[Senate Hearing 118-588]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 118-588
MILITARY CONSTRUCTION, VETERANS AFFAIRS,
AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS
FOR FISCAL YEAR 2025
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HEARINGS
BEFORE A
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
on
H.R. 8580/S. 4677
MAKING APPROPRIATIONS FOR MILITARY CONSTRUCTION, THE DE-
PARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS, AND RELATED AGENCIES FOR
THE FISCAL YEAR ENDING SEPTEMBER 30, 2025, AND FOR OTHER
PURPOSES
__________
Department of Defense
Department of Veterans Affairs
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: https://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
55-314 PDF WASHINGTON : 2025
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COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
PATTY MURRAY, Washington, Chairman
RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Vice
JACK REED, Rhode Island Chairman
JON TESTER, Montana MITCH McCONNELL, Kentucky
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware JERRY MORAN, Kansas
BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii JOHN HOEVEN, North Dakota
TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas
CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West
JOE MANCHIN, West Virginia Virginia
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland JOHN KENNEDY, Louisiana
MARTIN HEINRICH, New Mexico CINDY HYDE-SMITH, Mississippi
GARY PETERS, Michigan BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
KYRSTEN SINEMA, Arizona KATIE BRITT, Alabama
MARCO RUBIO, Florida
DEB FISCHER, Nebraska
Evan Schatz, Staff Director
Elizabeth McDonnell, Minority Staff Director
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Subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related
Agencies
KYRSTEN SINEMA, Arizona, Chairman
PATTY MURRAY, Washington, (ex JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas, Ranking
officio) MITCH McCONNELL, Kentucky
JACK REED, Rhode Island LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska
JON TESTER, Montana JOHN HOEVEN, North Dakota
BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, (ex
TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin officio)
MARTIN HEINRICH, New Mexico MARCO RUBIO, Florida
JOE MANCHIN, West Virginia BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
GARY PETERS, Michigan DEB FISCHER, Nebraska
Professional Staff
Michelle Dominguez
Dylan Byrd
Jason McMahon
Patrick Magnuson (Minority)
Jennifer Bastin (Minority)
Administrative Support
Gabriella Armonda
LaShawnda Smith (Minority)
C O N T E N T S
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hearings
Wednesday, May 1, 2024
Page
Department of Defense:
Military Construction and Family Housing..................... 1
Thursday, May 2, 2024
Department of Veterans Affairs................................... 75
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back matter
List of Witnesses, Communications, and Prepared Statements....... 123
Subject Index:
Department of Defense: Military Construction and Family
Housing.................................................... 125
Department of Veterans Affairs............................... 126
MILITARY CONSTRUCTION, VETERANS AFFAIRS, AND RELATED AGENCIES
APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 2025
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WEDNESDAY, MAY 1, 2024
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:01 a.m. in
Room SD-124, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Kyrsten
Sinema, chairwoman (presiding).
Present: Senators Sinema, Tester, Heinrich, Peters,
Boozman, Murkowski, Hoeven, Collins, and Fischer.
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Military Construction and Family Housing
STATEMENT OF HON. BRENDAN OWENS, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF
DEFENSE FOR ENERGY, INSTALLATIONS, AND
ENVIRONMENT
opening statement of senator kyrsten sinema
Senator Sinema. Good morning. This hearing of the Military
Construction, Veterans Affairs and Related Agencies
Appropriations Subcommittee, will please come to order.
I would like to welcome Ranking Member Boozman, and I look
forward to working with you this cycle.
Senator Boozman. Yeah.
Senator Sinema. I am excited.
To our witnesses, thank you so much for being here today. I
specially would like to acknowledge Lieutenant General Vereen
and Lieutenant General Banta who are appearing before the
subcommittee for their last Posture Season prior to their
retirements; you and me, both.
[Laughter.]
Senator Sinema. Thank you for your decades of service.
Today, we are reviewing the fiscal year 2025 Budget Request
for Military Construction and Family Housing. Overall, the
$17.6 billion request is an increase of $870 million from last
year's proposal, which is a good-news story, particularly under
FRA caps. And while it is a nominal increase in the context of
the broader DOD budget, the Department is demonstrating a
continued focus on buying down our Military infrastructure
backlog, and these investments make a difference for our
Service members and their families.
Yes, gentlemen, we are not going to start you in, so you
can--unless you want to stand the entire time, which is
totally--no?
However, we should also recognize that program requirements
continue to grow in cost and complexity, and in spite of the
top line increase, this year's major construction request
includes fewer projects than last year, so while we welcome the
investment proposed by the Department and acknowledge that new
missions such as the Air Force's Nuclear Modernization, or
Navy's Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program, are taking
a larger share of a relatively small pie to the detriment of
many other current mission needs.
Because of the growing cost of doing business, we need to
look at how to creatively meet facility needs that more
efficiently and cost-effectively accomplish the mission. For
example, as the Services execute their sustainable building
materials pilot projects, I expect the Department to evaluate
if and how cost savings are being derived across the lifecycle
of the facility, and to incorporate those lessons into future
planning and design. We must also invest in resilient
infrastructure that is tailored to the energy and climate needs
and installation level.
I am encouraged in the Service's focus of quality of life
facilities in their request, which include funding for two
dozen on-base community and living quarter projects such as
barracks, child development centers, schools, medical
facilities, and more. The request also includes an increase
over last year's proposal for the Energy Resilience and
Conservation Investment Program, which is a critical program
for modernizing and securing our installation energy
infrastructure.
However, again, because of the increasing complexity and
cost of the ERSIP (sic) projects, the increase in the request
actually gets us to three fewer new projects than last year
because it includes $100 million in prior-year cost-to-
completes. That is only a third of the total unfunded
requirement. So I appreciate the Department has not level
funded military construction and family housing programs, but
with the current and future cost of doing business, we need to
think creatively about how to accomplish more with less.
With that, I look forward to hearing our members--our
witnesses today.
And I would like to recognize Ranking Member Boozman for
his opening statement.
statement of senator john boozman
Senator Boozman. Well, thank you, Madam Chair. And I am
pleased to be with you today, with our first outing, and we do
appreciate having you around. Senator Murray did a great job.
And I know that you are going to step in and do also a great
job. You have got a wonderful staff, as do I; that keep us out
of trouble.
Senator Sinema and I served on Veterans Affairs together,
and she is good about correcting me in a very gentle way.
[Laughter.]
Senator Boozman. So we appreciate that.
So I would like also to extend welcome to our witnesses,
and recognize the upcoming retirements. Congratulations General
Banta for 37 years of service, and also Lieutenant General
Vereen for more than 36 years of service. I thank both of you
for your dedication and service, and I wish you well in your
retirement.
This year's budget request is $17.5 billion, a 6 percent
decrease from the fiscal year 2024 enacted level of $18.7
billion. Although this request represents a 5 percent increase
over last year's request, it continues the trend of having more
expensive projects rather than a higher quantity of projects.
Unfortunately, this isn't a surprise as inflation continues to
drive up costs, and we continue to see larger and more complex
projects in the budget.
MILCON continues to make up 2 percent of the total DOD
budget, even though we see a substantial backlog of
requirements continue to increase. This year's MILCON projects
on the unfunded priority list exceed $7 billion, the highest
ever submitted. Adding to the backlog is disaster recovery in
Guam, with early estimates as high as $50 billion. A bill like
that cannot be absorbed within the traditional MILCON Program.
I would like to hear from our witnesses how they intend to
address disaster recovery, and working with us so that we can
plan that in the budgeting process. The program has continued
to struggle from economic factors, such as inflation, and
supply chain delays, and while it can take time for the MILCON
process to respond, the changing market conditions, the current
environment is not new. While some cost fluctuation is
expected, I hope this year's request accounts for the inflation
we continue to see.
Additionally, I am concerned about scope and cost increases
due to new statutory, regulatory, and policy requirements,
although early in their implementation it appears that both
electrification and project labor agreements could have
significant impacts on project costs.
Early data suggests that projects can increase by 30
percent to 200 percent after accounting for these requirements.
That is simply unaffordable, and I am worried about the effect
these policies will have on the projects in this request, as
well as future budget requests. I hope the Department
approaches these matters objectively and takes the waiver
process very, very seriously.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today, and
continue the dialogue, and the work needed for a successful
MILCON Program. I yield back, Chair.
Senator Sinema. Well, thank you, Ranking Member.
We will now proceed with opening statements from Assistant
Secretary Owens, followed by each of our Service witnesses. I
ask that you keep your remarks to three minutes and then submit
your full written testimony for the record.
Assistant Secretary Owens, you may proceed.
summary statement of hon. brendan owens
Mr. Owens. Thank you, Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman,
distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to discuss the President's fiscal year 2025 Budget
Request for the Department of Defense's Military Construction
and Housing Programs. Our installations are the foundation of
our National Security Posture, and I appreciate this
opportunity to engage on how this budget request supports
critical priorities within this portfolio.
A significant gap persists between installation conditions
today and the quality standards that are deserved by, and best
support warfighter readiness. We must accelerate our
infrastructure investments while also ensuring they are
optimized to support the mission.
To that end, the Department is implementing the Resilient
and Healthy Defense Community Strategy to guide our
infrastructure investments. The RECC is centered on three lines
of effort: adopting human-centered requirements, optimizing our
footprint, and transforming our portfolio management.
For fiscal year 2025, we are requesting $15.6 billion for
military construction across the Department, including $1.8
billion for facilities that will directly enhance and support
quality of life. To provide ongoing support for our existing
facilities, we are requesting $13.6 billion in facility
sustainment funding, and $6.3 billion in restoration and
modernization funding.
To ensure these investments are optimized for readiness and
quality of life, we are working with the DOD components to
transform our military construction processes and adopting a
sustainment management strategy that supports delivery of high-
performance assets.
Of all infrastructure we provide, our Service members'
housing has the greatest impact on their quality of life.
Unfortunately, DOD has, in too many instances, failed to live
up to our role in making sure housing dignifies our Service
members' commitment, and enables them to bring the best
versions of themselves to their mission.
Housing issues were highlighted in GAO's 2023 report
documenting poor living conditions in barracks. We anticipate
implementing 28 of GAO's 31 recommendations from this report,
this year.
The Department established a Tiger Team to prioritize
urgent investments to DOD's government-owned housing, these
efforts, synchronized with over $3 billion requested for family
and unaccompanied housing, will enhance our oversight of the
portfolio. We have a lot of work ahead, but we are all
committed to getting after it.
Reliable, adaptable, and resilient energy remains essential
to military capability and readiness. The backbone of DOD's
efforts to ensure energy security. And thank you, Chair Sinema,
or highlighting this. This is our $732 million request for the
Energy Resilience and Conservation Investment Program, but
resilient, mission-ready installation is much more than just
what is inside the fence line.
Partnership with the communities that support our
installations is critical, as is responsible stewardship of on-
and-off--both on and off installation environments. As such, we
are requesting $1.6 billion for environmental cleanup,
including $448 million for BRAC environmental.
While we are making progress, EPA's new Drinking Water Rule
will significantly increase the costs associated with PFAS-
impacted drinking water that DOD must address. As always, we
will rely on our partnership with Congress to address these
requirements.
We greatly appreciate your sustained attention to and
support for our installations. We stand ready to work with this
committee to continue aligning our policies and resources to
support the National Defense Strategy, and improve readiness
and quality of life for our soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines,
Guardians, and their families.
Thank you. And I look forward to your questions.
[The statement follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Brendan Owens
introduction
Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, and distinguished members of
the subcommittee: Thank you for the opportunity to discuss the
President's Fiscal Year 2025 budget request for the Department of
Defense's (DoD) energy, installations, and environment programs. Our
installations are the foundations of our National security posture, and
I look forward to working with this committee in the coming months to
continue aligning our policies and resources to support the National
Defense Strategy and the safety, productivity, and quality of life of
our personnel.
creating resilient and healthy defense communities
To meet the objectives of the National Defense Strategy, the
Department of Defense must recruit and retain a strong, healthy, and
resilient military force. More than two million military and civilian
personnel live, work, train, raise their children, and spend time with
their families on our 538 installations, supported by extensive built
and natural infrastructure. This includes more than 850,000 rotational
and permanent Unaccompanied Housing (UH) bed spaces; more than 242,000
Family Housing (FH) units for Service members and their families; more
than 280,000 buildings and permanent structures, comprised of
workspaces, schools, commissaries, hospitals, and other facilities; and
30 million acres of land, including test and training ranges, parks,
protected areas, waterways, and other natural features that contribute
to local economies and communities.
These spaces are central to our Service members' military
experience, affecting their physical and mental health, their ability
to carry out their missions, and the overall recruitment and retention
of the force. Therefore, it is both a national security imperative and
our moral obligation to ensure that they are effective, positive places
for current and prospective Service members, their families, and the
civilian workforce.
Over the past 5 years, the Department has invested an average of
$11.4 billion a year to build new facilities, $15.4 billion a year to
maintain and repair infrastructure, and $2.5 billion a year on
environment restoration and conservation efforts. Despite this
investment, the Department recognizes that a significant gap persists
between installation conditions today and the quality standards that
are expected, deserved, and best support Warfighter readiness. The
estimated deferred maintenance backlog, which is based on addressing
infrastructure condition deficiencies relative to their original
specifications, stands at $134 billion and continues to accrue faster
than our pace of investment.
Moreover, this backlog does not account for upgrades needed to
accommodate current standards and Service member needs, or ready our
infrastructure to be resilient to changing climate and environmental
conditions. Over 79% of our installations were established before 1970
and nearly 33% of built assets are more than 50 years old. These assets
reflect the needs and policies of the time they were constructed,
requiring not just regular upkeep, but potentially significant upgrades
or outright replacements to meet evolving requirements and preferences.
Additionally, the number of incidents where hurricanes, flooding and
wildfire have left billion-plus dollar recovery actions in their wake
is increasing at an unsustainable rate (e.g., $1 billion at Offutt Air
Force Base, $3 billion at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, and over $4
billion at Tyndall Air Force Base).
It is clear that we cannot continue down this path. Continued
infrastructure challenges or failures negatively impact our ability to
project power and prepare forces, as well as quality of life of Service
members, their families, and the civilian/contractor workforce. This
will, in turn, exacerbate the recruiting, retention, and readiness
challenges the Department faces.
Given the magnitude of the infrastructure funding deficit and the
profound effect that poor living and working conditions can have on
readiness, retention, and morale, it is imperative that we not only
invest more but also invest better to achieve our goal of delivering
healthy, functional, and resilient spaces. Improving the Department's
vast infrastructure footprint will be a significant undertaking and
require us to transform how we invest in our installations, with a
focus on making them true power projection platforms.
Therefore, the Department is implementing the Resilient and Healthy
Defense Communities Strategy, which will guide actions that will ensure
that these spaces are healthy-providing spaces that are safe and
comfortable, have exceptional indoor and outdoor environment quality,
and offer proximity to open space that contributes to overall well-
being; functional-enabling the way people want to live and work by
offering intuitive, efficient, and user-friendly design and modern
amenities and technologies; and resilient-delivering continuous service
and resilience against climate change, environmental hazards, and other
risks that have the potential to disrupt or displace. This strategy
follows a three-pronged approach to our infrastructure investments:
1. Adopt human-centered requirements that will help us create
environments that do not just meet utilitarian needs and compliance
standards, but promote purpose, productivity, and camaraderie. This
includes developing design and maintenance requirements that emphasize
people and their needs, preferences, and experiences to create spaces
that support and protect them and investing in technologies to empower
users with information and feedback mechanisms about their environment
that allow installation managers to monitor their performance and
deliver high-quality assets.
2. Optimize our footprint to ensure that the scale and scope of our
infrastructure footprint is aligned with the needs of our people by
consolidating underutilized or underperforming assets and ensuring that
new facilities are built to last and are efficient, adaptable, and
resilient to evolving demands and conditions. We are also seeking
targeted opportunities to upgrade and modernize our existing asset
portfolio to increase longevity and reduce operating costs.
3. Transform how we manage our portfolio by adopting a sustainment
management strategy that improves asset performance by aligning
sustainment funding with asset requirements. This will be enabled by
deeper partnerships with private industry, local and State governments,
and academic and community organizations to leverage their capabilities
in infrastructure financing, design, construction, and management;
updated internal construction and maintenance processes to enhance
infrastructure quality; and improved oversight and accountability
mechanisms that support consistent and sustained delivery of high-
performance assets.
Underpinning these three efforts are key strategic enablers: clear
and measurable outcomes to track our progress; training and skill-
building of our infrastructure management workforce to better deliver
on these commitments; and continuous engagement with Service personnel
and family members to ensure we are capturing and meeting their
expectations. Together, these efforts will drive changes across the
defense infrastructure enterprise and ensure that it is managed as a
strategic asset to promote the well-being of our Total Force.
adopting human-centered requirements
Every design, land use, and construction decision we make--from the
ability to walk to access basic amenities, to how much natural light is
available in their homes, to the systems that ensure the cleanliness of
their water, to how often they pass through communal spaces that
facilitate social interaction--has consequences for our people's
physical and mental health and overall well-being. Similarly, the
management and condition of installation lands as well as that of
surrounding public and private lands affects air quality, noise
pollution, light pollution, fire risk, flood risk, water quality and
access to or quality of outdoor education and recreation opportunities.
We must therefore put human needs and values at the center of our
approach to delivering and maintaining built and natural
infrastructure.
A key aspect of this approach is placing ``livability'' at the
heart of our planning and planning principles. We are developing
objective and measurable standards of asset performance along four
dimensions-health, safety, functionality, and reliability-and
integrating them into our policies and Unified Facilities Criteria
(UFC). These standards may include: indoor and outdoor environment
quality, such as air and water quality and thermal, lighting, and
acoustic comfort; availability and reliability of utilities and
amenities; walkability and accessibility; prevalence of shared and
community-oriented spaces; and proximity to critical services, such as
child development centers, school, healthcare facilities, and dining
facilities.
We are also working to ensure that installations are equipped with
5G and next-generation communications networks that are responsive to
our service members' needs. This digital infrastructure will not only
enable key military applications, such as augmented and virtual reality
training, but also allow Service members and families to access a
variety of digital tools such as virtual healthcare, remote work and
education, smart home technologies, and a range of lifestyle-enhancing
applications and services. It will also support our efforts to
implement and monitor livability standards as we equip installations
with an array of sensors that enable remote equipment diagnostics,
preventive and proactive maintenance, and overall better-informed
infrastructure investment decisions. These tools will enable
installation managers to identify and remediate issues, empower users
with information about their environment, and increase overall
transparency and accountability for the quality of our installations.
optimizing our footprint
The scale and scope of assets within installations must be aligned
to our mission and our people's needs. Over the years, the combination
of new missions, evolving user preferences and tastes, and changing
environmental and climate conditions has resulted in a portfolio size
and mix that is not optimized to today's demands. Therefore, we are
evaluating opportunities to create a more efficient footprint within
installations, build high-quality resilient built and natural
infrastructure, and invest in targeted upgrades that add to the
longevity of our assets, all in service of meeting our people's needs
while reducing the total lifecycle cost of our infrastructure.
As a starting point, we will survey the existing footprint to
better align supply with demand, identifying opportunities to
consolidate, repurpose, and, where applicable, dispose of excess
facilities that are no longer necessary to execute the mission or meet
our people's needs. We will do so in ways that are safe and
sustainable, relying on long-term planning to preserve structures that
can be adapted for reuse in the future. We will further leverage
lessons from consolidation projects to better plan for the end-of-life
of all assets. To ensure the impacts of these decisions on our
personnel and the surrounding communities are fully considered, the
Department will conduct user experience assessments to better
understand how people are using facilities and amenities on and off-
base to inform any decision on reducing the size and scope of our
infrastructure footprint.
For new construction or major renovations, we are exploring leading
practices for modular, open architecture that can be adapted to a
variety of purposes to determine where to incorporate it within our
inventory and mission sets while leveraging the latest in
infrastructure innovation and high-quality, low impact construction
materials to build facilities that will be usable for decades to come.
We are seeking opportunities to develop assets that can be shared
between military units, other government agencies, and with the broader
defense community.
We are continuing to improve our installations' resilience. For
example, our ongoing expansion of the DoD Climate Assessment Tool
(DCAT) with new predictive models, decision tools, and technologies
will improve our installation managers' ability to understand the
vulnerabilities facing their installations and help them adapt to or
prepare for evolving risks. The Department, in partnership with the
private sector, is also focused on improving electrical and water
system quality, reliability, and resilience through integration of new
technologies and improved operational approaches. We are extending our
energy resilience investments, through technologies such as microgrids,
beyond our most critical operational facilities to include those
facilities that most impact our personnel's day-to-day quality of life,
including housing, commissaries, and other priority assets. Similarly,
the DoD will continue to maintain and create the natural infrastructure
needed for water resilience both on and off installation.
