ability to ‘‘speak military” helps businesses make contacts at Fort Detrick.

The office’s goal is to link businesses with the various entities on the Fort Detrick campus, resulting in contracts for vendors and needed goods and services for the fort.

The office, on Thomas Johnson Drive, itself is a contractor with the fort. It is run by director Darryl Rekemeyer and business development specialist John S. Gregg for Data Solutions & Technology Inc., a woman- and veteran-owned small disadvantaged business in Lanham. The company bid on the contract in December and in January hired Rekemeyer and Gregg — military veterans who between them have eclectic backgrounds in business, government contracting and counseling — to staff the office.

The men work to increase contracting opportunities at the fort, but made clear that they can neither guarantee nor negotiate contracts. Instead, the office is like a library resource room for businesses seeking to contract with the fort, Rekemeyer said.

‘‘We are an information resource for businesses looking to work with Fort Detrick,” Gregg said. ‘‘We will support and supplement a company’s business development. We will not do it for them.”

To maximize the office’s potential as a business tool, representatives from the Frederick County Office of Economic Development, the Maryland Technology Development Corp. and Fort Detrick’s Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization all have regular contact with it.

Laurie Boyer, deputy director of the county’s economic development office, said the Business Development Office gives her agency an additional tool to work with, whether in recruiting businesses to the county or helping established Frederick companies tap the fort’s procurement opportunities.

‘‘It’s good for us to know we have the [office] as an option,” Boyer said. ‘‘It really helps us expand the scope of our services.

‘‘Darryl and John have been a great asset since the [office] has been opened,” she said. They ‘‘make contacts quickly and readily.”

Since the office opened March 22, it has compiled a database with more than 350 businesses that have done business or want to do business with the fort, Rekemeyer said. The office has facilitated contracts ‘‘in excess of $5 million ... working with businesses of all sizes, with a concentration on businesses in the region,” he said.

While military officials have referred to the Business Development Office as a ‘‘one-stop shop” for businesses trying to work with the base, Rekemeyer prefers to describe the office as ‘‘a business filter. Actually, we’re stewards of service to the community — small and large businesses, the fort and its 38 mission partners.”

The key to success for the office itself, and those seeking its help in competing for the Fort Detrick contracts, is flexibility, Rekemeyer said.

‘‘We have aligned the office with the needs of the community with the needs of the partners on the fort,” he said. ‘‘We have to be agile and we tell businesses they need to be agile” and sometimes willing to work with other partners to land a contract.

Gregg, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, said his and Rekemeyer’s ability to ‘‘speak military” contributes to the office’s success.

Gregg, who has lived in Frederick ‘‘more on than off” since 1983, said he was excited about the opportunity to work with people and businesses he already knew. The position ‘‘fit my skill-set,” he said.

With a degree in counseling, Gregg also worked for the Roman Catholic Church in a lay capacity, doing training and counseling. He later worked for the Frederick County Job Training Agency, Montgomery Works and an outplacement firm in Leesburg, Va.

When the Fort Detrick job opened, he ‘‘was in transition,” he said. ‘‘I knew the contract director at [Data Solutions & Technology]. They needed someone who knew the Frederick community.”

Rekemeyer, an Air Force navigator in the Vietnam War, came to the Fort Detrick office after a year in business development for a woman-owned small disadvantaged business in Virginia. That company, he said, was doing a lot of government contracting, particularly in with the Departments of Homeland Security, and Housing and Urban Development, but his experience with government contracting goes back three decades.

‘‘Right after I got out of the military, I started with Wang [Technologies]. I was a program manager in the area of physical security for the computers and worked on State Department contracts,” Rekemeyer said.

He decided to join the Fort Detrick office because it was ‘‘such a unique thing,” he said.