The catch is that if you don't know software development, you probably don't know what you need...

>knowing what you need.

But if you have a government department that builds software, they can also spec it. And everyones interests are aligned.

Further you open the door to bell labs/DARPA type speculative work.

Seems to me, the type of work environment where you have that freedom, are able to open source work would be attractive to a lot of people.