Lastly, resilience also includes ensuring installations have robust
incident response, management, and recovery capabilities. The demand on
and need for these programs and their capabilities is growing due to
the increasing severity of weather events and other climate-related
impacts. Policies governing these programs are being updated to
incorporate climate considerations and infrastructure modernization
into hazard assessment, mitigation, response, and recovery planning
actions at installations.
transforming portfolio management
Achieving the ambitious commitments set out in the Resilient and
Healthy Defense Communities Strategy requires an effective asset
management strategy that leverages the suite of government and external
stakeholder capabilities to maximize our return on investment. We must
approach design, construction, maintenance, and project development
differently, both in terms of seeking new and innovative ways to
partner with industry, communities, and other external stakeholders and
reforming internal construction processes and maintenance practices.
The Department has implemented various approaches to design, build,
and operate our infrastructure, ranging from full government control
across all three dimensions to full privatization, and combinations in
between. This gives the Department a menu of options that can be
optimized for any given project. In many cases, government ownership
and operation is best suited to the Department's needs. In others,
outsourcing to private partners or leveraging third party financing
through privatization or performance contracting may reduce risk and/or
provide solutions at similar or better quality on a more cost-effective
basis. We can also draw upon our strong and long-established
partnerships with other government agencies, State and local
governments, academic institutions, and civil society organizations in
the communities in which we operate to develop mutually beneficial
solutions.
To ensure we have the full range of options available and are
applying those that are most appropriate for each situation, the
Department is reviewing authorities and exploring opportunities to
expand partnerships with industry, other government organizations, and
non- government stakeholders. These may include maximizing the use of
Intergovernmental Support Agreements (IGSA) with State and local
governments to provide, receive, or share installation- support
services; expanding partnerships with academic and research
institutions on areas such as ecosystem conservation, sustainable
design, and climate change risk assessment; and working on natural
infrastructure beyond the fence line through programs like the
Readiness and Environmental Protection Integration (REPI) program and
the Sentinel Landscapes Partnership.
The Department must also develop more timely and flexible processes
and organizational structures to enable more agile delivery of
infrastructure needs. Under current processes, a military construction
or large-scale maintenance project can take 5 years to be incorporated
in a budget request to Congress and once funded, can take potentially
another 4 years to obtain beneficial use.
This can and must be improved. The Department has already issued
policies that better align roles and responsibilities of project
sponsors, installation managers, and construction agents to deliver
better outcomes, such as early involvement by DoD construction agents
with project sponsors to inform project scope, cost, and schedule. We
are also implementing project management agreements for military
construction projects that will ensure requirements and stakeholders
are properly aligned to deliver modern, high-quality infrastructure.
The Department is pursuing facility prototype projects that not only
will demonstrate our ability to build efficient resilient buildings but
will also guide our efforts on how to streamline our infrastructure
acquisition processes. We are improving guidance and training,
developing solutions to expedite time-consuming steps like
environmental reviews and permitting, and incorporating strategies to
not only minimize environmental impacts, but sustain or improve
environmental quality.
The Department must also work to provide more confidence,
transparency, and standardization in the development of facilities
sustainment, restoration, and modernization (FSRM) budgets to ensure
infrastructure is properly maintained. We are working with the DoD
Components to move away from our current portfolio-level approach and
toward an asset management approach that will derive sustainment
requirements at the individual asset level and incorporate asset age,
functionality, and condition as well as building system, component, and
subcomponent condition. This will optimize limited FSRM budgets by
recommending investments that maximize condition of facilities in a
component's portfolio. Further, the Department will set condition goals
for different facility categories to ensure that quality of life is not
short-changed at the expense of mission needs.
All of these actions must be supported by meaningful oversight and
accountability mechanisms as well as accurate cost and performance data
to help balance cost, performance, and risk. To that end, the
Department is working to establish authoritative cost and performance
data sources to continuously evaluate and update our asset management
approach. We are updating condition assessment processes to prioritize
human-centered requirements, leverage digital diagnostic tools, and
deploy expert inspectors. Together, these will enable a common
operating picture of our built and natural infrastructure that can
guide decision-making and improve transparency.
taking care of our people
Building resilient and health defense communities requires us to be
good stewards of the environment and good neighbors and partners with
the communities that support our installations. As such, the Department
must maintain safe and efficient facilities and improve the quality of
life for our military personnel and their families by ensuring access
to safe, quality, and affordable housing. The Department must also
ensure that it has a robust environmental cleanup program to address
the effects of releases of hazardous substances, pollutants, or
contaminants into the environment.
housing
Family and Unaccompanied Housing
While all of the Department's infrastructure affects our Service
members' military experience, none is more impactful than their
housing. It is both a crucial quality of life issue and a critical
mission-enabling asset. However, we recognize that the DoD has, in too
many instances, failed to live up to our role in making sure the
housing we provide honors the commitment of the personnel that live on
our installations and enables them to bring the best versions of
themselves to their critical missions. As the Department's Chief
Housing Officer, I am committed to ensuring that all Service member
housing-whether it is government-owned, government- controlled, or
privatized-meets appropriate life, health, and safety requirements and
provides a positive living experience for military personnel and their
families.
The Military Departments have privatized 99 percent (approximately
202,000 units) of their FH inventory, as well as 4,700 UH apartment
units (8,500 bedrooms), on their installations in the U.S. The
Department still owns or controls, operates, and maintains
approximately 39,000 FH units, most of which are on enduring bases in
overseas locations. In addition, the Department's housing inventory
includes more than 846,000 government-owned or -controlled (GovO/C) UH
bed spaces worldwide.
Historically, DoD's GovO/C requirements have not competed well for
military construction and operations and maintenance funding, leading
to significant maintenance backlogs and outdated and deteriorating
housing facilities. The Department has begun placing greater priority
on funding for its GovO/C housing in recent years, but these
investments are challenged by the size of the existing inventory and
the cumulative effects of deferred maintenance, insufficient
recapitalization funding, and lack resources for oversight. As such,
these facilities' rate of degradation is outpacing our ability to
address issues despite this increased prioritization. We must therefore
place a greater emphasis on bringing the quality of the Department's
GovO/C housing to what it needs to be for our Service members and their
families to have a positive living experience.
In September 2023, the Government Accountability Office (GAO)
released a report titled Military Barracks: Poor Living Conditions
Undermine Quality of Life and Readiness, documenting poor living
conditions in the Department's government-owned and government-
controlled unaccompanied housing (i.e., barracks and dormitories). The
findings in this report provided even greater clarity to the issues
facing our UH portfolio and confirmed that conditions have affected
Service member quality of life, recruitment, and retention, as well as
military readiness. The report's recommendations have also helped us
further refine our ongoing response actions. The Department concurred
or partially concurred on all 31 recommendations in the report, and we
anticipate implementing 28 of the 31 recommendations in Calendar Year
2024.
The Department's FY 2025 Family Housing budget request includes
$2.0 billion to fund construction, operation, and maintenance of
government-owned and leased family housing worldwide; invest in select
military family housing privatization projects and provide oversight of
privatized housing and lodging projects; and provide housing referral
services to assist military members in renting or buying private sector
housing. The FY 2025 request sustains our increased focus on ensuring
the delivery and maintenance of quality housing for military families,
including $743.9 million for construction to ensure quality family
housing for military personnel and their families, to include Army
family housing construction projects in Europe ($164.2 million), two
Navy family housing construction projects on Guam ($197.0 million), and
Air Force family housing projects in Europe ($5.8 million); $194.0
million for prioritized investments in two Department of the Air Force
(DAF) and one Department of the Army (DA) Military Housing
Privatization Initiative projects to improve the safety, quality,
habitability and/or long-term financial viability of those projects;
and $171.1 million for privatized housing support and oversight, to
include the one-time inspections of DoD's privatized housing and
government-owned family housing as required by Section 3051 of the FY
2020 National Defense Authorization Act, as amended. The Department's
FY 2025 budget request of $1.2 billion for Family Housing Operation and
Maintenance represents a $86.7 million increase compared to the FY 2024
enacted amount and a will continue to ensure that U.S. military
personnel and their families have suitable housing choices.
The Department's FY 2025 budget request includes $1.093 billion for
11 (11) construction projects that will improve living conditions for
unaccompanied personnel. This funding level is $623.7 million higher
than our FY 2024 budget request ($469.3 million) and takes the right
steps towards honoring our commitment to modernize Unaccompanied
Housing to improve privacy, provide greater amenities, and address the
findings in the September 2023 GAO final report on Military Barracks.
The FY 2025 budget request includes $854 million for seven active Army
barracks projects worldwide; $81.0 million for two reserve Army
projects in Parks Reserve Forces Training Area, CA and Fort Buchanan,
PR; and $158.0 million for a DAF Dormitory project at Joint Base (JB)
San Antonio, TX and JB Langley-Eustis, VA.
Going forward, we acknowledge that DoD's current GovO/C housing
investment levels are insufficient to stop ongoing facility and quality
of life degradation. To overcome these challenges and to improve the
quality of DoD's GovO/C housing, we must accelerate our investments and
ensure they are appropriately prioritized so they have the greatest
impact on the livability of DoD housing.
To that end, the Department has initiated a Tiger Team to address
ongoing and urgent improvements in living spaces for Service members,
initially prioritizing UH for junior enlisted Service members. The
Tiger Team will address the FY 2024 National Defense Authorization Act
(NDAA) provisions along with the issues highlighted by the GAO's
September 2023 report on Military Barracks. Specific objectives include
making immediate, ongoing, and urgent UH improvements; determining new
configuration and habitability standards; improving the accessibility,
availability, and reliability of UH metrics to drive investment
decisions; developing standardized preventative maintenance plans and
schedules; and identifying opportunities to improve indoor
environmental quality and address facility-related energy resilience
objectives.
We are also modernizing how we approach designing UH. The Military
Departments have four pilot projects in FY 2024 and FY 2025 to
recalibrate UH design to optimize energy use and incorporate
sustainable building materials to enhance indoor environmental quality,
passive design features to improve resilience and reduce maintenance
requirements, and modern facility related control systems to allow for
data-driven management and sustainment of these critical facilities.
Lessons learned from these pilots, combined with the results of the
Tiger Team, will help inform our efforts to ensure future UH projects
are resilient and optimized to support our Service members.
We recognize that implementation will require significant and
sustained investment, improved oversight and use of management tools,
and enhanced housing standards to improve the current posture across
all unaccompanied housing. Similar to the Department's reform actions
to improve the conditions and oversight of MHPI housing, the Department
must commit to long- term, organizational investment of resources, and
ensure accountability at all levels, from Senior leaders and
headquarters staffs to installation commanders and staffs.
I am absolutely committed to ensuring that the Department remains
focused and coordinated on this issue. I meet with my Military
Department counterparts bi-weekly to monitor UH conditions and
improvements and evaluate investment and progress. In addition, my
office is working with the Military Departments to finalize new UH
metrics to help the Department measure current conditions and progress
improving UH livability.
At an installation level, we are improving the day-to-day
management of UH. The Department appreciates the FY 2024 NDAA's
directive around professional UH oversight that requires UH managers to
be civilian employees or dedicated military personnel. This reform will
enable managers to focus solely on their responsibilities of assessing
and inspecting UH conditions, managing work orders for repairs,
communicating with residents regarding repairs, and ensuring that
installation maintenance officials conduct needed emergency and
preventive maintenance.
Finally, we are continuing to explore leveraging privatization as a
tool to improve UH by evaluating the results of the Services' pilot
projects and incorporating the lessons learned from the broader
Military Housing Privatization Initiative (MHPI).
Military Housing Privatization Initiative
The Department continues to enhance the MHPI program and improve
our oversight of the private sector MHPI companies that own and operate
MHPI housing projects. As a result of our collaboration with the MHPI
companies, all 18 rights set out in the MHPI Tenant Bill of Rights
(TBoR) are fully available at all but three of the nearly 200
installations with privatized housing, representing approximately 97
percent of military families residing in MHPI housing. Based on
commitments from the remaining MHPI companies, we expect all 18 Tenant
Rights to be available at all of DoD's installations with MHPI housing
by the end of CY 2024. We will continue our efforts to educate and
engage Service Members and their families to ensure they are aware of
and take full advantage of the TBoR.
The Department of Defense is committed to working closely with you
and the committee staff to ensure the long-term success of the MHPI
program and we will remain diligent in our oversight to ensure DoD's
privatized housing projects deliver quality housing and a positive
living experience for military personnel and their families.
defense environmental restoration program
The Department must take deliberate and sustained action to address
risks to human health and the environment resulting from past DoD
activities. Our environmental cleanup program includes the Installation
Restoration Program (IRP) and Military Munitions Response Program
(MMRP). The IRP is focused on cleanup of hazardous substances,
pollutants, and contaminants, while the MMRP is focused on responding
to unexploded ordnance and munition constituents at former military
ranges. These programs encompass active installations, Formerly Used
Defense Sites (FUDS--sites that DoD transferred to other Federal
agencies, States, local governments, or private landowners before
October 17, 1986), and sites DoD transferred to other entities as part
of its Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) activities. We are
requesting $1.6 billion for these programs, including $1.2 billion for
environmental restoration on our active installations and FUDS
properties and $448 million for BRAC environmental.
Progress Towards Cleanup Goals
To date, the Department, in cooperation with State agencies and the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), has completed cleanup
activities at 87 percent of Active and BRAC IRP and MMRP sites, and
FUDS IRP sites, and is now monitoring the results. During FY 2023
alone, the Department completed cleanup at 176 sites. Of the roughly
40,700 restoration sites, 34,300 are now in monitoring status or have
completed cleanup.
Our focus remains on continuous improvement in the restoration
program: minimizing overhead, adopting new technologies to reduce cost
and accelerate cleanup, refining and standardizing our cost estimating,
and improving our relationships with state regulators and affected
communities through increased dialogue. These initiatives help ensure
that we make the best use of our available resources to complete
cleanup.
While the Department continues to make progress on completing
cleanups, the remaining sites are some of the most complex cleanup
sites. Chemicals of Emerging Concern and others like per- and
polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) continue to pose challenges for DoD's
cleanup programs as new science requires reconsideration of previous
decisions and more expensive solutions to protect our Service members,
their families, communities, and the environment. Additionally, some
complex sites have either no feasible or only inefficient solutions for
cleanup and, as a result, the Department is making significant
investments in environmental technology to identify new potential
remediation methods.
per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances
The presence of PFAS in the environment is a national issue due to
its wide-spread use in many industrial and consumer products. The
Department recognizes the importance of this issue and is committed to
addressing PFAS in a deliberative, holistic, and transparent manner,
supported by $942 million across multiple appropriations. The
Department's PFAS Task Force continues to provide strategic leadership
and direction on DoD-wide PFAS efforts. To support the Department's
commitment to the health and safety of its service members, their
families, the DoD civilian workforce, and the communities in which DoD
serves, the Task Force's focus areas include:
--Mitigating and eliminating the use of aqueous film forming foam
(AFFF);
--Fulfilling our cleanup responsibilities;
--Understanding the impacts of PFAS on human health;
--Expanding PFAS-related public outreach; and
--Supporting PFAS research efforts and ensuring findings are publicly
available.
PFAS Cleanup and Drinking Water Mitigation
DoD follows the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation,
and Liability Act (CERCLA) and the long-standing EPA regulations for
all chemicals in our cleanup program, including PFAS. The Defense
Environmental Restoration Program statute provides authorities to DoD
to perform and fund cleanup actions and requires they be carried out in
accordance with CERCLA.
As of December 31, 2023, the Department has completed the initial
assessment at 707 (of 715) installations. 133 currently require no
further action, while 574 are proceeding to the next step in the CERCLA
process. During these initial assessments, DoD evaluates both
groundwater and drinking water. In addition, DoD is taking interim
actions at over 30 installations to prevent further PFAS migration off-
base and plans to take additional actions as more information becomes
available from our ongoing investigations.
For the past several years, DoD's approach has been that if DoD
identifies perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) and/or perfluorooctanoic
acid (PFOA) from DoD activities in off-base drinking water above 70
parts per trillion (ppt), we quickly took action (i.e., a CERCLA
removal action) to provide treatment or an alternative water source.
DoD has taken this type of action for drinking water wells surrounding
55 installations. Last week, EPA announced a National Primary Drinking
Water Regulation (NPDWR) for six PFAS under the Safe Drinking Water
Act. The Department appreciates the clarity the NPDWR provides now that
it has been finalized and is evaluating its impact on our efforts to
address PFAS in drinking water. The Department has reviewed existing
PFAS sampling results, plans to expand existing cleanup investigations,
and provide drinking water treatment for impacted off-base wells, on a
prioritized basis.
AFFF Replacement Progress
Over the past few years, the Department has undertaken an
aggressive initiative to develop and demonstrate fluorine-free
alternatives for AFFF. In January 2023, the Navy published a Military
Specification for a PFAS-free firefighting product. A number of
fluorine-free alternative fire suppression products have been
demonstrated to achieve acceptable fire extinguishment performance and
DoD has completed evaluations of the shelf life, materials
compatibility, and toxicity screening of these formulations. As of
February 2024, two products have passed the qualification process and
are available for purchase. The Military Departments have begun the
transition from AFFF for more than 6,000 mobile assets and
approximately 1,500 facilities and are following transition plans that
include proposed schedules, estimated costs, and strategies to use
fluorine-free products and other available technologies, such as water-
only systems. Based on current Military Department schedules, the
Department will need to exercise the two NDAA- permissible 1-year
waivers to extend the Congressional deadline of October 1, 2024 to stop
using AFFF to ensure a safe and methodical transition that does not
affect mission activities.
PFAS Public Outreach
As the Chair of DoD's PFAS Task Force, I am committed to expanding
our outreach efforts as we continue to address PFAS. DoD initiated a
robust communication and outreach effort in FY 2023 focused on
improving outreach to communities by gathering input from community
members and developing communication products that explain DoD's
cleanup activities in a comprehensible and transparent manner. The
Department has also visited 11 installations and conducted over 100
interviews with community members and other stakeholders. These efforts
ensure a cohesive and collaborative approach to communication across
DoD, expand public access to information that explains our cleanup
progress and initiatives, and build stronger relationships with
communities and agency partners.
improving mission resilience
The National Defense Strategy promotes building a resilient Joint
Force and defense ecosystem that can operate in a contested environment
at home and abroad. We must work to improve the resilience of our
installations and infrastructure to a wide range of challenges,
including extreme weather, climate impacts, disruptions to energy or
water supplies, and physical or cyber-attacks. The Department requires
a multi-faceted approach focused on policy revisions; adjusting how we
approach planning, design, and construction; and innovative
technologies to counter such a diverse set of threats.
infrastructure resilience
The Department is addressing mission resilience at the building and
installation level by developing policies that establish aggressive
performance goals, reduce waste, and improve quality of life. Further,
we are improving energy resilience on our installations through
increased energy efficiency measures and electrification of our
buildings and supporting infrastructure. My office is working with DoD
components to leverage the Department's facility data to assist them in
performing building level assessments that will inform infrastructure
modernization and recapitalization decisions and institutionalize
resilience in all of our investments. We are reviewing and updating
Unified Facility Criteria against existing and emerging performance
standards for resilience, clean and reliable energy, electrification,
indoor environmental quality, and facility related control systems.
Finally, the Department is pursuing a comprehensive plan and associated
investments to deploy the charging infrastructure essential to
transition our non- tactical vehicle fleet to electric power. This
effort will enable installations to utilize the storage capacity of
electric vehicles and add capability that furthers our investments in
micro-grids.
Military Construction
Infrastructure resilience is integrated into the military
construction (MilCon) program. The MilCon program also places
significant focus on quality of life as well as critical mission
requirements and life, health, and safety concerns. We are requesting
$15.6 billion in the budget for MilCon across the Department, an
increase of 6% from last year's request, which includes infrastructure
requirements for the Pacific Deterrence Initiative ($1.7 billion),
investments in the Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization Program ($2.0
billion), quality of life facilities (including child development
centers, barracks and dining facilities, dormitories, and schools--
$1.83 billion), new aircraft beddown (B-21, KC-46A, F-35, T-7A--$419
million), European Deterrence Initiative and NATO Security Investment
Program (NSIP) ($559 million), hospital and medical facilities ($464
million), projects in support of the modernization efforts in support
of Sentinel Ground Based Strategic Deterrent program ($700 million),
and construction projects in support of special warfare operators ($355
million).
