When Stephen Perry's resignation as administrator of General Services Administration becomes effective Oct. 31, the top two politically appointed leadership roles in the federal procurement community will be vacant.

Perry's resignation has been long expected. He has served since 2001 and has overseen several efforts to reform the agency, culminating in a restructuring that will blend two of the agency's three divisions into one organization. After Perry signed the order to formally create the new Federal Acquisition Service out of the bone and sinew of the Federal Supply and Federal Technology services, procurement observers began to whisper that he had accomplished his final planned milestone and would soon step down.

Perry proved them right with an announcement last week.

But his departure does not happen in a vacuum. Although it's common for political appointees to leave their offices before the end of a president's term, such actions don't often amplify an existing void. Perry's does, however, because David Safavian, former administrator of the Office of Federal Procurement Policy, recently resigned his post. He was arrested — and indicted last week — on felony charges of lying to GSA and the Senate regarding lobbyist Jack Abramoff. The charges are not related to procurement or Safavian's tenure at OFPP.

Senior career employees at the two organizations will lead the agencies for now. GSA Deputy Administrator David Bibb will become acting administrator when Perry leaves, and Robert Burton, OFPP's associate administrator, has temporarily stepped into Safavian's place.

The repercussions of Perry's resignation reverberate in two directions. Outward, his absence will affect the larger procurement community. Inward, he leaves the agency when it is in the midst of a makeover and already missing experienced leaders following a wave of retirements during the past few months.

Looking inward

Perry said the reorganization is the latest phase of an ongoing improvement effort. GSA's internal investigations, which revealed that some field employees disregarded rules, were among the efforts he made to identify and fix problems, Perry said.

"Some of the issues we've dealt with in my tenure were issues we sought to discover and improve upon," he said. "We as an agency restated and recommitted ourselves to our agency's values and goals."