Posts Tagged ‘efficiency initiative’

To avoid “hollowing out” the force as it slashes spending over the next decade, the Defense Department will need to identify components of the budget other than force structure, readiness and modernization to capture the needed savings, Michèle Flournoy, who served as defense undersecretary for policy under Obama until last February, wrote in a commentary Tuesday in the Wall Street Journal. Where else to look? One place is infrastructure. “This inability to shed or realign facilities hangs like an albatross around the department’s neck …

The Air Force has undergone a dramatic downsizing over the past decade to produce a force that is smaller than before 9/11, eliminating more than 30,000 personnel and retiring nearly 1,900 aircraft. Shrinking the Air Force has been the only effective response to declining budgets that would maintain readiness, Air Force Secretary Michael Donley explains in a series of commentaries this week …

The Pentagon lacks a uniform approach to track whether the department is achieving $100 billion in anticipated savings from efficiency initiatives launched by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta in fiscal 2012, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. Some services were not reporting all of the costs required to carry out cost-cutting moves, nor all the savings generated …

The Pentagon’s initiative to save $150 billion through fiscal 2016 by reducing overhead and eliminating other redundancies is on track to be completed, Press Secretary George Little told reporters Tuesday. The $60 billion in additional overhead savings announced as part of the FY 2013 budget request also is expected to be reached, reported American Forces Press Service. The department currently is developing plans to carry out those goals …

DOD should be able to identify additional opportunities to generate savings by streamlining resources at its headquarters, GAO concludes in a new report after reviewing recent efforts to reduce overhead costs at the department. DOD may not have identified all areas where reductions in headquarters personnel and operating costs could be achieved because the department was working quickly to identify savings in the fiscal 2012 budget …

Several elements of past Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ initiative to save money by streamlining overhead have encountered difficulties, but overall the effort is advancing, Pentagon Comptroller Robert Hale said last week. Attempts to limit the number of civilian workers and eliminate contract workers may not be successful, Hale said …

The cutbacks in personnel and funding affecting installation support since fiscal 2011 are expected to continue for the foreseeable future, Craig College, the Army’s deputy assistant chief of staff for installation management, told attendees at this week’s 2012 ADC Winter Forum. In the current year, FY 2012, Army officials are coping with a $1.5 billion cut in installation funding from the previous year. As a result, 3,766 civilian positions will be eliminated from the service’s installation workforce this year …

The planned reorganization of Air Force Materiel Command is not a precursor to relocating Eglin AFB’s weapons research and development function, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz said Tuesday. “We are not de-establishing the Air Armament Center. Nothing is migrating from Eglin with respect to the proposal for the Air Force Materiel Command reorganization,” Schwartz said …

DOD officials are counting a delay in funding planned military construction projects from fiscal 2013 to 2017 as saving $8.2 billion when compared to the previous year’s long-term spending plan. The department is relying on the delay in funding construction projects as one of its primary areas of savings in its latest round of efficiency initiatives …

The Army’s Accessions Command was officially discontinued during a ceremony last week at Fort Knox, Ky., closing the book on the activity responsible for recruitment for the past 10 years. The Army announced the inactivation last April as a cost-cutting move …