This request also includes $3.733 billion for the Defense-Wide
Components, including:
--$386 million for dependent educational facilities;
--$273 million for incremental funding of fuel infrastructure;
--$417 million for recapitalization of National Security Agency
facilities;
--$545 million for Missile Defense Agency projects in support of
Defense of Guam and an increment of the Ground Test Facility
Infrastructure at Redstone Arsenal;
--$295 million to address, force structure growth disconnects, and
antiquated infrastructure for Special Operations Forces;
--$262 million for Washington Headquarters Services facilities;
--$636 million for the Energy Resilience and Conservation Investment
Program; and
--$455 million for exercise related construction, unspecific minor
construction, and planning and design for defense-wide future
year projects.
In addition, the Defense-Wide request contains $464 million for
medical facility recapitalization including $78 million for the eighth
increment (of a $695 million project) for the Walter Reed Medical
Center Addition/Alteration at Naval Support Activity Bethesda,
Maryland; $97 million for the second increment (of a $257 million
project) for an Ambulatory Care Center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and
$289 million for various other Ambulatory Care Center additions and
replacements.
We continue to pursue improvements in project development processes
to ensure projects are appropriately scoped and priced for successful
execution. The Department's Military Construction Reform initiative is
primarily focused on early involvement between project sponsors and the
DoD Construction Agents (DCAs) responsible for executing the projects.
We are working with the DCAs and industry to incorporate their
knowledge and expertise earlier into our project planning and design
activities to ensure executable projects. We recently finalized a
comprehensive policy associated with the planning and design of
military construction projects. The policy ensures that all DoD
Components clearly understand the difference between planning
activities and design activities to consistently apply the appropriate
funding to each task. Additionally, DoD is focused on improving
information sharing between key project stakeholders, ensuring that
critical details such as project requirements, acquisition timelines,
and construction status inform proactive decisions on projects. We are
close to issuing policy requiring project management agreements early
in the project requirements process that will provide transparency on
key project data and change management decision making allowing project
stakeholders to manage scope and cost changes to minimize impact to
project delivery.
The Department recognizes not only the necessity of, but also the
challenges associated with estimating and awarding military
construction projects on budget, particularly given the supply chain
tightening and significant material price increases over the last few
years. We appreciate the additional support Congress has provided over
the last few fiscal years to ensure that authorized project costs are
better positioned based on market realities. However, the Department
acknowledges that it has work to do to ensure that estimates result in
executable projects including the recent application of the area cost
factor for overseas unspecified minor military construction projects.
This year we are further refining our financial risk management
processes and policies and will codify our findings in updated policy
to ensure that component budget requests reflect known project risks.
Facilities Sustainment, Restoration, and Modernization
The Department's inventory of buildings and structures is the
largest within the Federal portfolio. Facilities Sustainment provides
for the regularly scheduled maintenance, repair, or replacement of
facility components and directly influences the condition of our
facilities. Investments must be made throughout the service life of a
facility to optimize its performance, maintain indoor environmental
quality, and support the safety, productivity, and quality of life of
our personnel, while also reducing avoidable costs associated with
premature deterioration. In addition to facilities sustainment funding,
the Department relies upon its Restoration and Modernization program
funding to provide ongoing support to reduce our maintenance and repair
backlog and to modernize our facilities to support changing missions
and functions.
The Department's FY 2025 budget request includes $13.6 billion of
sustainment funding for the Military Services and the major Defense-
Wide organizations. This represents a $619 million increase from the FY
2024 budget request and will achieve an average of 79 percent of the
Department's annual requirement for facilities sustainment (excluding
the Marine Corps from the overall calculation). We are working with the
Marine Corps to pilot a comprehensive model that would optimize FSRM
and MilCon facility investments across their real property portfolio.
In addition to facilities sustainment funding, the Department
relies upon its Restoration and Modernization (R&M) program funding to
provide ongoing support to assigned missions by countering obsolescence
and reversing degraded conditions of existing facilities. The FY 2025
budget request includes $6.3 billion in Operations and Maintenance
appropriations for facilities R&M, a $259 million decrease compared to
our FY 2024 budget request.
The Department has traditionally managed the budgeting for
sustainment of assets at the portfolio level with a sustainment model
that uses basic data from a component's real property inventory and
commercial cost models. This model generates aggregate sustainment
requirements that treat facilities similarly for investment purposes
regardless of age, condition, or maintenance history. Roughly 10 years
ago, the Department instituted a requirement to use a standardized
condition management system, the Sustainment Management System. DoD has
continued to mature the tool to track more closely the 13 major systems
in a building and will roll out a cloud-based SMS this year for DoD
Components to manage the condition of the major system in the
Department's buildings. However, knowing the condition of an asset and
the systems that comprise that asset is just one aspect of proactive
infrastructure management. Improving facility condition data and
operationalizing other existing investment data sources, enables
resource optimization from the Department-level down to the
installation with the ability to assess risk-based investment options
using future years defense program (FYDP) funding profiles, mission
dependency data, and a variety of DoD Component derived assumptions to
array strategic investment options that will inform investment
decisions. To that end, the Department is investing $2 million in FY
2024 to initiate development of a facility investment optimization
model that will optimize the allocation of facility repair funding to
produce the most benefits regarding the condition of our facilities.
The system will provide more confidence, transparency, and
standardization in the development of facilities sustainment,
restoration, and modernization (FSRM) budgets and allow an asset
management approach currently lacking in the Department's
infrastructure management processes. This initiative is guiding our
transition into an asset management approach for budgeting and managing
the Department's inventory more holistically and provide DoD with
better information to target investments to address current and backlog
maintenance requirements. It will also provide much-needed data in the
building component systems and their maintenance and recapitalization
schedules to properly conduct sustainment, which will reduce energy
demand. The additional data will also allow the Department to better
plan electrification of existing projects, consistent with our energy
resilience goals.
We appreciate your support for the $2 million funding request for
optimization model development in the FY 2024 NDAA and the Further
Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2024. This funding will allow us to
begin development on the technical aspects of the model. The FY 2025
budget request includes $2 million to continue the maturation of the
optimization model.
energy resilience
Reliable, flexible, and resilient energy remains essential to
military capability and readiness. The Department depends on energy-
resilient forces, weapon systems, installations, and infrastructure to
achieve missions at home and abroad. In FY 2023, the Department
consumed 614,787 billion British Thermal Units (BBtus) of all forms of
energy, costing a total of $16.5 billion, to support operations and
training across a worldwide set of installations and power thousands of
energy consuming platforms.
While our installations utilize commercial, municipal, and host
nation power and energy grids for day-to-day operations, we must also
have credible and resilient localized installation energy capabilities
to sustain critical missions if these sources of energy are disrupted.
Similarly, the Department relies on organic capabilities as well as
commercial partners to provide operational energy to train, deploy,
operate, and sustain globally deployed forces. Our potential
adversaries understand the essential nature of energy, and seek to
degrade, delay, or deny the Department's ability to deploy forces by
disrupting access to energy to reduce our readiness, and undermine our
deterrent posture. Enhancing energy resilience and reducing energy
demand are essential to achieving Joint lethality, supporting
distributed operations, and reducing risks to sustainment in contested
environments.
The FY 2025 President's Budget Request responds to clear direction
in statute and the 2022 National Defense Strategy to ensure
installations and forces are resilient to all hazards--kinetic, cyber,
and natural--and ensure the use of energy promotes the readiness of the
armed forces for their military missions. This is reflected in our
$3.46 billion request for operational energy (the energy required for
training, moving, and sustaining military forces and weapons platforms
for military operations) and $3.80 billion request for installation
energy (the energy used to power permanent installations and non-
tactical fleet vehicles).
Operational Energy
The operational energy initiatives in the FY 2025 President's
Budget request ensure that the Department is postured to fight and win
in contested environments and support the priority focus on strategic
competition with the People's Republic of China. Investments in
advanced propulsion for air, sea, and land platforms, the
electrification of on-board systems, upgrades that extend time on
station, range, and endurance of current equipment, and long-term
research and development on breakthrough technologies illustrate the
scope and scale of Department efforts to adapt our use of energy in
warfighting platforms to a changing operating environment.
In FY 2023, the Department issued a new Operational Energy Strategy
to meet the requirements of 10 USC 2926(e). To ensure the Joint Force
can fight and win in contested environments, the Operational Energy
Strategy includes the following lines of effort:
--Energy Demand Reduction
--Energy Substitution and Diversification
--Supply Chain Resilience
--Enterprise-wide Energy Visibility
The Department is also adapting its strategy, policy and decision-
making processes to better align with the challenges of contested
logistics and distributed, austere operations. To assist with the
implementation of this new strategy, the ASD(EI&E) leads the Contested
Logistics Operational Energy Working Group (CLOE WG), which was
established in FY 2022 in accordance with 10 USC 2926(d). With senior
leader representatives from the Services, Joint Staff, and Combatant
Commands, the working group is shaping the direction and implementation
of the Operational Energy Strategy to inform future planning and
programming guidance.
The CLOE WG met in FY 2023 to implement the Operational Energy
Strategy and begin execution of the near-term (2023-2024) and mid-term
(2024-2028) initiatives. In FY 2024, the CLOE WG will meet on a
quarterly basis as required by Section 343 of the FY 2024 NDAA and
subsequent annual energy reports will use the Operational Energy
Strategy as the baseline for evaluating initiatives and measuring
progress in the implementation of the strategy.
We are also focused on ensuring that requirements and acquisition
decision-making reflects challenges of contested environments and the
benefits of advancing energy-related technologies and practices.
Through the Department's Climate Working Group, the Military
Departments adapted policy, processes, and procedures to ensure
consideration of energy supportability analyses and evolving
operational requirements.
With support from the Assistant Secretary of Defense for
Acquisition, my office initiated a pilot program for the application of
energy supportability analyses in Integrated Acquisition Portfolio
Reviews (IAPRs), starting with one for the Defense of Guam. By focusing
on specific groups of platforms, these analyses will better assess
overall Joint capabilities, assess any risks related to the provision
of energy, and enhance the identification of interdependencies outside
of any single portfolio. We will support additional portfolio reviews
in FY 2024 and beyond.
Installation Energy
The Department continues to make significant investments to
increase the energy resilience of installations and facilities critical
to generating, deploying, operating, and sustaining military
capabilities. Our FY 2025 request is focused on adapting military
facilities to withstand increasingly challenging conditions and
deploying advanced technologies to strengthen the ability to recover
from disruptions to critical infrastructure; improving installation
energy, mission, and water resilience; and modernizing Department
operations to keep pace with industry.
These investments are supported by our recent and continuing
efforts to develop or update installation energy policy across the
Department. For example, we recently updated our policies for energy
resilience planning and metrics at installations to reflect the 10 USC
2920 energy resilience requirements. These updated policies set forth
energy availability standards for critical missions; directs the
Military Departments to promote the use of multiple and diverse sources
of energy in their planning, with prioritization of energy resources
originating on the installation; encourages the use of microgrids; and
favors the use of full-time, installed energy sources rather than
emergency generation in their energy resilience solutions.
We are also working to harmonize the planning and assessment
processes for critical missions across the Department. Approximately
430 Installation Energy Plans (IEP) are expected to be completed by the
end of this fiscal year with 92% of IEPs expected to be completed by
the end of FY 2025. Currently, these plans establish the basis for
planning energy performance projects and provide a roadmap for
integrating appropriated and public-private partnership authorities to
close energy resilience gaps. Going forward, the IEPs will also
document critical load requirements, lessons learned from black start
exercises, and the ability of installations to withstand a 14-day
energy disruption.
Black start exercises (BSE) are an important component of the
Department's approach to risk assessment and for identifying gaps in
our installations' electrical infrastructure. BSEs identify previously
unknown interdependencies between various systems, so that we can
mitigate vulnerabilities to installation critical missions and best
prioritize our resilience resources. The Department is actively
executing planned exercises in accordance with 10 USC 2920. To date,
the Department has executed 45 exercises with over 30 BSEs planned to
be completed by the end of FY 2025.
The Energy Resilience and Conservation Investment Program (ERCIP)
is the backbone of the Department's energy and water resilience
investments. The FY 2025 budget request includes $732.2 million ($636
million in construction projects and $96.2 million in planning and
design funds) to prioritize projects that support energy resilience for
critical mission requirements. The Department focuses on investments in
microgrids, backup generation, and energy storage. In addition, ERCIP
will continue to support a range of technologies and efforts, including
clean renewable energy, energy storage systems, advanced geothermal and
advanced nuclear technologies, accelerated deployment of air and ground
source heat pumps, and infrastructure projects directly supporting
distribution infrastructure for electrical vehicle charging stations.
The Department appreciates the support Congress has provided to ERCIP
as it has evolved from a conservation-focused program to one that
emphasizes resilience.
Another significant part of our efforts to enhance energy
resilience is improving energy efficiency and increasing the amount of
carbon pollution-free electricity (CFE). Energy efficiency bolsters
installation energy resilience by helping reduce the energy demand from
distributed energy production resources during commercial grid
disruptions. DoD and the Federal enterprise will leverage its scale and
assets to spur new CFE development and spearhead the deployment of
innovative CFE technologies at scale to accelerate grid
decarbonization. Additionally, DoD is currently developing onsite
resilient pilot projects for emerging low-carbon technologies,
including advanced nuclear energy (small modular and micro-reactors)
and advanced geothermal projects to demonstrate both commercial and
resilience benefits. These efforts are supported by an array of
contracting mechanisms such as energy performance contracts (i.e.,
ESPCs and UESCs), alternative financing and power purchase agreements,
enhanced use leases, and appropriated funding.
The FY 2025 request includes funding to deploy charging
infrastructure that supports a transition of the Department's non-
tactical vehicle fleet to zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs). The transition
to ZEVs is both a response to market forces and a strategy to enhance
resilience of the Department's installations and the Defense Industrial
Base. While we recognize that China dominates the supply chain lithium-
ion batteries-batteries that many of our critical defense systems rely
upon-we are working with our partners investing in on-shoring and
friend-shoring of key supply chain capabilities to evolve this paradigm
and ensure our ability to access these critical batteries.
innovation
Making the right investments in energy and environment innovation
expands the Department's operational energy capabilities, reduces fuel
burden in an era of contested logistics, keeps trust with the American
people, and preserves vital training lands. The Department runs four
energy and environment innovation programs which set the technical
direction for the Department of Defense by funding the development and
demonstration of mission-critical energy and environment capabilities
and helping them through the acquisition process. The innovation
programs focus on prototyping ahead of transition into Service programs
of record and work hand-in-hand with our policy teams to ensure the
DoD's defense ecosystem both supports and informs DoD initiatives at
the leading edge of technology.
The Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program
(SERDP) is requesting $58.8 million, and the Environmental Security
Technology Certification Program (ESTCP) is requesting $136.5 million
for needed investments in land and species conservation to preserve
access to training areas, remediating past hazards such as munitions
and PFAS, addressing supply chain resilience for key materials, and
developing infrastructure adaptation and energy resilience solutions
for DoD installations.
The Operational Energy Capability Improvement Fund (OECIF) and the
Operational Energy Prototyping Fund (OEPF) are the Department's only
joint research efforts dedicated to developing operational energy
solutions for the joint force. OECIF and OEPF focus on requirements in
all domains, including space, and continue to lead the Nation by
solving some of the most difficult problems underlying power for future
Directed Energy applications, innovating to use what was once
considered waste for power and energy at forward locations,
investigating next-generation fuel and power sources and distribution
methods for autonomous platforms and dismounted warfighters, and
enabling maneuver in space. Our $166.9 million request for OECIF and
$53.6 million request for OEPF will allow these programs to continue
multi-year investments in a range of critical technologies, from hybrid
electric tactical vehicles that provide silent overwatch and low heat-
signature capabilities, to highly efficient solar cells for extending
the operational reach of crewed and uncrewed systems.
responsible and resilient chemical management
Responsible chemical management is critical to the health of our
personnel and the resilience of our weapon systems and infrastructure.
As such, DoD seeks to adopt innovative approaches to chemical
management that result in purposeful selection of chemicals which are
less persistent, bio accumulative, and toxic. We are preparing to
integrate these approaches throughout the life cycle of chemical use:
from the early stages of research and development to the maintenance,
operation, and disposal/reuse of our weapon systems.
While we ramp up efforts to optimize the use of alternatives, we
must simultaneously ensure existing critical uses are met in the
interim. For example, some PFAS compounds are critical to the safe and
effective operation of a range of military items from radars to missile
guidance systems, medical devices, and jet engines. To understand the
challenges to PFAS transitions, we are establishing policies that
require improved chemical transparency in our weapon systems,
researching and transitioning to safer alternatives wherever possible,
engaging with the defense industrial base to understand and manage
supply chain vulnerabilities, and responsibly managing the use and
disposal of chemicals while seeking orderly transitions to
alternatives. Potential impacts from the loss of access to mission-
critical chemicals are not yet fully known, but could be both costly to
address and potentially leave the Department dependent on supplies from
foreign sources (e.g., India and China). We also continue to build on
past successes by working with regulatory agencies and private industry
to develop strategies to address these concerns, starting with actions
such as identifying PFAS-containing products critical to national
security and mitigating risk from their obsolescence and foreign
dependency.
environmental resilience
The reality of a changing climate poses a range of risks to
Department readiness and threatens installation resilience through
dangerous heat, flooding, drought, wildland fire, and extreme weather.
These conditions adversely impact training, soldier welfare, equipment
performance, infrastructure performance and reliability, and place
added strain on the Department's resources. The 2022 National Security
Strategy recognizes climate change as a strategic challenge that is
transforming the context in which the Department operates. Using the
DoD Climate Assessment Tool, as required in multiple NDAAs, we identify
actions needed to ensure the continuity of missions at (or deploying
from) our installations and incorporate those actions into installation
master plans, installation resilience plans, installation energy and
water plans, and construction projects. This helps us ensure, for
example, that new buildings are not being located in known floodplains,
that energy resilience projects account for increasing heat, that
wildfire management is incorporated in facility planning, and that
drought-prone installations improve their water resilience to support
their missions. These assessment processes have now expanded to inform
Department operational planning considerations for forces and equipment
and wargaming scenarios. Additionally, DoD's approach to extreme
weather and climate risk assessment has been shared with, and is being
utilized by Federal interagency partners, as well as allied nations.
The Department is undertaking a range of measures that reduce risk
in contested environments, improve and expand operational capabilities
and flexibility, and improve installation resilience, while reducing
energy demand and use. These efforts include a range of efficiency
measures that reduce energy demand for operational platforms and
installations such as winglets on large aircraft and highly efficient
heat pumps in buildings. Specific attention is being given to deploying
installation-scale micro-grids and tactical micro-grids at the
operational level to add resilience to key mission requirements and
enhance mission assurance. The Department, in concert with other
agencies such as DOE, continues to invest in researching new
technologies that promise to reduce vulnerabilities, expand
environmental protections, add operational capabilities, and reduce GHG
emissions.
Environmental Conservation and Compatible Development
DoD lands contain significant resources supporting our Nation's
natural and cultural heritage, including resources important to
American Indian, Alaskan Native, Native Hawaiian Organizations, and
other Indigenous Peoples. DoD lands provide habitats for over 550 plant
and animal species that are federally protected under the Endangered
Species Act, contain over 130,000 recorded archaeological sites, and 41
National Historic Landmarks. We are requesting $703.7 million in
conservation funding, which will allow us to manage these resources in
compliance with applicable Federal statutes to create healthy and
resilient natural landscapes that reduce climate risks such as flooding
and wildfire.
The condition of the lands and waters on and off installation
affects test and training access, while also impacting numerous
mission-essential considerations, including flight hazards, wildland
fire resilience, drought resilience, flooding, and water quality and
quantity. The lands and waters that enable and support military
readiness, the Department's natural infrastructure, are changing
rapidly due to changing development patterns and climate change.
Without sustained strategic investment and management, DoD natural
infrastructure can be degraded or eliminated, resulting in loss of
mission-essential support. To address these challenges, the Department
is developing a Resilient Natural Infrastructure Strategy which will
build on current successes and guide its actions to ensure that the DoD
can identify and reduce threats to mission- essential natural
infrastructure. Through integrated on and off-installation land
management, conservation, and restoration the Department will ensure
the natural infrastructure needed for military readiness while
optimizing outcomes to create numerous co-benefits including climate
mitigation and livable, healthy and resilient defense communities.
The DoD Legacy Resource Management Program, or Legacy Program,
plays an integral role supporting the conservation and resilience of
the lands and resources under the Department's stewardship. It supports
the military's combat readiness mission by ensuring continued access to
the 26.9 million acres of military land, air, and water resources
needed to accomplish vital testing, training, and operational
activities. Since its establishment in 1991, the Legacy Program has
funded over 3,300 projects, totaling more than $400 million, and
benefiting over 300 military installations, worldwide.
The Legacy Program works in close coordination with the Military
Services, as well as in partnership with other Federal and State
agencies, non-governmental organizations and academia, to identify the
most pressing conservation challenges. These interactions allow the
Legacy Program to strategically invest in targeted projects to support
military mission readiness, more efficiently meet regulatory
requirements, and improve the effectiveness of DoD conservation
programs.
One such partnership is the Recovery and Sustainment Partnership
(RASP) with the Department of the Interior (DOI) and the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service (FWS). Through this partnership, DoD and FWS have
identified priority species and conservation actions, resulting in
significant improvements to species recovery and conservation,
regulatory efficiencies, and mission flexibility. These investments in
conservation are making significant progress towards alleviating
existing or potential mission restrictions by promoting species
recovery. In FY 2023, six endangered species were declared recovered
and de-listed from the Endangered Species Act due to the conservation
efforts of DoD and its partners. To build on and broaden the numerous
successes and innovations achieved to date in enhancing species
conservation and recovery while sustaining military readiness, DoD and
DOI renewed our Memorandum of Understanding on February 2, 2024 to
support the continued partnership and collaboration under the RASP.
The Department has a similar track record as stewards of our
Nation's cultural heritage. The National Historic Preservation Act
(NHPA) requires that any Federal agency ``ensure that historic property
under the jurisdiction or control of the agency is identified,
evaluated, and nominated to the National Register of Historic Places
(NRHP)''. To date, DoD has surveyed 49% of its land (approximately 10
million acres) and 71% of its real property assets over fifty years of
age (approximately 95,000 assets). Additionally, in the next two
decades, approximately 80% of the current DoD building inventory will
reach 50 years of age and need to be evaluated for listing on the
National Register of Historic Places. To reduce this backlog, DoD
launched the Nationwide Approach to NHPA Section 110 Surveys Program in
FY 2023 to increase the DoD surveyed land portfolio and meet NHPA
requirements. The DoD's Cultural Resources Program, with funding
provided by the Legacy Program, has established a partnership with the
National Preservation Institute (NPI) to provide funding for a nation-
wide effort to identify and evaluate historic properties. This program
represents a substantial investment by DoD, with the Legacy Program
allocating up to $13.5M over 5 years. As a result, DoD will be able to
survey high priority real property assets and archaeological sites to
substantially improve regulatory processes, enable necessary
infrastructure improvements, and support mission readiness.
Continued investments in conservation will maximize our flexibility
to use our land, water, and airspace for military purposes and to
address incompatible land uses beyond our fence lines and will ensure
that our military and civilian personnel have the access they need to
conduct mission- essential activities. Strategies to address these
conservation and climate adaptation priorities can be most effective
through landscape-scale initiatives to better capitalize on both our
on- installation conservation programs and our off-installation
conservation partnerships through the Readiness and Environmental
Protection Integration (REPI) Program.
Readiness and Environmental Protection Integration (REPI) Program
The REPI Program safeguards military missions by improving
installation resilience to extreme weather events and climactic
changes, promoting compatible land use, and preserving critical
habitats and natural resources near DoD installations and ranges. REPI
is uniquely positioned to support DoD's ability to operate seamlessly
across domains by stimulating mutually beneficial and cost-effective
partnerships between local communities, Federal and State agencies, and
non- governmental organizations.
Our FY 2025 budget request for REPI is $177.3 million, which
remains consistent with the budget for the past two fiscal years. In
addition to projects, this year's budget request includes funding for
additional capacity to support strategic priorities in the Indo-Pacific
Region, focused on partnerships with the governments of Hawai?i and
Guam and local partnerships with counties, non-governmental
organizations, and native organizations.
From FY 2003 through FY 2023, the REPI Program has secured over
$1.4 billion in DoD funding with nearly $1.3 billion in non-Department
partner contributions to protect over 1.2 million acres of land at 124
locations across 37 States and territories to preserve key operational
assets, infrastructure, and capabilities. In FY 2023 alone, DoD secured
nearly $165.8 million in non-Department partner contributions to
protect nearly 395,490 acres, including over $12.3 million from State
and local governments and conservation organizations to preserve key
mission capabilities across Hawai'i, Guam, and Alaska. The combination
of REPI Program funding and non-Department partner contributions helped
expand project planning capacity and execution in the Indo-Pacific
region to improve installation resilience, expand innovative
partnerships that support mission capabilities, and enhance resource
conservation and community benefits. For example, on the island of
Kaua'i in Hawai'i, Pacific Missile Range Facility Barking Sands
received over $5.1 million in REPI funding in FY 2023 to mitigate
upland flood potential, soil erosion, and wildfire potential while
restoring habitat for endangered seabirds. In addition, the restoration
and protection of native forests helps to increase Pacific Missile
Range Facility Barking Sands' water supply.
The REPI Program also continues to support the interagency Sentinel
Landscapes Partnership between DoD, the U.S. Department of Agriculture
(USDA), and the DOI. The Partnership promotes shared land use
priorities and works to advance conservation outcomes in landscapes
across the country where national defense, sustainable agriculture and
forestry, and community resilience to climate change intersect. From
the inception of the partnership in FY 2012 through FY 2022, projects
across sentinel landscapes have attracted nearly $233.2 million in DoD
funds, matched by nearly $938 million in funds from other Federal
agencies, State and local governments, and private entities. These
contributions have permanently protected over 677,000 acres of land
through FY 2022 and enrolled 1,196,244 acres of land in financial and
technical assistance programs in FY 2022 alone. In FY 2023, the
Sentinel Landscapes Partnership achieved a significant milestone,
celebrating its 10-year anniversary and the designation of three new
sentinel landscapes: the South Carolina Lowcountry and the Virginia
Security Corridor, which is comprised of the Potomac and Tidewater
Sentinel Landscapes.
The REPI Program serves as one of the key tools the Department is
using to meet strategic objectives outlined in the DoD Climate
Adaptation Plan, including creating resilient natural infrastructure
solutions near installations and enhancing climate adaptation through
collaboration. The REPI Program helps accelerate the development of
nature-based solutions through multiple funding avenues, including
programs administered by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
(NFWF). Through NFWF's National Coastal Resilience Fund and the America
the Beautiful Challenge, the REPI Program has dedicated over $43.6
million in funding from FY 2020 through FY 2023 to projects benefitting
DoD installations and ranges, neighboring defense communities, and
habitats for fish and wildlife.
The REPI Program has seen significant success in expanding
relationships with partners at all levels of government, particularly
at the local level. This year, the REPI Program worked closely with
State and local governments and organizations, such as the National
Association of Counties, the Association of Defense Communities, and
the National Association of Conservation Districts to build stronger
local partnerships with defense communities to advance climate
resilience, quality of life, and community engagement objectives that
directly support military readiness.
other programs and initiatives
retention of critical training land in hawaii
The relationship between the U.S. Military and Hawai'i has been a
critical piece of U.S. military and diplomatic strategy for over 125
years. Hawai'i's strategic location in the Pacific, unique training and
port areas, and support for critical defense missions make it a
cornerstone of our posture in the Indo-Pacific region. In support of
this indispensable defense mission, the Military Departments lease
approximately 53,000 acres of land across five islands in the chain.
These lands, primarily adjacent to U.S.-owned installations, provide
ideal locations for specialized defense capabilities, multi-domain
operating areas to generate future force readiness, and training ranges
that our Joint Force leverages with allies and partners.
The Department recognizes that past incidents, particularly the
fuel and concentrated Aqueous Film Forming Foam (AFFF) spills at the
Red Hill Bulk Fuel Storage Facility (RHBFSF) and the diesel spill at
the Maui Space Surveillance Complex, have resulted in a severe and
worsening loss of public trust between the DoD and Hawai'i's people.
This situation presents exceptionally challenging conditions for DoD
negotiations with the State to retain the use of these critical
training land. Senior leaders are working to engage consistently,
respectfully, and transparently to repair relationships and build
trust.
As a testament to the Department's commitment to the people of
Hawai'i, in December 2023, the Department safely completed the removal
of over 104 million gallons of bulk fuel from the Red Hill storage
tanks and began the process of removing the remaining fuel from the
pipelines and closing the RHBFSF. While there is still a long way to go
with removing the residual fuel, tank cleaning, closure, and ultimate
decommissioning of Red Hill, the Department is committed to the long-
term continued environmental recovery and revitalization of the Red
Hill Drinking Water Shaft to ensure safe drinking water at Joint Base
Pearl Harbor Hickam.
Additionally, in 2023, in partnership with the Governor of Hawai'i,
the Department awarded a $3.2 million capacity-building grant to the
State of Hawai'i. Awarded through the Office of Local Defense Community
Cooperation, this effort will aid the State in increasing its capacity
to work with the DoD on a range of issues, to include the compatibility
of the Department's land retention efforts relative to Hawaiian land
use concerns and economic needs.
In January 2024, the Deputy Secretary took measures to enhance our
collaboration with the people of Hawai'i to protect and preserve the
Hawaiian lands on which we operate and to build and maintain trust with
the people of Hawai'i. At her direction, the Department is establishing
a Hawai'i Coordination Cell for Energy, Installations, and Environment,
which will be dedicated to synchronizing communication and engagements
with State and local officials and the public on matters related to
DoD's use of the lands in Hawai'i. The Hawai'i Coordination Cell will
be integral to strengthening partnerships and relationships that enable
the continuation of the critical military missions in Hawai'i, which
are vital to the U.S. military strategy in the Pacific and our National
strategy to promote stability in the region.
Of the approximately 53,000 acres of land leased by the Military
Departments, about 44,000 acres will expire within 7 years. The
Military Departments are seeking to negotiate new property agreements
for 22 separate parcels, including training areas, main cantonments,
support areas, and easements (including ocean area), before their
expiration in 2028, 2029, and 2030. The Department is committed to
being comprehensive and open with the public as the Military
Departments negotiate land acquisitions. On October 27, 2023, the Army
provided in-person testimony to the Board of Land and Natural Resources
on the Army's proposed training land retention on the islands of O'ahu
and Hawai'i. The Navy and Air Force have also begun public outreach for
their land retention requirements. The expected timeline for reaching
new property agreements is 5-7 years because of the lengthy and robust
environmental compliance and real estate due diligence requirements.
Through consistent public actions that support and benefit the State of
Hawai'i and the military, the Department will continue building
relationships and set the conditions today to enable productive
negotiations.
construction on guam
The Department has several upcoming key posture actions in Guam
that will require historic levels of military construction, including
the relocation of Marines from Okinawa, the Integrated Air and Missile
Defense of Guam, and Polaris Point expansion. This massive construction
surge for posture initiatives includes repair requirements due to
damage sustained from Typhoon Mawar. The rise in military construction
requirements, complicated by labor and material constraints and the
tyranny of distance, drove the Department to take a holistic look at
its approach to supporting construction in Guam.
In the past year, the Department completed a construction capacity
assessment examining limitations imposed by workforce, port capacity,
and utility constraints, among many other factors. Through the effort
the Department determined that sufficient capacity exists to support
several billion dollars of construction at any given time. This
capacity to execute mission- essential construction was only possible
with the help of Congress passing the FY 2024 NDAA provision that
provided DoD construction contractors with a stable H-2B visa workforce
through December 31, 2029.
The Department is now working towards integrating and synchronizing
the Military Department, Defense Agency, and DoD Field Activity
military construction to ensure the Department is delivering the right
capabilities and quality of life improvements to the warfighter on
time. The goal is to have an adaptable tool that identifies mission
need dates, mission dependencies, programming and design requirements,
environmental considerations, climate, and other requirements to inform
the Department's future infrastructure investments.
The Department has additionally made great strides in codifying its
oversight structure for all things energy, installations, and
environment in Guam. In December 2023, the Deputy Secretary appointed
the Under Secretary of the Navy as the senior defense official for Guam
and co-chair, with the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and
Sustainment, of the Guam Synchronization Oversight Council (GSOC). The
GSOC provides the strategic direction and alignment for the various
strategic efforts underway in Guam. One of the main tasks assigned to
the GSOC by the Deputy Secretary is the oversight of the military
construction program on Guam, which the Department's construction
synchronization effort will inform.
the office of local defense community cooperation
The Office of Local Defense Community Cooperation (OLDCC), in
coordination with the other Federal agencies, delivers a program of
technical and financial assistance to enable States, territories, and
communities to plan and carry out civilian responses to workforce,
business, and community needs arising from Defense actions; cooperate
with their military installations and leverage public and private
capabilities to deliver public infrastructure and services to enhance
the military mission; achieve facility and infrastructure savings, as
well as reduced operating costs; increase military, civilian, and
industrial readiness and resilience; and support military families.
OLDCC's program portfolio is presently comprised of 250 grants,
exceeding $1.5 billion, and represents partnerships between the
Department and most States, territories, and communities, supporting
over 260 Department of Defense installations.
The OLDCC Installation Resilience Program assists States,
territories, and communities in identifying man-made or natural threats
alongside their installations as ``one community'' and assessing the
public and private infrastructure and services necessary to sustain our
installations and communities, including housing, education, critical
infrastructure, and healthcare. For housing, this program looks at its
resilience for Service members and their dependents through targeted
business-case studies and planning activities. This effort also
includes tabletop exercises to gauge civilian and uniformed first
responders' ability to respond to disasters and catastrophic events. In
FY 2023, OLDCC enabled 17 of these locally-led exercises. Once an
installation- community team performs these assessments, they can
collectively identify opportunities for future projects to preserve and
enhance mission resilience and assurance. Moving forward, these
tabletop exercises will better incorporate Federal partners and
installations to help identify and prioritize critical infrastructure
needs.
The Department is requesting $50 million for the Defense Community
Infrastructure Program (DCIP), which aims to enhance military value,
cadet training at covered educational institutions, installation
resilience, and military family quality of life by responding to
deficiencies in community infrastructure around military installations.
DCIP also incorporated the consideration of Defense Critical
Infrastructure (DCI) starting in FY 2024. Between FY 2020 and FY 2023,
OLDCC awarded 65 projects representing $300 million in Federal funding
and $251.7 million in non-federal funding through this program.
OLDCC has also been an active partner with the State of Hawai'i,
Territory of Guam, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands
(CNMI).
In Hawai'i, programs of assistance include redeveloping 12 public
schools on the Island of O'ahu through the Public Schools on Military
Installations program; coordinated planning on climate-related
resiliency and energy availability through an Installation Resilience
project for Marine Corp Base Hawai'i and its surrounding community; and
two DCIP infrastructure projects on the Island of Hawai'i in support of
emergency response and preparedness for the community and in support of
Pohakuloa Training Area.
In Guam, OLDCC works closely with the Territory to seek funding for
infrastructure upgrades directly and indirectly associated with the
Department's basing needs. This includes identifying and jointly
undertaking further enhancements as requirements evolve, and Federal
investments in Guam's other socio-economic needs. To date, OLDCC has
funded $490.1 million in Guam civilian infrastructure projects
supporting improvements to the Territory's road network, upgrades to
Guam's wastewater treatment facility and systems, construction of a
cultural repository to curate artifacts unearthed as a result of DoD
activities, and the pending construction of a level 2/3 bio-security
testing facility, providing the capability on the Territory to test
samples and ensuring the health, safety, and general welfare of the
Territories military and civilian population.
OLDCC has also partnered with the CNMI to collaboratively address,
resource, and sustain direct and indirect support that enables the
Commonwealth, its citizens, and our military to prosper and respond to
tactics deployed by the People's Republic of China. Since 2016, OLDCC
has provided programs of assistance to the Commonwealth Office of the
Governor, totaling over $18 million in grant assistance. This includes
over $4.2 million last year to support efforts to formulate methods to
secure, bolster, and enhance the Commonwealth's Information Technology
infrastructure; initiate a structured economic analysis and decision-
making methodology to enhance and ensure the Department's resilience in
the Indo-Pacific; and enhance capacity of the Commonwealth Office of
the Governor that supports, facilitates, and sustains effective and
responsive communications.
OLDCC is currently working with the Commonwealth to provide
technical assistance to conduct comprehensive needs assessments for
infrastructure on Saipan, Rota, and Tinian, with specific focus on
seaports, airports and power plants; implement a resilient and secure
IT infrastructure; and support whole-of-government collaboration to
enhance intermodal transit within the Commonwealth.
Finally, in working with communities across the country, the
Department believes there is more that can be done to support the
modernization needs of the local defense industrial base and
installations. The Department stands ready to work with Congress to
find ways to address this need to not only support communities that
contribute greatly to defense missions on installations, but also to
enhance the capabilities and resilience of the defense industrial base
and the defense industrial workforce.
military aviation and installation assurance siting clearinghouse
The Military Aviation and Installation Assurance Siting
Clearinghouse continues to protect the Department's ability to train,
test, and operate as the Nation expands its renewable and other
commercial energy and power transmission capacity. Among these energy
projects, commercial wind development typically poses the greatest
compatibility challenge to DoD due to physical obstruction of low-level
flight routes and electromagnetic interference with DoD radar systems.
DoD resolves project concerns though collaboration between the
Clearinghouse, the Military Departments, local communities, States, and
energy developers, thereby maintaining the Department's ability to
train, test, and operate while enabling development of alternative
energy resources. The Clearinghouse negotiates Mitigation Agreements
with wind energy developers to minimize the impacts from proposed
projects on DoD missions.
The Department works with the DOI, the Bureau of Ocean Energy
Management (BOEM) and States to create plans that support aggressive
new offshore energy development goals. The Department works with its
Federal, State and industry partners at every stage of planning,
permitting, and development. DoD is an active partner in the search for
compatible leasing off the Central Atlantic Coast, including a new
round of leasing just getting underway in 2024. As part of this effort,
the Clearinghouse has initiated studies of offshore wind impacts. DoD
has also collaborated in offshore development planning throughout the
Atlantic, Pacific, and Gulf of Mexico. In each case, the Department
collaborates to protect national security while allowing compatible
development.
The Department is actively implementing new approaches to protect
DoD missions. The Clearinghouse intensified efforts to advocate for
State-level legislation to protect military installations and
operations from incompatible wind energy development. Although DoD and
developers have had success resolving issues related to incompatible
energy development, state support is invaluable in the rare cases where
developers choose not to voluntarily coordinate with DoD. The
Clearinghouse is developing geographic areas of concern that will alert
industry to areas of extreme military compatibility challenges.
native american lands environmental mitigation program
The Native American Lands Environmental Mitigation Program
(NALEMP), codified under the FY 2021 NDAA, addresses environmental
effects of Department actions on Indian lands and other locations where
the Department, an Indian Tribe, and the current landowner agree that
such mitigation is appropriate. NALEMP is requesting $20 million to
mitigate these environmental effects, which are typically associated
with hazardous materials, munitions debris, underground fuel storage
tanks, unsafe buildings, lead-based paint, asbestos, and abandoned
equipment. Most Indian lands are located in rural and remote areas with
low population densities; thus, they might not qualify as high priority
sites under the Department's more limited environmental restoration
programs. NALEMP seeks to bridge the gap between Tribal needs and these
traditional risk- based environmental restoration programs and
incorporate Tribal priorities to address potential impacts to Indian
lands.
To date, over one-hundred sites in the continental 48 States and
Alaska have been fully mitigated. Ninety-five percent of the 1,160
potential Tribal impacts reported to the Department have been assessed
and 161 have been found eligible for NALEMP and 128 impacts are under
review. In FY 2023, the Department executed a total of 14 NALEMP
cooperative agreements (CA), of which nine CAs were with Alaska Native
Tribes and five with American Indian Tribes in the continental 48. By
the end of FY 2024, the Department will execute an additional 14 CAs,
of which 12 will be with Alaska Native Tribes and five American Indian
Tribes in the continental 48 States.
environmental justice
The Department of Defense (DoD) supports the Administration's
efforts to take a more active Federal role to address Environmental
Justice (EJ). We have long recognized that in order to sustain the
defense mission, we must build trust and community resilience through
partnerships that safeguard healthy, secure, and vibrant natural and
human environments for our neighbors, our Service members, and their
families.
With the issuance of EO 14008 Tacking the Climate Crisis at Home
and Abroad and EO 14096 Revitalizing Our Nation's Commitment to
Environmental Justice for All, the Military Services have been
proactive in revising their policies and guidance to improve early
engagement with disadvantaged communities and Tribal Nations affected
by Federal actions. In partnership with the Council on Environmental
Quality and other Federal agencies, we have developed tools that will
enhance our mapping and analysis of climate change impacts to
communities and developed a strategic framework for achieving climate
change adaptation and resilience that address 5 lines of effort,
including EJ. The DoD will take into account equality in our
investments in military families and communities, implement training
for service members and civilian specialist in EJ literacy, strengthen
Government-to-Government relations with Tribal Nations, and leverage
existing public-private partnerships to support infrastructure and
environmental enhancements in communities adjacent to the Department's
installations.
conclusion
Thank you for the opportunity to discuss DoD's Fiscal Year 2025
budget request supporting our energy, installations, and environment
programs. We appreciate Congress' continued support for our enterprise
and look forward to working with you.
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL KEVIN VEREEN, DEPUTY
CHIEF OF STAFF, DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
General Vereen. Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman,
distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for this
opportunity to speak about the Army's fiscal year 2025 Military
Construction Budget Request, and thank you for your continued
support to our Army soldiers, our civilians, and our families.
The Army's investments in quality of life are critical for
the readiness of the Total Force and our ability to recruit and
retain the best of our nation. Investing in soldier barracks,
family housing, child care, and spouse employment enables
readiness because soldiers can focus on their mission. Our
requested barracks funding is now an average of $2.1 billion
across all components of the Army, and we have requested 100
percent of the sustainment requirement for all barracks types
in the operations and maintenance account.
We are also implementing new processes to improve our
costs-to-complete for MILCON projects by involving the U.S.
Corps of Engineers and Garrison Commanders early in the process
we can provide more accurate costs.
How we invest in barracks to ensure safety, health, and
well-being of our residents, demonstrates our commitment to the
most basic needs of our soldiers. We recruit soldiers, but we
retain families, which is why the Army continues to make
significant progress to provide high-quality family housing.
This budget requests $752 million for the operation,
maintenance, leasing, privatization oversight, and construction
for Army family housing worldwide, and includes investments in
the Army-controlled family housing. Privatized housing
providers will invest over $2.5 billion in new construction,
renovations, and other development work. When it comes to Army
families, investing in the access to affordable child care also
makes a difference in supporting a soldier's ability to serve.
Thank you for funding eight new child development centers
from fiscal year 2021 through fiscal year 2024 in renovating 11
child development centers, and 12 more in fiscal year 2024.
This budget request includes $174 million for three child care
development centers and one youth center. This also includes
the Fort Liberty Child Care Development Center, which we would
like to thank you for pulling it forward.
We also continue to support spouse employment
opportunities. We have implemented and supported many
initiatives to help spouses maintain their professional
careers. We know that spouse unemployment can lead to potential
financial strain with Army life and lead to retention
decisions.
Thank you for your efforts to expand the scope and
licensure reimbursement with 38 states. When we can provide
critical support to the professional spouses and enable them to
continue meaningful careers throughout their PCS moves, we also
enable that family to continue their commitment to the Army.
The strength of our Army is our soldiers, and the strength
of our soldiers are our families. This budget request is an
investment in the well-being and readiness of our soldiers and
families.
I look forward to answering your questions. Thank you.
[The statement follows:]
Prepared Statement of Lieutenant General Kevin Vereen
introduction
Chairwoman Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, and distinguished
members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to present
the Army's Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 budget request for military
construction and Army housing, and for your continued support and
commitment to the Army's Soldiers, Families, Civilians, and Soldiers
for Life. This last year, the Army has made meaningful progress
building resiliency in our force. But more needs to be done to fulfil
our commitments to our soldiers, particularly in the areas of barracks
and housing. Working with the Congress, we will continue to build on
our efforts in 2025.
With ongoing and emerging threats around the world, building
resiliency in our force, infrastructure, and industrial base is a
strategic imperative. First, we must ensure our installations
adequately support our soldiers and their families around the globe.
Second, we must invest in advantages over our adversaries-including
modernizing our operational energy capacities. Lastly, we must continue
to improve the management of our installations and physical resources
to ensure the Army's focus can be mission oriented. The FY 2025 budget
request will help the Army make these strategic investments while we
continue to remove obstacles to our success. To build the Army of
tomorrow, we must make deliberate investments in our installations
today.
military construction budget request
The Army's FY 2025 Military Construction (MILCON) budget request
across all components is $3.9 billion, which covers 45 projects. A vast
majority of this funding will be used to address critical inadequacies
in housing and other quality of life issues on our installations. Of
that request, $2.3 billion is for the Regular Army, $362 million is for
the Army National Guard, and $255 million is for the Army Reserve. The
remainder of the MILCON request is $752 million for Army Family Housing
and $213 million for Base Realignment and Closure Accounts.
For the active Army, $1 billion of the $2.3 billion is dedicated to
projects supporting soldier quality of life-including investments in
barracks and childcare facilities. Another $772 million is for 12 major
construction projects supporting various readiness functions,
including: $114 million for live fire ranges and training facilities,
$112 million for upgrades of Army power projection assets, $262 million
for unit equipment maintenance facilities, $276 million to modernize
the Army's aging Industrial Base infrastructure, and $8 million for a
land purchase. Planning and Design funding for $325 million and
Unspecified Minor Military Construction for $186 million rounds out the
active Army MILCON request.
The Army National Guard's MILCON request totals $362 million,
including $202 million for five National Guard Readiness Centers to
improve training proficiency, increase unit readiness, and enhance the
quality of soldiers' work environments. The National Guard is
requesting to improve readiness with four vehicle maintenance facility
projects totaling $72 million, a live fire training range for $18
million, $26 million for planning and Design, and $45 million for minor
construction projects.
The $255 million Army Reserve MILCON request includes $81 million
for two barracks. The remaining four projects for the Army Reserve
support unit and training readiness include two vehicle maintenance
facilities for $45 million, an Army Reserve Center for $78 million and
a Vertical Construction Skills Training Facility for $16 million.
Planning and design for $31 million and minor construction for $4
million complete the Army Reserve request.
unaccompanied housing--barracks
Our first and highest priority is to ensure our soldiers have safe,
high-quality living and working conditions. While the health of our
soldiers extends beyond our installations into the communities that
support our installations, ultimately healthy and ready soldiers start
with quality housing. The challenge we face with deferred maintenance
and quality of our housing portfolio-as highlighted in last year's
Government Accountability Office Report--built up over many years. The
Army is proactively building a multiyear plan to address these
challenges responsibly over the next few years. However, in situations
where the living conditional are unacceptable, the Army is taking
immediate action to ensure all soldiers are adequately housed as
quickly as possible.
In the last few years, with the help of the Congress, the Army's
investment in permanent party barracks has grown from $718 million in
FY 2021 to over $1.5 billion in the FY 2025 budget request. Across all
components, our requested barracks funding is an average of $2.1
billion over the next 5 years. As part of that funding, the Army is
requesting 100 percent of the barracks sustainment requirement in the
operations and maintenance account to ensure we maintain our good and
adequate barracks. The requested $935 million for nine MILCON barracks
projects-seven for the active Army and two for the Army Reserve-will
help expand our barracks capacity. In addition, the Army plans to
dedicate a large portion of the requested Restoration and Modernization
funding-also provided in the Operations and Maintenance Account-to
barracks recapitalization.
We are grateful to Congress for recognizing the Army's need for
additional MILCON and Facilities Sustainment, Restoration, and
Modernization (FSRM) funding in FY 2024 and look forward to building
upon that investment. Our 2025 budget request is part of a multi-year,
systematic approach to address deferred maintenance, and to sustain the
quality of our barracks once the issues have been resolved. The FY 2025
MILCON and FSRM funding requests provide our best estimates of the
total costs of projects needed to put the Army on a path to addressing
barracks deficiencies across the Future Years Defense Program.
Modernizing our design and management for new and renovated
barracks remains a priority for the Army. The six permanent party
barracks projects in the MILCON request will provide 996 beds.
Additionally, the Army is actively assessing the potential to privatize
barracks where it makes sense to do so. The Office of the Secretary of
Defense (OSD) is currently reviewing options to privatize barracks at
Fort Irwin, California, where a Life Cycle Cost Analysis shows that it
can be more cost-effective to have a private company build and manage
the barracks than building government-controlled barracks. The Army
currently has five other locations with privatized barracks.
Looking to the future, the Army is aggressively addressing
Congress' concerns to deliver the highest quality barracks possible for
our soldiers. The Army will continue to look for ways to improve
soldiers' quality of life when updating our barracks, including adding
security cameras in every new and renovated barracks. In 2025, the Army
is planning to hire 75 civilian barracks managers across 56
installations-one for each housing office-that will be principally
responsible for barracks maintenance, as required by the FY 2024
National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The Army is exploring
options to expand this program. Having full time civilian personnel
supervising barracks maintenance will help to ensure we maintain our
barracks investments made in the FY 2025 request while allowing our
soldiers to focus on their warfighting mission. Additionally, the Army
is finalizing a total inventory of the work required to fix our below
standard barracks to provide Congress with an accurate estimate of the
Army's needed funding for barracks going forward. Lastly, we are
building a program to use the new Repair by Replacement authority in
the FY 2024 NDAA to fund poor and failing barracks projects where
estimated repair costs exceed 75 percent of the replacement costs.
army family housing
In addition to efforts on barracks, the Army continues to make
significant progress to provide high quality family housing for our
soldiers and their families-both government controlled and privatized
family housing.
The FY 2025 budget requests $752 million for the operation,
maintenance, leasing, privatization oversight, and construction for
Army Family Housing worldwide. This includes investments in the Army
controlled family housing. This funding is vital to improve the quality
of family housing. The Army remains committed to effectively
maintaining our government-controlled housing, which is mainly located
overseas. In FY 2025, the Army is requesting three construction
projects for government-controlled housing, including 84 new housing
units in Chievres, Belgium; replacement construction of 54 units in
Baumholder, Germany; and renovation of another 35 units at Camp Zama,
Japan.
In addition to ensuring high-quality government-controlled housing,
the Army has made significant progress in improving the quality of
privatized housing. Over the next 3 years, private housing providers
will invest over $2 billion in new construction, renovations, and other
development work. Over the last 2 years, the Army has implemented
several oversight reforms to better hold private housing providers
accountable for maintaining the high-quality privatized housing our
soldiers deserve. These efforts have included strengthening and
clarifying enforcement language in ground leases, conducting house-by-
house inspections, implementing quality assurance of construction and
renovations, developing a standardized quality assurance maintenance
program that will be applicable to all private housing companies doing
business with the Army, and conditioning incentive payments based on
quality assurance inspections.
This last year, we conducted 100 percent house-by-house third-party
inspections at Fort Eisenhower where most of the homes-but not all-were
determined to be in safe and habitable condition. The Fort Eisenhower
project continues to work on improving the housing experience for
soldiers and families. The Army is taking quick, substantive actions
when our inspections reveal deficiencies in work performed by the
private housing providers. In the FY 2025 budget request, the Army has
requested $34 million to continue these third-party inspections and has
targeted completion of the entire housing inventory by the end of FY
2026.
As part of the Army's commitment to providing quality housing, we
continually look for feedback from our soldiers and private housing
providers. Annually, the Assistant Secretary of the Army
(Installations, Energy and Environment) and the Commanding General of
Army Materiel Command meet with private housing providers and senior
Army leaders to assess the portfolio's status and develop solutions to
address prevailing challenges. Additionally, the Commanding General,
Installation Management Command, continues to hold weekly meetings with
privatized housing providers and stakeholders throughout the
installation community to review the physical conditions of privatized
housing and to receive an update on the status of displaced families.
other facilities
The Army's inventory includes a wide variety of facilities beyond
housing, from equipment maintenance shops to unit headquarter office
buildings. We must maintain and improve all Army facilities to enable
our mission. With guidance from the Congress, Army senior leaders
continue to prioritize investment of limited resources and provide the
Congress with a list of unfunded priorities. With construction cost
growth continuing to outpace core inflation by 2 to 3 percent, Army
MILCON project costs sometimes end up being greater than amounts
authorized and appropriated. In FY 2023, the Army re programmed over
$364 million to on-going construction and previously authorized project
awards, displacing other funding priorities. We continue to look for
cost savings in every project to minimize the need to submit request
additional funding in the future. We look forward to working with
Congress on options for accounting for project cost growth in our
original MILCON requests to minimize these cost-to-complete requests in
the future.
child care
The resiliency of our force is dependent on more than just housing.
Our soldiers and their families need access to safe childcare so that
they can focus on their missions. To assist our families finding safe
childcare, the Army has a robust Child Care Fee Assistance Program that
subsidizes the cost of community childcare for approximately 10,000
children per day when a family has limited access to installation
childcare or a family's duty station is off an installation.
For many Army families, Child Development Centers (CDCs) provide
important childcare in many places where access may be limited. As the
Army is looking to add and improve CDCs and other childcare centers
over the next 10 years, the FY 2025 MILCON Budget request includes $174
million for two CDCs and one Youth Center.
spouse employment
In addition to child care, the Army supports Spouse Employment
through the Military Career Accelerator Pilot Program that allows
spouses to intern with industry, ensuring Spouses can transfer
professional licenses when their Soldier moved stations. Thirty-eight
States have adopted some form of enhanced timely military spouse
licensure portability policies, and thus far 29 States have adopted six
or more licensing compacts that support military spouse licensure
portability. The Army is developing a tool for Army Spouses who are
Department of the Army Civilians to explore vacancies at future duty
locations and to help reduce gaps in unemployment. The tool is
scheduled for launch by the third quarter in FY 2024.
safety and occupational health
The safety of our soldiers and civilians remains at the forefront
of our efforts to maintain a resilient force. The Army is undertaking a
major evolutionary step forward implementing the Army Safety and
Occupational Health Management System, which will move us from a
reactive approach to safety and occupational health, where planning was
primarily based on historic trends, to a proactive approach. We
appreciate Congress' guidance as we move out on a pilot program that
will install data recorders on tactical vehicles. These recorders
provide critical data to support mishap investigations and give us the
capability to proactively improve driver and passenger safety by
identifying hazards for mitigation. The recorders will also provide the
potential for daily monitoring of each vehicle to provide individual
feedback for improving driver confidence and performance.
installation resilience
Ensuring our installations can sustain and protect our Soldiers,
their Families, and our operational capacity through any adverse
situation remains a top priority. Threats to our installations are more
pervasive, diverse, and acute now than ever in history. From securing
the land around our training areas to more frequent and severe weather
events, the Army must protect our installations from more than just
physical threats; we must protect our cyber capabilities, energy
infrastructure, and water resources through deliberate investments. For
the Army of tomorrow to be able to project force around the world, we
must invest in resilient installations today.
To assess risks to our installations, the Army has completed
initial Installation Energy and Water Plans (IEWPs) for almost every
installation, and we have started developing Installation Climate
Resilience Plans (ICRPs). These assessments are valuable tools to
inform installation leaders, planners, and senior leaders about short-
and long-term risks and vulnerabilities to our infrastructure and other
assets on our physical installations. To help mitigate risks to our
installations' water and energy, the Army has completed 180 of the 189
IEWPs; we are on track to complete the remaining IEWPs in FY 2024.
Additionally, ICRPs help inform how our installations and facilities
will specifically mitigate or adapt to the effects of climate change.
Since my last update, the Army completed ICRPs for USAG Alaska,
Anniston Army Depot, Fort Bliss, Fort Carson, Fort Cavazos, Fort
Liberty, and Fort Stewart. In addition, two new ICRPs are underway at
Fort Detrick and USAG Poland. Significantly, we are working with
partners in neighboring communities and academia to share essential
regional data in determining risks from climate change. The Army,
working with the Congress, will be ready to use these plans to
prioritize investments that address our most critical climate, water,
and energy vulnerabilities.
To test our resilience, Army installations conduct Black Start
Exercises assessing installations' ability to respond to an electric
grid outage. These exercises have been completed at 10 installations
and planning is underway to execute these exercises at seven additional
locations in FY 2024. The Army continues to explore a wide array of
technologies to bolster our installation resilience. Specifically, the
Army invests directly in our infrastructure resilience, by using the
authorities Congress has given us. We also enter into private-public-
partnerships to bring private sector capital onto installations. For
example, there are 33 active technology demonstrations projects
underway at 28 Army installations as part of the Department of
Defense's Environmental Security Technology Certification Program.
Working across the government, the Army leverages expertise of other
Federal agencies, such as our four geothermal energy pilot projects
with the Department of Energy. Congressional funding for Army research
labs has also increased installations' ability to test and leverage
resilient technologies. In February 2024, a ribbon cutting was held for
a new microgrid at Fort Cavazos, Texas, which will support 43
facilities and was made possible, in part, by $9 million in
congressional research funding provided to the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers' Engineering Research Development Center.
Microgrids are a central feature of the Army's resilience planning.
They can include on-site power generation, controllable distribution
systems, and energy storage. Microgrids promote resilience by islanding
on-base power in the event of an off-base power interruption. The
carbon neutral energy that they can provide for our installations also
supports the Army's Climate Strategy goal to be net zero by 2050. To
date, the Army has 29 operational microgrids, with 9 in construction,
29 in design, and over 50 in early stages of planning. To continue this
effort, the FY 2025 MILCON budget request includes $248 million to
invest in these types of energy resilience projects.
Installation resilience is about more than just fortifying our
energy and water supply and distribution. The buildings we construct
must last longer and use less energy over the long term. This is
especially important for the Army which has more buildings on our
installations than the other military services combined.
industrial base and supply chains
The security of our defense and industrial base is critical to
support our soldiers on the front lines. The Army's FY 2025 MILCON
request includes $276 million to invest in the capacity of our organic
industrial base. These investments will pay dividends for years to
come, increasing the Army's capacity to meet every size and type of
mission.
installation management innovation
The Army continues to improve and innovate to efficiently manage
the financial and physical resources entrusted to us by the American
people. Beyond using the existing authorities provided by the Congress
to improve management of housing, the Army is exploring how geospatial
information technology and analysis can optimize our use of land. These
innovative tools and methods, as authorized in the FY 2021 NDAA,
provides us detailed insights about how we are occupying our property,
and where we are not fully occupied, allowing the Army to advertise
available land for use by other agencies.
In addition to making efficient use of land, the Army is actively
reducing our holdings, when appropriate. During FY 2023, the Army
disposed of over 9,000 acres of surplus property. We have completed
transferring all surplus acres at Fort Gillem, completed a long-awaited
transfer at Fort Ord, California to the Bureau of Land Management, and
are close to completing an Economic Development Conveyance that will
transfer 5,400 acres at Pueblo Chemical Depot, Colorado. We are also
close to completing major real estate transactions at Stratford Army
Engine Plant, Connecticut and Riverbank Army Ammunition Plant,
California.
The Army's use of Energy Savings Performance Contracts (ESPCs),
Utility Energy Savings Contracts (UESC), and Intergovernmental Service
Agreements (IGSAs) continue to improve installation efficiency and
lower facility operational costs across all utilities and services. In
FY 2023, the Army awarded two ESPCs and four UESC projects totaling
$156 million, delivering the Army 3.5 megawatts of onsite carbon-free
energy generation with 7.5 megawatt hours of battery energy storage.
The Army is working to award nine ESPCs and UESCs totaling $354 million
in FY 2024, with more to follow in FY 2025 and FY 2026. The Army's 160
IGSAs include agreements for environmental services, waste management
and dozens of other community partnerships. The Army is ready to sign
an IGSA with Sourcewell, a service co-op of the Minnesota State
government, for blanket Purchasing for Municipal Supplies and Services.
This exciting approach to obtaining goods and services is anticipated
to initially save the Army approximately $3.75 million per year. Going
forward, we continue to innovate on our use of ESPCs, UESCs, and IGSAs
to reduce the long-term cost of our facilities.
natural resources stewardship and restoration
Preserving and restoring natural resources enables the Army to
provide realistic warfighter training environments and recreational
areas for our soldiers and families. Through the Army's Readiness and
Environmental Protection Integration Program (REPI), we have preserved
over 760,000 acres in 29 States. The Army and its partners have
invested over $1.2 billion to support the protection of natural
resources.
The Army is also taking responsibility for our past actions that
caused releases of hazardous substances, pollutants, or contaminants to
the environment. We must continue to invest in these remediation
efforts, because the environmental issues will not go away on their own
and the cost to clean up these releases only continues to grow. Among
these chemicals, the Army recognizes that exposure to unacceptable
levels of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) poses a risk to
our soldiers and surrounding communities. While PFAS was used in many
industrial and consumer products around the country, the Army is
evaluating the extent to which its prior use of PFAS containing
materials has impacted soils and ground water. The Army has been taking
action to address PFAS in a transparent manner by testing for and
mitigating risks from PFAS in drinking water, characterizing and
remediating past releases, and transitioning to PFAS-free alternatives
to aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF).
conclusion
The Army's FY 2025 Budget Request demonstrates a commitment to
Soldiers quality of life through investments in building, sustaining,
maintaining barracks; Army Families through investments in Family
Housing and CDCs. These efforts increase quality of life for Soldiers
and enable them to focus on their warfighting mission. Thank you for
your time today and I look forward to your questions.
STATEMENT OF VICE ADMIRAL JEFFREY T. JABLON, DEPUTY
CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS FOR INSTALLATIONS
AND LOGISTICS, UNITED STATES NAVY
Admiral Jablon. Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman,
distinguished Members of the Committee, thank you for the
opportunity to testify on the importance of our infrastructure,
its resiliency, and the entirety of support required to meet
the Navy and Joint Force mission.
It is an honor to appear before you to represent the
sailors and civilians who work and live at our 70 installations
around the world.
The Chief of Naval Operations recently issued America's
Warfighting Navy, outlining the Navy's goals in alignment with
the National Security Strategy and the National Defense
Strategy through the framework of warfighting, warfighters, and
foundation. Enabling that framework begins with the principle
that all sustainment starts from the shore. The Navy's PB-25
submission maintains our momentum for achieving a sustainable,
resilient, and ready foundation of installations that deliver
fleet readiness and combat logistics capability.
In PB-25, the Navy requests $3.4 billion in MILCON for 11
projects in fiscal year 2025, including Shipyard Infrastructure
Optimization Program, or SIOP projects, for the first increment
of Dry Dock 3 modernization in Portsmouth, Virginia, and
planning and design for a multi-mission dry dock in Naval Base
Kitsap, Washington.
Equally essential, quality-of-life investments include $206
million in fiscal year 2025 for restoration and modernization
of unaccompanied housing, and $437 million for child and youth
programs, including fee assistance subsidies, additional child
care providers, and pay increases.
Through prior investments, the wait list for Navy Child
Development Centers is 3,500. This is down from 5,300 at the
start of fiscal year 2023. Additionally, we continue to
implement quality-of-life initiatives, including the High-Speed
Wi-Fi Pilot initiated in the Hampton Roads, Virginia area,
provided to our sailors free of charge.
Our request also includes $826.7 million in fiscal year
2025 to improve installation cybersecurity, energy efficiency,
climate change modeling, and other installation resiliency
investments. I would like to express my sincere thanks to
Congress for the passage of the Indo-Pacific Security
Supplemental, which adds $282 million to our fiscal year 2024
MILCON account to address two critical SIOP Projects.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today.
And thank you for supporting our uniformed personnel,
civilians, and their families, who are all over the world doing
incredible work on behalf of the security of this country.
I understand and embrace the depth of my responsibilities
as Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Installations and
Logistics, and I look forward to working with you in the
pursuit of warfighting capability, readiness optimization
afloat and ashore, and support for our sailors, civilians, and
their families.
Thank you. And I look forward to your questions.
[The statement follows:]
Prepared Statement of Vice Admiral Jeffrey T. Jablon
introduction
Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, distinguished members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify on the importance
of our infrastructure, its resiliency, and the entirety of support
required to meet critical Navy and Joint Force missions. It is an honor
to appear before you and represent the thousands of Navy Sailors and
civilians who work and live at our 70 installations around the world.
Backed by strong support from Congress, the Navy continues driving
improvements in our installations to maximize the operational readiness
of our forces as well as the Quality of Service for our Sailors and
their families. Thank you for your trust, confidence, and commitment to
ensuring our Navy's ability to preserve the peace, respond in crisis,
and win decisively in war.
evolving our strategy to operate at scale
The Chief of Naval Operations recently issued America's Warfighting
Navy, outlining the Navy's goals and priorities in alignment with the
National Security Strategy (NSS) and National Defense Strategy (NDS).
Through the framework of Warfighting, Warfighters, and Foundation, the
Navy will deter aggression, defend our National security interests, and
preserve our way of life. Our Naval Logistics Enterprise (NLE) is an
essential part of our operations to address strategic challenges
including the People's Republic of China as the pacing threat, Russia
as an acute threat, support for Ukraine's fight to remain a democratic,
independent, and sovereign nation, and AUKUS, a generational
opportunity to strengthen military capabilities and the prosperity of
the United States and two of our vital allies. America's Warfighting
Navy conveys the CNO's direction to deliver power for peace while
remaining postured and ready to fight and win as a part of the Joint
Force. The CNO's guidance directs the Navy to view everything we do
through a warfighting lens to ensure our Navy remains the world's
preeminent fighting force. Additionally, the Navy will employ
principles of mission command to empower leaders at all levels to
operate in complex environments and take bold action with confidence,
while earning and reinforcing the trust and confidence of the American
people every day. The NLE delivers critical capabilities that underpin
America's Warfighting Navy through our priorities of Warfighting,
Warfighters, and the Foundation that supports them.
Our success in delivering decisive combat power depends on
sustainment--our ability to maintain and prolong operations until
successful mission accomplishment. The Maritime Sustainment Strategy:
Sustaining Naval Forces Across the Competition Continuum (MSS) outlines
the CNO's strategy for moving with purpose and urgency to improve the
Navy's capabilities, capacity, and competencies relative to this
critical warfighting function. An evolutionary document, the MSS
introduces `sustainment in depth'--a layered, systemic approach
designed to build genuine agility and resiliency into our logistics
enterprise.
The MSS begins with the principle that all sustainment starts from
the shore. Ultimately, the end state of the MSS and sustainment in
depth is a Navy capable of providing the right materiel and services,
at the right place and right time, across the competition continuum,
regardless of operational tempo and level of demand from distributed
operational forces. Ashore platforms (our installations or ``decks'')
and payloads (installation capabilities) form the foundation of this
goal. From this baseline, the MSS establishes four lines of effort,
aligned with the Joint Staff's Joint Warfighting Concept--
Operationalize the Shore, Integrate Logistics Command and Control,
Enable Assured Power Projection, and Strengthen Sustainment for
Distributed Operations, integrated across the five Maritime Sustainment
Vectors: Rearm, Refuel, Repair, Resupply, and Revive, and three
crosscutting enablers of Data, Distribution, and Decks. The MSS
illustrates the criticality of deliberate, impactful infrastructure
investments that fully integrate the shore enterprise as a warfighting
capability.
The Navy's FY-25 budget maintains our momentum for achieving a
sustainable, modern, resilient, and ready network of installations and
contingency locations that deliver Fleet readiness and combat logistics
capability across the continuum of peacetime, competition and conflict
to effectively sustain warfighting and our Warfighters at scale.
military construction
The Navy's MILCON budget optimizes Navy installations to enable
global logistics and Force development, generation, and employment from
the shore. PB-25 MILCON requests $3.4B for a total of 11 projects,
MILCON Planning and Design, and Unspecified Minor Construction. PB-25
also continues to invest in projects supporting the Shipyard
Infrastructure Optimization Program (SIOP) and other critical
infrastructure requirements. PB-25 funds the first increment of Dry
Dock 3 Modernization, Portsmouth VA (P1062) and continues to fund
increments for previously awarded SIOP projects at Portsmouth and Pearl
Harbor naval shipyards. PB-25 funds 6 projects required to establish
new infrastructure to support fielding of new warfare platforms. The
Navy included additional Planning and Design funding to accommodate for
SIOP MILCON project Multi-Mission dry dock, Naval Base Kitsap,
Washington (P454). PB-25 also funds Fallon Range Training Land
Acquisition (P445), which was authorized in FY23 but had not yet
received appropriations.
Our PB-25 MILCON request reflects the Navy's top priorities--
investment to support new Warfighting platforms, SIOP and other
critical facilities/infrastructure that contribute to readiness. MILCON
investment, together with Restoration and Modernization (RM), and
Facilities Sustainment (ST) funding is critical to restore and sustain
Fleet Readiness. CNO Guidance, Fleet and Combatant Commander input, and
installation readiness requirements informed the prioritization of
funds.
siop
The SIOP will deliver dry docks to support current and planned
classes of nuclear- powered warships, optimize workflow through
significant changes to the shipyards' physical layout, and replace
obsolete capital equipment with modern technology that increases
productivity and safety. Recapitalizing century-old infrastructure
improves the Quality of Service for our 37,000+ shipyard employees and
Sailors. The shore support and resilient infrastructure delivered by
SIOP sustains the US Navy's nuclear powered platforms and Warfighters.
The Navy's four public shipyards, which maintain both nuclear and non-
nuclear- powered ships and submarines, are critical to National
Defense. Recapitalization of shipyard infrastructure, to include dry
docks, is also critical to maintain throughput and ensure our ships can
deploy on time, putting more players on the field. SIOP's planned
execution is closely coordinated with Fleet maintenance schedules and
integrated with regular shipyard operations to ensure synchronization.
The PB-25 budget submission for SIOP invests $2.8B in FY25 and a
total of $9.0B across the FYDP. PB-25 funding will support ongoing work
for the replacement of Dry Dock 3 at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard,
utilities upgrades at Norfolk Naval Shipyard, a Multi-mission Dry Dock
at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, and modernization of Dry Dock 3 at
Norfolk Naval Shipyard. As the SIOP program matures, the Navy is
mindful of the need to control costs to the greatest extent possible
and coordinate with Congress for shared success. To these ends, the
Navy has implemented a standard cost estimating system for SIOP to
maintain fidelity and history across projects, sites, and time.
Additionally, the Navy published a ``Shipyard Design Specification''
that serves as common design criteria for all forthcoming SIOP projects
to drive standardization, maintainability, and cost predictability. I
remain committed to working with Congress in this generational effort
to improve both the Navy's ability to maintain our nuclear platforms
and support Quality of Service improvements for our Sailors and
shipyard workforce.
quality of service (qos)
Our Navy continues to face challenges with recruiting new Sailors
and the overall health and welfare of the force. Our sailors, civilians
and their families are the backbone of our Navy, the true source of our
Naval Power, and the Navy cannot operate without a proficient,
innovative and motivated workforce. We rely on our Warfighters to
protect the Nation and its interests. As you may know, the Navy--and
our Naval Reservists, in particular--are providing much of the
logistics support to Freedom of Navigation operations in the Red Sea.
Additionally, the Navy activated three Reduced Operating Status (ROS-5)
Sealift vessels, one Ready Reserve Force (RRF) Large Medium Speed Roll-
on/Roll-off (LMSR) and two Maritime Prepositioning Force (MPF) Roll-on/
Roll-off Container (ROCON) ships, to support Army Joint Logistics Over
the Shore (JLOTS) Foreign Humanitarian Aid (FHA) operations in Gaza.
Navy Sealift will transport a floating pier, equipment, and personnel
to support the JLOTS FHA mission. Quality of Service (QoS) is the
combination of Quality of Life, which is the experience of a Sailor and
their family outside the workplace, and Quality of Work, which is the
Sailor's experience in the workplace. We owe it to our Warfighters to
care for them and their families, providing a QoS that meets or exceeds
established standards.
The Navy is committed to enhancing QoS for our Warfighters at work
and at home through an integrated and comprehensive approach, which
aligns with the CNO's recently released Culture of Excellence (COE)
2.0. COE 2.0 is the foundation by which our Navy builds its
Warfighters--our people, leaders, and teams--as a key enabler of
delivering decisive combat power. Alongside the QoS-related funding of
SIOP projects and MILCON in support of operations, are the equally
essential Quality of Life investments in Unaccompanied Housing (UH) and
Child and Youth Programs (CYP), the combination of which will maximize
the QoS experience of our personnel. In PB-25, the Navy increased
Restoration and Modernization (RM) funding for UH to address critical
repairs. The FY-25 budget requests $206M to effect repairs for
facilities at NAS Lemoore, NAS Oceana, Joint Base Pearl Harbor Hickam,
NSA Bahrain, SUBASE Kings Bay, and NAVBASE Kitsap. Through the rest of
the PB-25 FYDP, additional UH investments are planned for NAVBASE
Coronado; NAS Pensacola; Portsmouth Naval Shipyard; Camp Lemonnier,
Djibouti; Lackland Air Force Base; and Naval Station Rota, Spain. In
addition to these plans, the Navy continues to implement, evaluate, and
expand other Quality of Life initiatives including the high-speed Wi-Fi
pilot initiated at 12 permanent party Navy UH sites in the Hampton
Roads, Virginia area. Provided to our Sailors free-of-charge, the Wi-Fi
pilot will run through September 2024, at which time performance
metrics and feedback from our Sailors will inform follow-on
implementation plans.
CYP provide affordable, quality child and youth program services
and are a workforce enabler that directly enhances the readiness,
efficiency, and retention of Navy personnel. Our PB-25 submission
requests $437.4M in FY-25, which fully funds Navy child and youth
programs and services for ages 0-18. The Navy is expanding access to
childcare by enhancing efforts to recruit and retain childcare
professionals, seeking innovative partnerships, expanding community-
based fee assistance, and increasing on-base capacity through military
construction projects.
The quality of CYP is high, but the Navy experiences capacity
shortfalls. This is most prevalent in the fleet concentration areas of
Norfolk, San Diego, Kitsap, Pearl Harbor, Jacksonville, and the
National Capital Region. The current total waitlist for Navy Child
Development Centers (CDCs) is 3.5K (down from 5.3K at the start of
FY23). With 88% of CYP direct care billets filled, staffing shortages
have an impact on childcare capacity. The Navy increased pay,
recruitment bonuses, childcare discounts, and expedited onboarding to
increase staffing levels. Military Child Care in Your Neighborhood
(MCCYN) fee assistance is available to geographically dispersed
families or families in locations with long waitlists for on-base care.
In FY23, the Navy expanded fee assistance to over 6.5K spaces. The Navy
continues to pursue MILCON, facility sustainment (including equipment),
and playground funding to improve or maintain the condition of our CDCs
and School Age Care facilities. Solving care capacity issues requires a
multifaceted approach between the Navy and the community, which the
Navy will continue to pursue.
While funding for these critical programs remains a challenge, we
are committed to working with Congress to target investments that
deliver the highest QoS dividends. We welcome continued collaboration
to include this subcommittee and the House Armed Services Committee's
Quality of Life panel to improve programs in support of our Sailors and
their families including childcare, compensation, housing, and spousal
support programs.
installation resilience
The Navy works to ensure installations and infrastructure are
resilient to a wide range of challenges, including extreme weather
events, water scarcity, sea level rise, recurrent flooding, wildfires,
and other environmental considerations and threats that can affect
operations and present significant risks to mission.
PB-25 continues our focus on resilient, mission ready installations
by improving our climate resiliency and energy security. Our PB-25
request includes $624M over the FYDP to improve installation utility
infrastructure to support resiliency electrification of facilities and
mobile assets. From a FY15 baseline, the Navy reduced facility energy
use intensity by 8.2%, reduced water use intensity by 20.7%, and
avoided one million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e)
through energy savings initiatives.
PB-25 continues our previous year investments in nature-based
solutions aimed at minimizing risks from erosion, extreme temperatures,
flooding, drought, storm surges, and other climate hazards; upgrading
our building control systems to improve cybersecurity and energy
savings, and transitioning our vehicle fleet to zero emission vehicles.
In addition, we continue to explore opportunities to expand third party
financing, leveraging private capital to improve reliability and
resilience with minimal investment. This past year, as part of a third
party financed contract, we commissioned a 20 Megawatt Liquefied
Natural Base Power plant at NS Guantanamo Bay, projected to save an
estimated $10M in annual fuel costs and curtail 20,000 metric tons of
CO2 emissions annually.
PB-25 includes various energy security investments to include $21M
across the FYDP for conducting carbon footprint assessments to identify
energy savings opportunities, $2M in FY25 for supporting energy
security at main operating bases, and $10.7M across the FYDP for
increasing installation energy resilience workforce. We remain focused
on identifying vulnerabilities and increasing resilience via our black
start exercises which test an installation's ability to continue its
mission upon total loss of commercial power. We completed 13 exercises
in FY23 with 12 planned in FY24. Lastly, we continue to work to
strengthen our partnerships with communities, States, and allies and
partners outside our fence line, increasing our capability to respond
to and recover from climate-caused, or manmade disruptions that impact
our fleet operations.
base operating support and facilities sustainment, restoration and
modernization
A balanced infrastructure investment strategy requires focused,
stable investment to address mission requirements supporting the
Warfighter and warfighting, along with the core infrastructure that is
the force enabler and multiplier for all supporting missions. Our Shore
installation platforms require Facility Sustainment, Restoration and
Modernization (FSRM) funding, in addition to MILCON, to accomplish
planned workload. Navy Base Operating Support (BOS) comprises Fleet
Operations, Safety and Security, Facility Support, Quality of Life, and
Mission Support and Management programs provided to 70 Navy
Installations.
I would like to thank Congress for the $268M increase in our FSRM
funding for FY24. These funds will enhance our ongoing efforts to
improve utility infrastructure, safety, and repair projects on our Navy
installations. We look forward to further collaboration with Congress
to fund other critical sustainment, restoration, and modernization
projects.
The FSRM PB-25 budget outlook demonstrates a slight increase in RM
funding in FY25, followed by a general decrease in RM funding across
the FYDP. Sustainment funding, which maintains facilities at their
current state, is projected to remain relatively constant across the
FYDP between 77% to 80% of the overall OSD modeled sustainment
requirement. However, in FY25, sustainment funding has been targeted to
100% for Nuclear Deterrence, Naval Operational Architecture,
Unaccompanied Housing, and fitness centers.
Restoration and Modernization (RM) funding is key to revitalizing
critical infrastructure that has experienced degradation and
investments are targeted towards the most impactful warfighting
enablers. Increased funding for the utilities and fuels programs is
critical to account for recent volatile global markets and to ensure
``must pay'' bills do not take funds at the expense of fleet
modernization RM projects.
The PB-25 BOS program is prioritized across the FYDP to support
non-inflationary utilities requirements in support of third party
financing agreements, new facilities, and revised utilities cost
sharing with the government of Japan, as well as fire and emergency
services and all-hazards response to Navy ports and other shore
locations. Funding for the BOS program remains essentially flat across
the FYDP, which translates to reduced buying power.
conclusion
Our PB-25 budget request is a strategy-driven submission that will
sustain the most lethal, resilient, survivable, agile, and responsive
Navy in the world. As we built our request, we made difficult choices
across the spectrum of requirements. We believe our submission strikes
the most effective balance of investments to ensure a free, open,
prosperous, and secure international order, build a resilient defense
ecosystem, and deliver power for peace while remaining postured and
ready to fight and win.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today, and
thank you for supporting our uniformed personnel, civilians, and their
families who are all over the world doing incredible work on behalf of
the security of this country--a world that is dangerous, complicated,
and interconnected. I understand and embrace the depth of my
responsibilities as Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Installations
and Logistics, and I look forward to working with you in the continued
pursuit of warfighting capability, readiness optimization both afloat
and ashore, and support for our Sailors and their families.
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL EDWARD D. BANTA, DEPUTY
COMMANDANT, INSTALLATIONS & LOGISTICS,
UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS
General Banta. Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, and
distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to discuss the Marine Corps' fiscal year '25
Military Construction Budget Request.
I would like to thank you for funding last year's budget
request and the unfunded priority list. Congress' support will
accelerate improvements for the quality of life of our Marines,
enable Marine Corps modernization initiatives, and improve our
INDOPACOM posture.
In this year's budget, we are requesting $1.2 billion for
nine military construction projects, unspecified minor
construction, and planning and design funds. This request aims
to modernize our installations and reflects a balanced
investment approach to support our Marines and our families,
viewed through an operational lens, these investments allow us
to posture ourselves in the best manner to serve the nation.
First, I want to highlight our Barracks 2030 Initiative,
the most consequential barracks investment plan we have ever
undertaken. In February of 2023, the Commandant of the Marine
Corps directed the Service to review our barracks portfolio and
identify opportunities to improve the quality of life for our
Marines. From this review, we began our Barracks 2030
Initiative and identified three areas to focus our efforts;
management, modernization, and material. These investments will
include the professionalization of our barracks management
workforce with the addition of 347 full-time civilian
employees.
Next, we will modernize our infrastructure through the
levers of repair, reconfiguration, recapitalization, and right-
sizing the number of buildings in our portfolio. We will do
this using the levers of military construction, restoration and
modernization, and demolition. Your support will be critical in
this long-term strategy to right-size our portfolio.
Lastly, we will prioritize available funds to provide
functional and updated furnishings for barracks rooms by taking
advantage of the current centralized procurement contract. Also
of note, we recently completed a 100 percent wall-to-wall
barracks inspection of nearly 58,000 rooms, enterprise-wide.
This comprehensive assessment provides us with a good sight
picture of where we are and where we need to improve, and it
will further inform these investments.
Finally, I would like to underscore the Marine Corps'
investment into the Indo-Pacific. Five of our nine projects in
this year's budget are in the region. These critical projects
in Hawaii, Guam, and Australia bolster our presence in the
region and continue our investments to begin the movement of
Marines from Okinawa to Guam this year. Funding modern and
resilient infrastructure and housing in the Pacific is critical
to posture Marines in a fighting stance for campaigning and
crisis response.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today,
and for your continued oversight, input, and support.
I look forward to your questions.
[The statement follows:]
Prepared Statement of Lieutenant General Edward D. Banta
introduction
Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, and distinguished members of
this subcommittee; I appreciate the opportunity to discuss the Marine
Corps' Fiscal Year 2025 (FY25) military construction budget request.
Thanks to support from Congress, the Marine Corps continues to improve
our installations and bases as power projection locations that train
and deploy Marines while providing high quality services and housing
for our families.
First, I want to express sincere gratitude for the funding provided
for the Marine Corps' FY24 military construction program. These funds
will assist in improvements to our barracks and family housing, support
Marine Corps modernization initiatives, and continue the rapid growth
of our Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM) posture. Seven FY24 projects
are located west of the International Date Line and within the Second
Island Chain. These critical infrastructure projects are necessary for
the Marine Corps to meet the challenges presented by current and future
threats and enable the movement of Marines from Okinawa to Guam. The
Marine Corps projects to save $1.5B with the Congressional
authorization to extend the H-2B Visa ``temporary need waiver'' through
2029. Thank you for your support of this extension.
Additionally, Congress provided funding for one barracks project in
FY24 aboard Marine Barracks Washington; this is in addition to the six
barracks appropriated in the FY23 budget. These barracks will improve
the living conditions for thousands of our single Marines and make a
positive impact on our talent management initiatives. The Marine Corps
also thanks Congress for the additional $15M included in the Department
of the Navy's FY24 budget for barracks planning and design to assist in
our modernization effort. Finally, Congressional funding for the
Hawai'i Water Reclamation Facility in the FY24 budget is critical to
supporting environmental stewardship aboard an important installation
in our priority theater.
I also want to highlight the recent third-party audit we completed
this year. As we invest in new platforms, barracks, and training, it is
our responsibility as good stewards of taxpayer funds to continue to
prove that when the Corps is provided a taxpayer dollar, we can show
exactly where and how it has been invested--a responsibility we take
very seriously. Following a rigorous 2-year audit, the Marine Corps
achieved an unmodified audit opinion, the best possible outcome--and
the first time in the Department of Defense's history that any service
has received an unmodified audit opinion. These results demonstrate how
seriously the Marine Corps takes its stewardship of taxpayer funds and
our ability to account for and put to best use every dollar trusted to
the service. This audit supports what we have believed for a long
time--when Congress provides the Marine Corps a dollar, we invest it
wisely, and we can tell you exactly where and how it was spent to
further our Nation's national security objectives. The Marine Corps
worked with Independent Public Accountants to validate budgetary
balances and records and to audit physical assets at installations and
bases across the globe. These actions included counting military
equipment, buildings, structures, supplies, and ammunition held by the
Marine Corps and our DoD Partners. The audit's favorable opinion was
only possible through the support and hard work of numerous dedicated
Marines, civilian Marines, and many other partners across DoD.
Nonetheless, we will not rest on our laurels; the audit report pointed
out some areas for improvement, and we will use these recommendations
to make our fiscal practices even better.
Marine Corps installations and logistics underpin the Service's
statutory obligations to organize, train, equip, and sustain combat-
ready Marine Forces. Installations are the places from which the Marine
Corps develops young Americans based on the Service's legendary ethos
and values and generates readiness by preparing units for combat under
demanding, realistic training conditions. They provide indispensable
positional advantage while assuring allies and deterring adversaries
with more than 23,000 Marines living and operating from bases in the
Western Pacific. These same bases enable allied, Joint, and interagency
capability and interoperability with an array of training venues and
support, stock, and maintain mission essential equipment, munitions,
and supplies for use in training and contingencies. Installations
demonstrate an unshakable commitment to our Marines and their families
by providing safe, healthy, and supportive environments in which to
live and train, and they foster trust with our local communities. As
our Commandant stated in his initial guidance, we will focus on
improving our barracks, base housing, gyms, chow halls, child
development centers, and personnel policies. These quality of life
improvements are direct contributors to a more capable and lethal
force.
barracks 2030, family housing, and child development centers
In February 2023, the Commandant of the Marine Corps directed the
Service to review our barracks portfolio and identify opportunities to
improve the quality of life for our Marines. From this review, we began
our Barracks 2030 initiative, the most consequential barracks
investment plan we have ever undertaken, and identified three areas to
focus our efforts- management, modernization, and material.
First, we will professionalize our barracks management workforce
with the addition of 347 fulltime civilian employees. They will
streamline and improve oversight processes and decrease collateral
duties for Marines who lack the required training to execute these
responsibilities effectively. We will also implement a resident advisor
program, like a college dormitory, to allow senior non-commissioned
officers to reside in each barracks. This will provide mentorship and
leadership to young Marines navigating their transition from home to
the Marine Corps.
Next, we will modernize our infrastructure through the levers of
repair, reconfiguration, recapitalization, and right sizing the number
of barracks in our portfolio. Service wide, 17% of our barracks are in
poor or failing condition. To right size the number of barracks in our
inventory, we will first determine the required number at each
installation and begin targeted demolition to remove buildings not
suitable for long-term investment. While new construction will
contribute to our plan, a greater need will be in leveraging
restoration, modernization, and demolition of our existing inventory.
For example, we currently renovate about nine barracks annually. Under
our new process, we will now mirror private industry practices and
begin in- stride room renovations instead of waiting 15-20 years to
renovate the entire building.
Finally, we will prioritize available funds to provide functional
and updated furnishings for barracks rooms. We will do this by taking
advantage of the current centralized procurement contract currently in
use by the Army and Navy. Previously, furniture acquisition varied by
region and limited our economies of scale. By changing to this
centralized mechanism, we will improve our refresh cycle to 10 years
and estimate a 20% cost savings through enterprise procurement.
While we implement this plan, the Marine Corps is already acting.
In March, we concluded our 100% wall-to-wall Environmental, Health, and
Safety (EHS) inspections of every barracks room to establish the
baseline conditions of habitability. Of the over 58,000 rooms
inspected, we directed the immediate relocation of 118 Marines due to
EHS concerns. Overall, more than 50% of the rooms inspected had
deficiencies requiring corrective actions which we are addressing.
These inspections will inform and refine our Barracks 2030
initiative. By improving the barracks through professionalizing
management, modernizing infrastructure, and providing better
furnishings, the Marine Corps will deliver its warfighters with a home
appropriate to the professionalism and readiness we demand. While we
improve the barracks for our single Marines, we will continue to
emphasize the importance of our families, particularly through the
Family Housing portfolio.
This year, the Marine Corps requested over $205M in family housing
construction and operations for FY25. This request sustains funding for
the 169 Base Housing Management professionals, who provide the
necessary oversight of over 23,000 PPV homes in CONUS and Hawai'i for
our Marine families. To ensure our partners are meeting the
requirements to a level we expect, the Marine Corps will complete
third-party inspections of PPV homes this fiscal year. These
inspections hold our housing partners accountable and provide our
Marines and their families with safe, livable homes. We are reviewing
the results of the initial third-party inspections to develop
corrective action plans for implementation in FY25. The Marine Corps
continues to identify specific areas to focus on in conjunction with
the partner to improve the family housing inventory. For example, our
West Coast partner executed a $34M recapitalization project to provide
60 new homes at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, AZ. Providing quality
homes is one pillar to our quality of life investments for our
families. Another important pillar is childcare facilities.
High-quality childcare is a family-readiness priority for the
Marine Corps. The adage ``we recruit Marines, we retain families''
remains as true today as ever. In FY23, our child development programs
served more than 30,000 children across the globe. The Marine Corps has
57 childcare facilities (38 Child Development Centers [CDCs] and 19
School Age Care facilities) at 16 installations. To meet the rising
demand for childcare, the Marine Corps will begin construction on two
new CDCs at MCB Camp Pendleton, CA and Guam. These new facilities will
serve 350 children and provide relief to waitlists in those locations.
The service's biggest challenge with respect to CDCs remains the
ability to obtain and retain a stable workforce for these facilities.
Congressional funding and authorities in support of various
workforce initiatives are critical to help recruit and retain the best
employees. As an incentive tool, civilian staff receive a 50% discount
on childcare fees for their first child enrolled at the CDC and a 20%
discount on subsequent children. Beginning in FY23, we added over $100M
to the Child and Youth portfolio to hire more employees at increased
wages to help retain a professional workforce. We are proud to
highlight that 40% of our staff is comprised of military spouses, which
is possible through our non-competitive childcare employee military
spouse transfer program. Additionally, to provide additional options
for our families, the Marine Corps offers community-based childcare fee
assistance to families stationed at installations with extensive
waitlists. In FY23, families enrolled nearly 1,600 children in the fee
assistance program at a cost of over $6.1M.
For the FY25 budget, the Marine Corps is requesting $133M in Child
and Youth Program funding to sustain these initiatives and account for
increased participation. We thank Congress for their continued support
in building, staffing, and maintaining high quality childcare
facilities for our Marines and their families.
fy25 military construction budget request
To posture ourselves in the best manner to serve the Nation, the
Marine Corps has requested $1.2B for military construction projects and
$149M for family housing construction projects in FY25. This budget
request supports the National Defense Strategy, SECNAV's Strategic
Guidance, and our Commandant's direction. It is a balanced approach and
includes the following investments:
--Important infrastructure in Guam to include a new Youth Center for
the families of our Marines, and Earth Covered Magazines to
store modern weapons systems and ordnance.
--A new aircraft hangar on Marine Corp Base Hawai'i identified in the
recent Environmental Assessment to support the home basing of
KC-130J and MQ-9 aircraft.
--Modernized maintenance facilities and aircraft hangar space at MCAS
Cherry Point, NC. This includes a sustainment center to
accommodate F-35 aircraft, maintenance and storage space, and
secure data network areas. Additionally, a Composite Repair
Facility will provide a depot-level facility for advanced
composites and rotor blade repair.
--A new Parachute Survival Training Facility at Joint Base Lewis-
McCord for our reserve units in the State of Washington. This
facility provides maintenance, repair, and storage of
parachutes, and storage and maintenance of arms for USMC Forces
Reserve.
--Significant investments to our infrastructure in Darwin, Australia
in support of the Marine Rotational Force-Darwin. This includes
maintenance support facilities and an aircraft maintenance
hangar to provide maintenance, storage, and other support
functions. Today, more than 31,000 Marines are forward-deployed
or stationed across 42 countries.
More than 23,000 of those Marines are currently forward-postured
west of the International Date Line and positioned to respond to
activity by our pacing threats. To reaffirm our commitment in the Indo-
Pacific, the FY25 MILCON budget includes five projects in the region,
valued at over half a billion dollars. One example of a significant
quality of life investment is the Youth Center in Guam, which is a part
of a larger investment designed to accommodate the first phase of
Marines and their families moving from Okinawa to Guam beginning in
CY24. Funding modern and resilient infrastructure and homes in the
Pacific is critical to posture Marines in a fighting stance for
campaigning and crisis response.
As stated earlier, barracks are among the most clear-cut quality of
life investments we can make for our single Marines. The Marine Corps
possesses 658 barracks with approximately 155,000 bed spaces. In FY22
and FY23, we renovated 30, improving the quality of life of 8,116
Marines. In FY24, we will renovate 13 barracks to improve the living
conditions of 3,517 Marines. We are leveraging a tier-based readiness
approach to lifecycle management to prioritize investments for the most
critical facilities. Every dollar spent will be targeted to where it
will have the greatest impact. The PB25 budget does not reflect the
full Barracks 2030 planning strategy. However, it is the starting
point. The Marine Corps allocated $274M in FY25 (an additional $61M
above previous years) to address barracks modernization, and if
additional funds are made available, the Marine Corps can execute
additional FSRM requirements of $230M for FY25.
installation resilience and environmental stewardship
We must properly maintain our facilities and infrastructure to
prevent degradation of our capability to train and generate readiness
for global employment to support mission-essential tasks. The complex
contested operating environment we face today challenges our ability to
perform these tasks effectively from our installations. Natural and
human-caused events can disrupt or degrade key operating and support
capabilities, presenting an omnipresent risk to unrestricted
operations, both at home and abroad. Addressing the risks to preserve
tactical and strategic advantage is essential for Marines to remain a
ready, relevant force.
Resilience rests in the ability to maintain critical functions,
such as a reliable power grid, access to safe drinking water, and
redundant communications capabilities, as well as the ability to train
and equip Marines, and care for Marines and their families. We must
ensure our installations can continue to operate effectively in the
face of all hazards and threats to include changing environmental
conditions. In October 2023, the Marine Corps published the
Installation Campaign Plan for Environmental Resilience and Energy
Readiness, framing our approach to plan, build, and sustain climate-
resilient installations and outlining three primary objectives: Promote
Environmental Resilience; Achieve Energy Readiness; and Build
Partnerships and Rally Support.
One part of this solution includes programs like the Office of the
Secretary of Defense- managed Readiness Environmental Protection
Integration (REPI) Program. For every dollar committed by the REPI
program, outside partners provide a nearly equal match. The Marine
Corps encroachment partnering program protected nearly 113,000 acres of
land from FY05 through FY23 by leveraging nearly $165M in DoD funds and
nearly $147M in conservation partner funds. The Marine Corps
consistently has highly rated REPI proposals and has used REPI
effectively to safeguard our missions by improving installation
resilience to extreme weather events and fluctuating climatic
landscapes, promoting compatible land use, and preserving critical
habitats and natural resources near our installations. We are also
partnering with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) Engineering
with Nature (EWN) program, a collaborative effort across Federal,
State, and local agencies with input from the public, to use nature-
based solutions to mitigate the effects of severe weather. In places
like the Carolinas and Hawai'i, the Marine Corps is planning to
leverage EWN to develop wetland and dune restoration, artificial reef
construction, and stormwater management and erosion control. We will
continue these efforts to build long-term and sustainable solutions at
these and other installations.
In terms of energy resilience, or the ability to withstand and
recover rapidly from power disruptions, Marine Corps installations will
operate and maintain effective energy infrastructure to avoid and
recover from anticipated and unanticipated energy disruptions to
sustain mission essential functions and critical installation services.
Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany, GA became the first Marine Corps
Net Zero Installation in 2022 and continues to be the gold standard for
energy resilience. To build on this achievement, we are leveraging
lessons learned from Albany and multiple authorities to build resilient
bases. For example, the Marine Corps is successfully utilizing
congressionally authorized third-party financing to accelerate the
delivery of energy resilience and utilities infrastructure
modernization projects in support of critical missions. In FY23, Marine
Corps Air Station (MCAS) Cherry Point, NC completed a $47M utility
energy services contract (UESC) project to enhance energy security with
a focus on installation electrical and wastewater system upgrades. This
state-of-the-art project, in partnership with the local utility
company, took 2 years to complete and is projected to deliver more than
$2.2 million in annual energy cost savings. Additionally, this year's
budget request includes the F-35 Sustainment Center at MCAS Cherry
Point, NC. This net zero emissions project will incorporate passive
design for load reduction, electrification, sustainable materials, and
efficiency to mirror the benefits found at MCLB Albany, GA.
Finally, I want to highlight the Marine Corps' work to adhere to
the FY20 NDAA direction to phase out aqueous film-forming foam (AFFF)
at our installations. The Marine Corps is working with USACE on task
orders to remove, rinse, and dispose of AFFF from all facilities,
tactical vehicles, and non-tactical vehicles. Our current plan is to
complete the contract with USACE by the end of FY24. We intend to
implement water fire suppression systems where we can, and use the
replacement fluorine-free foam only where necessary to protect the
safety of our personnel and mission critical assets.
conclusion
The Marine Corps' significant transition in how it is organized,
trained, and equipped, to meet current and evolving threats from our
adversaries, cannot be accomplished without Congressional support. The
foundation of these efforts starts at home. Our Barracks 2030
initiative is instrumental in improving the quality of life of our
Marines, while improving the quality of family housing and childcare
facilities are important for Marines and their families.
Evolving threats demand evolving capabilities and improved
resilience, and your Marines are ready for the challenge. The Marine
Corps will continue to modernize our infrastructure to ensure we are
postured to support our Nation's interests. Thank you for the
opportunity to testify before you today, and for your oversight, input,
and support as we make the necessary changes to best position the
Marine Corps for mission accomplishment. I look forward to working with
you to improve the lives of our Marines and to maintain the fighting
stance of the Marine Corps to be ready at a moment's notice.
STATEMENT OF LIEUTENANT GENERAL TOM D. MILLER, DEPUTY
CHIEF OF STAFF FOR LOGISTICS, ENGINEERING,
AND FORCE PROTECTION, UNITED STATES AIR
FORCE
General Miller. Good morning, Chair Sinema, Ranking Member
Boozman, distinguished Members of the Subcommittee. I am
honored to appear before you today to discuss the fiscal year
2025 Air Force Military Construction and Family Housing
Programs.
I would like to begin by thanking the subcommittee for your
steadfast support of our Nation's Air Force. The generous
construction funding you provided with the fiscal year '24
Military Construction Veterans Act, multiple projects to
include basic military training chapel for American airmen, a
fire station, and a host of planning and design of current
military MILCON projects, all benefited from the $775 million
in additional appropriations. Thank you.
Last year, Congress provided a permanent increase to the
minor military construction threshold from $6 million to $9
million, and authorized the use of area cost factor adjustments
up to $14 million. These changes greatly help restore and
establish the buying power across the enterprise. Thank you for
these changes.
Our Nation is facing the rise of great power competition,
with the pacing threat of China and the acute threat of Russia,
multi-domain threats, and competition for access to resources.
In the face of these challenges, the Air Force continues to
prioritize the modernization of our nuclear enterprise at home
and support for combatant commanders, especially in the Indo-
Pacific and European theaters.
Direct support to combatant commander accounts for 20
percent of the Air Force's fiscal year 2025 MILCON request. Two
projects supporting the Pacific Deterrence Initiative will
improve infrastructure and facilities in the Indo-Pacific. The
critical infrastructure provides our allies, partners, and
potential competitors, a clear indication of the United States'
long-term commitment to this area of responsibility.
In preparation for the Sentinel Missile System, the Air
Force is continuing the largest at-land acquisition effort
since the original Minuteman. Additionally, the request
prepares Ellsworth Air Force Base to welcome the first B-21
Raiders and begins efforts at Dyess Air Force Base. Once
online, these weapons systems will be the future mainstay of
two-thirds of our Nation's nuclear triad, which is entrusted to
the United States Air Force.
Equally important, is support for the well-being of our
airmen in the form of affordable, accessible child care and
safe, high-quality housing. Generous congressional support in
fiscal year 2022 through 2024 accelerated the progress of 14
CDCs and dormitory projects.
In closing, the Air Force's continued partnership with this
subcommittee's members, your dedicated staff is essential to
modernizing our assets, the safety of our installations, and
the welfare of our airmen and their families.
I look forward to your questions, and the opportunity to
testify before you today.
[The statement follows:]
Prepared Statement of Lieutenant General Tom D. Miller and Mr. Bruce E.
Hollywood
introduction
Chair Murray, Ranking Member Boozman, and distinguished members of
the subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to discuss the
Department of the Air Force (DAF) Fiscal Year 2025 (FY25) Military
Construction Program.
Our installations remain the platforms from which we enable and
project combat power in and through the air, cyber, and space domains.
DAF installations serve as key nodes in a global network of operating
locations that enable Joint Force mission success around the world;
making the readiness, resiliency, and sustainability of installations
matters of strategic importance. Our installations are where we train
and equip for joint operations, control, and sustain air and space
weapon systems, test new weapon systems, generate readiness, and
provide safe, healthy communities that many of our Airmen, Guardians,
and their families call home. However, after decades of operating our
installations with nearly unprecedented freedom of action, the homeland
is no longer a sanctuary--as the National Defense Strategy (NDS)
clearly describes.
Our Nation faces the nexus of complex challenges: the rise of great
power competition with China and Russia; the increasing complexity of
multi-domain threats; the competition for access to resources; and the
increasing rate of technology change. We must ensure our installations
are resilient, optimized, and operationally efficient to successfully
defend the homeland; prevail against the full range of man-made and
natural threats; deter strategic attacks against the United States, our
Allies, and our partners; deter aggression and be prepared to prevail
in conflict when necessary; and build a resilient Joint Force and
defense ecosystem. We recognize the foundational capability our
installations provide in advancing these priorities through integrated
deterrence, campaigning and building enduring advantages.
In the face of these challenges, we made hard choices to prioritize
efforts focused on integrated deterrence in an environment of shrinking
advantage against aggressive competitors, operating in an evolving
security environment. Last year, in a continued effort to meet the
challenge of pacing adversaries, we focused on seven operational
imperatives. This year's budget reflects continued modernization
efforts in a resilient, effective space order of battle; operationally
optimized Advanced Battle Management System; achieving Moving Target
Indication at scale; development and fielding of a Next Generation Air
Dominance family-of-systems; cost-effective, resilient forward basing;
global strike capabilities built around the B-21 Raider; and
expeditious transition to a wartime posture.
In support of these imperatives, the DAF Military Construction
(MILCON) program continues to prioritize nuclear enterprise
modernization and Combatant Command (CCMD) infrastructure support with
an emphasis on the Pacific and Europe. The Facilities Sustainment,
Restoration and Modernization (FSRM) portfolio remains focused on
sustaining our existing infrastructure. Furthermore, we preserve the
well-being and quality of life of our service members and their
families through investments in housing, dormitories, and child
development centers (CDCs). We remain committed to sustaining the DAF's
power projection, enabling platforms, and searching for operational
energy improvements to increase range and operational capability. We
appreciate the continued partnership with Congress to ensure Air and
Space Forces are well- postured to compete, deter, and win.
united states air force
installations
We advance our commitment to optimizing installation investment
through implementing the Infrastructure Investment Strategy (I2S),
increasing senior leader oversight of the portfolio, and pursuing
reforms within our MILCON program. First introduced in 2019, the I2S is
the Department's long-term strategy to restore readiness of our power
projection platforms by guiding investment decisions at the enterprise
and installation level. We are taking the lessons learned from the I2S
and building an action plan to ensure our installations are ready,
right sized, and resilient to enable the DAF to compete in Great Power
Competition.
We oversee I2S implementation efforts through recurring
Infrastructure Councils and Infrastructure Program Management Reviews
to assess resourcing and asset management practices on infrastructure
readiness. The Council developed a series of metrics that quantify the
impact of I2S policies and investment decisions on infrastructure
condition, facility space use, and MILCON cost growth. Regular
assessments of the I2S allow senior leaders to make timely decisions,
which affect program execution and future budget decisions.
installation resilience
Ruggedizing our installations against evolving natural and man-made
threats to continually project power and compete in an era of Great
Power Competition is paramount for overall installation resilience and
Department of Air Force mission assurance.
Our Installation Energy Program focuses on ensuring Air and Space
Force installations are truly resilient to the broad range of threats
from adversaries, cyber-attacks, and changing climate. We define
resilience within the ``5 Rs'' of robustness, redundancy,
resourcefulness, response, and recovery. Installation Energy Plans
apply the ``5Rs'' to assess gaps and prioritize energy and water
projects to ensure mission readiness. The ``5Rs'' help describe how a
system is prepared for crises using the preventative attributes of
robustness, redundancy, and resourcefulness, as well as how the system
functions during crises using the performance attributes of response
and recovery.
Installation resilience is not ``one size fits all"-it is
multifaceted, context specific, and spread across different domains,
including people, infrastructure, and the environment. To incorporate
risk-informed installation resilience planning into the Department's
existing policy and planning structures, the Department developed the
Clean, Agile, Secure, Efficient (CASE) Framework, a comprehensive
approach to identify, prioritize, and put forth competitive climate-
informed resilience initiatives and investments and complements the
``5Rs.''
Adversarial threats and natural hazards pose a growing risk of
prolonged power outages for installations. Using a mission thread
perspective, we are working to identify key nodes on and off
installations that, in a denial-of-service scenario, may result in a
significant impact on our ability to deliver key capabilities. A
comprehensive understanding of mission requirements, current system
operations, accurate reporting, and historical outage data assist in
identifying possible service vulnerabilities. We strive to mitigate
operational impacts from disruptions to energy and water through
increasing investment in and improving maintenance of energy systems.
special interest items
natural disaster recovery efforts
The Natural Disaster Recovery (NDR) program has greatly benefitted
from Congressional support over the last several fiscal years and we
are seeing the results of this sustained and significant investment.
The program is substantially complete with Planning and Design (P&D),
nearly complete with acquisition, only two projects remaining to award,
pending the availability of funding. The DAF will make use of the $150
million Congress provided in FY24 to address the remaining disconnect
at Tyndall AFB, Florida. To date, we awarded 94% of the NDR program,
totaling over $4 billion of investments to improve mission readiness,
resilience, and efficiency at Tyndall AFB, Florida, Offutt AFB,
Nebraska, and Joint Base Langley Eustis, Virgina.
taking care of people: child development centers and dormitories
We strive to provide a high quality of life for our members and
their families. At the heart of that goal is affordable, accessible
childcare for our Airmen and Guardians and safe, high-quality dorms for
our unaccompanied members.
The inability to access affordable and quality childcare can impact
a service member's ability to report for duty and his or her decision
to stay in the service. To this end, the DAF is using a two-prong
programmatic approach to improve Child Development Centers (CDCs):
targeted investments in FSRM to address facility condition concerns,
and posturing MILCON projects to increase capacity. The DAF continues
to invest in CDCs through our MILCON and FSRM, of the 134 CDCs in the
DAF inventory none are in poor or failing condition.
In FY24, we are spending $46 million in FSRM funding on 11 CDC
projects, and in FY25 we intend to commit $50 million in FRSM funds for
CDC requirements.
Generous Congressional support in FY22 through FY24 funded most of
the CDC MILCON projects currently at an executable design stage, and
the DAF is actively working the design of CDC projects for inclusion in
future President's Budget and Unfunded Priority List submissions. The
Child and Youth Facility Master Plan facilitates project advocacy by
identifying CDC MILCON and FSRM projects that address child and youth
facility condition and capacity challenges. The FY25 President's Budget
includes a $40 million dollar CDC at Mountain Home AFB, Idaho which
will also serve as the Department's first use of mass timber.
Equally important to us is providing unaccompanied service members
high quality housing in our dormitory campuses. We will meet the FY22
NDAA Quality of Life requirements for permanent party dorms and are
committed to investing $1.1 billion, nearly a three-fold increase over
the previous 5 years, to address facility and living conditions through
FY26. The Government Accountability Office report on barracks
identified many issues; however, problems with our dorms are limited
and we remain committed to providing safe and adequate living
conditions.
In FY25, 99.3% of permanent party beds assess as adequate. From
FY22 through FY23, we funded 67 projects totaling $341 million to
repair and renovate dorms rooms. The DAF plans to spend approximately
$216M for 31 projects in FY24 to repair and improve dormitory
facilities. We are planning $300 million in FY25 FSRM to repair and
improve the condition of our dorms.
The DAF investment strategy for unaccompanied housing focuses on
restoration and modernization of dorms in their existing configurations
using FSRM funds, which allows MILCON funds to address capacity
shortfalls and facility recapitalization. Additionally, the DAF
appreciates the pilot program authority provided in the FY24 NDAA
allowing the replacement of dormitories using FSRM funds when needed
repairs exceeds 75% of the MILCON project to replace it. Though the DAF
has few dormitories which meet the replacement criteria, we can
certainly make great use in some high-need areas. The FY25 President's
Budget includes a request for two new dorm projects, one at Joint Base
Langley Eustis, Virgina, $81M, and the first increment of a Medical
Education and Training Campus dormitory at Joint Base San Antonio,
$77M.
fy25 air force milcon program
In FY25, the active-Duty Air Force and Space Force MILCON request
is $3.19 billion. This funding supports the DAF's commitment to
fulfilling NDS requirements, postures us for the future high-end fight,
and ensures we continue taking care of our Airmen, Guardians, and their
families. The program supports Combatant Commanders with a focus on the
Pacific and European theaters and modernizing the nuclear enterprise.
Additionally, the MILCON program continues efforts to bed down new
weapons systems and seeks to recapitalize facilities that have outlived
their useable life or no longer meet mission requirements. Our request
also focused on Planning and Design to reinforce the Air Force's MILCON
program stability and consistency. Program stability continues to be a
major focus, ensuring mature projects are included in the budget and
improve confidence they will award within programmed amount in the year
of appropriation.
combatant commander infrastructure
The FY25 MILCON program prioritizes Combatant Commander
requirements with a particular emphasis on the Indo-Pacific and
European theaters. Direct support to the Combatant Commanders accounts
for 20% of the FY25 MILCON request and aligns with the National Defense
Strategy to Build a More Lethal Force, while directly Prioritizing
Preparedness for War. Our FY25 program addresses some of the urgent
U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM), U.S. Strategic Command
(STRATCOM), and U.S. European Command (EUCOM) facility priorities.
Support to INDOPACOM will enhance the United States defensive
posture in the region, reassure allies and partners, and increase
readiness capabilities. The investment of resources to improve
infrastructure and facilities throughout the Indo-Pacific Theater
provides our allies, partners, and potential competitors a clear
indication of the United States' long-term commitment to the Pacific.
Two projects support the Pacific Deterrence Initiative (PDI) totaling
$247.7 million: a Runway extension at Yap Internation Airport ($96M),
Federated States of Micronesia; and a Theatre Corrosion Control Hangar,
Kadena AB, Japan ($132.7M).
The Air Force remains committed to European Defense Initiative
(EDI) efforts to reassure North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
allies and other European partners of United States commitment to
collective security and territorial integrity. In FY25, the Air Force
requests $110 million for EDI to support the prepositioning of
equipment in Denmark. This project will further improve deterrence
efforts in the theater and enable joint and coalition forces to quickly
respond to aggressive regional actors. The Air Force request also
supported Combatant Commands within the United States to include a
continued focus on Weapons Generation Facilities directly supporting
STRATCOM at Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota and Malmstrom AFB, Montana.
new mission bed downs
The NDS directs the Department of Defense to build a force that is
lethal, resilient, sustainable, survivable, agile, and responsive
through modernization of key capabilities; the first of which are
nuclear forces. The FY25 budget request continues the focus on
modernizing the nuclear enterprise by supporting the bed down of new
weapons systems and missions. The request includes three projects at
Ellsworth AFB, South Dakota, for a total of $177 million, and two
projects at Dyess AFB, Texas, totaling $31.3 million to beddown B-21
Raiders. It also includes three projects at F.E. Warren AFB, Wyoming,
totaling $403 million, a project at Malmstrom AFB, Montana, totaling
$20 million, and two projects at Vandenberg SFB, California, totaling
$277 million, to support transition from the Minuteman III
intercontinental ballistic missile weapon system to the Sentinel Weapon
System.
Sentinel will develop and deploy modern Aerospace Vehicle
Equipment, Command and Launch infrastructure (e.g. launch facilities,
launch centers, and other ground infrastructure), and Support Equipment
& Trainers. The Sentinel program is the largest Air Force land
acquisition effort since the original Minuteman, primarily to acquire
temporary construction easements for utility corridors in the missile
fields. Minuteman III-to-Sentinel conversion must occur on a precise
timeline to maintain the operational readiness of the nuclear deterrent
and deliver Full Operational Capability to the warfighter by 2036. We
will continue to inform Congress on the Air Force's progress during
design, construction, and commissioning of Sentinel facilities. Once
on-line, the B-21 Raider and Sentinel weapons systems will ensure the
Air Force can effectively deliver two- thirds of the Nation's nuclear
triad well into the future, should the need ever arise.
Approximately 41% of the program, $1.42 billion, supports New
Weapon Systems to ensure the DAF remains the world's premier Air and
Space Force. These systems include the Sentinel Ground Based Strategic
Deterrent, B-21 bomber, C-130J, F-35 fighter, T-7A training aircraft,
Long Range Stand Off facilities, F-16 fighter, Combat Rescue
Helicopter, Over the Horizon Radar System, and the E-11A Battlefield
Airborne Communications Node aircraft.
existing mission recapitalization
The FY25 request also includes $719.2 million funds current mission
projects, focusing on the most critical recapitalization of existing
infrastructure. The funding request includes a new dormitory in
Virginia, a dormitory in Texas, a Child Development Center in Idaho,
research facilities in Massachusetts, Joint Integrated Test and
Training Center in Alaska, Security Forces facility in Georgia, a Fire
Station in Ohio, the U.S. portion of a NATO Airlift Hangar in Spain,
and support for infrastructure in the United Kingdom.
planning and design
Planning and Design (P&D) remains a central focus of the DAF
program to reinforce program stability and consistency. Sufficient P&D
enables projects to progress rapidly through design and meet maturity
criteria for admissibility into the program, provides more accurate
cost estimates, and maximizes the opportunity to award projects in the
year of appropriation. Without sufficient P&D, the Air Force must award
designs by design phase, adding risk associated with costs and timely
delivery of design. The FY25 P&D request is $451.3 million, which is
consistent with last year's request to maintain a robust Space Force
P&D program ($84.9 million of the request) and includes weapons system
specific P&D supporting B-21, Over the Horizon Radar, Sentinel, and
other programs.
facility sustainment, restoration, and modernization (fsrm)
We view the FSRM and MILCON programs as interdependent. Together,
these two funding streams serve as the foundation of sustainable Air
Force installations. FSRM provides a non-MILCON pathway to repair
facilities and infrastructure, maximizing their lifespan. The FSRM
program prioritizes projects based on mission risk and commander
prioritization. In FY23, the Department of the Air Force's Deferred
Maintenance and Repair (DM&R) backlog surpassed $46.8 billion. This
represents a significant increase compared to previous years as is
contributable to a confluence of economic factors such as inflation,
increased labor and material costs, and continuation of post-pandemic
supply chain issues. The FY25 request includes $4.91 billion in FSRM
funding. Our priority for FSRM continues to be sustaining our existing
infrastructure with increased emphasis on quality-of-life projects
(i.e., dormitories, CDCs) and our operational and training
infrastructure. To maximize the near-term impact of current funding
levels, the Air Force will also continue to assess mission threat
vulnerabilities and prioritize infrastructure repair requirements which
directly affect an installation's primary mission. Our I2S drove
changes in how we execute FSRM funding distributed directly to
installations (considered decentralized FSRM), empowering Commanders to
make the right local investment decisions, including day-to- day
maintenance and smaller scale repair and sustainment projects, based on
mission requirements and I2S guidance.
housing construction, operation and maintenance
The Air Force prioritizes providing safe and healthy homes to our
families. The FY25 DAF Housing President's Budget requests $548 million
for housing construction, planning and design, and operations and
maintenance while focusing on eliminating inadequate housing from our
inventory and correcting health and life safety deficiencies. The Air
Force Housing program provides for housing construction, P&D, and
operations and maintenance using the Family Housing Master Plan (FHMP)
to posture a comprehensive investment strategy to execute projects at
the right time, scope, and cost.
The FY25 Family Housing construction request includes of $222M
funds $6.6 million for planning studies and design for future
construction projects, $65 million for two separate projects at Yokota
Air Base, Japan, providing whole house improvements of 51 homes for
Senior Non- Commissioned Officers, Company Grade Officers, and Field
Grade Officers, and $5.7 million to construct two deficit General
Officer Quarters and replace five garages at Ramstein AB, Germany.
Additionally, our request supports $144 million for restructures of
privatized housing Phase III at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson,
Alaska, and Lackland AFB, Texas.
The military family operations and maintenance request of $326
million supports the day- to-day operations and administration of our
military and privatized family housing, correcting health and safety
deficiencies, and provides for the alterations and major repair
projects to sustain and modernize the housing inventory of
approximately 15,200 government-owned family housing units and provides
enhanced oversight of over 52,000 privatized homes. The Air Force
continues to focus investment in the Air Force housing inventory to
provide adequate housing for all service members and their families.
privatized housing
Quality, affordable housing has a direct correlation to
recruitment, retention, and readiness. Hence, we remain focused on
improved oversight, long-term financial health, and sustainment of the
housing inventory. We are committed to ensuring Military Housing
Privatization Initiative (MHPI) projects provide safe, quality, and
well-maintained housing where military members and their families and
caregivers will want and choose to live.
We continue our efforts to improve our privatized housing portfolio
and address the remaining elements of the MHPI reforms set out in the
FY 2020-23 National Defense Authorization Acts (NDAA). We made
significant progress to implement reforms to enhance our oversight of
privatized housing and hold MHPI companies accountable for providing
quality housing. Specifically, several congressionally mandated
provisions were implemented throughout various DAF housing programs
including:
--FY 2020 NDAA Section 3011: We collaborated with the private-sector
MHPI companies to universally agree to adopt 18 rights set out
in the MHPI Tenant Bill of Rights. As Congress has recognized,
applying many of the Tenant rights at existing MHPI housing
projects requires voluntary agreement by the MHPI companies.
All companies will implement the 18 rights by the end of this
calendar year (2024).
--FY 2020 NDAA Section 3036: We implemented the amended section 606
payments to MHPI Projects to focus on the most urgent needs of
underfunded MHPI projects and ensure the projects invest these
funds investing appropriately to safeguard long-term project
viability.
--FY 2020 NDAA Section 3051: We began the process to complete
standardized privatized housing and government-owned housing
inspections and assessments at all locations. Using the DoD's
uniform housing standards, we completed a total of 45
inspections in FY23 and plan to complete the remaining 14 by
end of CY24.
--FY 2022 NDAA Section 2813: We verified the appropriate application
of Disability Laws and Collection of Modification Costs
requirements are documented in existing MHPI projects'
transaction documents. These requirements ensure the projects
make reasonable accommodations for any resident with a
disability.
In 2020, we added 218 government positions across the privatized
housing program, increased inspections, provided additional training to
housing personnel, and revamped housing governance. We continue to
maintain Resident Councils for two-way communication between the
residents and installation and project owner leadership. We then
utilize feedback from tenant satisfaction surveys to develop action
plans for improving the residents' experiences and encourage our Airmen
and Guardians, and their families to engage with Resident Advocates to
help resolve any disputes and improve communications among all relevant
DAF stakeholders.
We also expanded our metrics for assessing the health of the
privatized housing portfolio, particularly with regards to resident
satisfaction, maintenance quality and responsiveness, and property
management operations. Most of our private partners meet or exceed DAF
standards as prescribed in our metrics. However, when we identify
concerns with operational performance, we have placed a small number of
private partners on Community Action Plans, or if more systemic, on
Performance Improvement Plans with milestones and schedules. The goal
is to remedy deficiencies and ensure our military families receive
quality service and housing.
Some privatized housing projects require financial restructuring to
continue to remain financially stable and market comparable. The
restructure goals are to ensure the projects can fully fund operational
expenses, debt servicing, and sustainment of the homes for the life of
the lease and also fund reinvestment needs during the mid-term
reinvestment period. The FY25 President's Budget request includes $144
million to support two such restructures for the phase III project at
Joint Base Elmendorf- Richardson, Alaska, and the Lackland AFB, Texas
project.
environmental stewardship
The safety and health of the servicemen and women who work and live
on our installations, their families, and the surrounding communities
remain our highest priorities. We appreciate congressional support for
our efforts to address per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and
facilitate further progress in our Environmental Restoration Program.
environmental restoration
We are focused on being good stewards of the environment while also
meeting our cleanup obligations under the Comprehensive Environmental
Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) and the Resource
Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). Investigation objectives and
environmental response actions performed under these statutes aim to
reduce risk to human health and the environment in a risk-based,
prioritized manner at the approximately 15,000 restoration sites at our
active and closed installations. Currently, much of our restoration
program focus is on chemicals of emerging concern, most notably, PFAS.
The DAF PFAS response framework is built on the following lines of
effort: (1) protecting human health and the environment, (2) fulfilling
our cleanup obligations, (3) proactively communicating and
collaborating with stakeholders (local communities, States, Federal
agencies, and Congress), and (4) mitigating and eliminating aqueous
film forming foam (AFFF) use in accordance with NDAA requirements.
As of 30 September 2023, we've spent $2.1 billion to identify,
investigate, prevent, and respond to PFAS releases. Drinking water
response actions are complete at nine Base Realignment and Closure
(BRAC) installations and 31 Active, Reserve and Air National Guard
(ANG) installations. Response actions include providing bottled water,
installing point-of-use filtration or whole-house filtration systems,
and connecting residents to municipal water supplies.
The generous FY23 appropriations provided $216.4 million above the
budget request, of which $68 million is allotted to address PFAS at
BRAC installations. FY24 appropriations have also provided an
additional $5 million for PFAS, $15 million for RDT&E for PFAS
Destruction Technologies, and $23 million for PFAS at BRAC
installations. As of January 2024, we completed 100% (204
installations) of our CERCLA Preliminary Assessments and Site
Inspections and initiated 68% of our Remedial Investigations for 191
DAF installations. We are investigating the potential for other non-
AFFF PFAS sources in cleanup process and have leaned forward to take
prompt actions under CERCLA by implementing 23 interim remedial actions
to address drinking water impacts.
The FY24 budget includes $259 million to continue to identify,
investigate, mitigate, and respond to PFAS releases across our Active,
Reserve, Guard, and BRAC installations and we received an additional
$26 million to transition from AFFF to the new fluorine free foam (F3).
The FY25 budget request includes $362 million to further that effort.
On April 10, EPA announced a final proposed a national primary
drinking water regulation for six PFAS. We appreciate the clarity that
the final regulation provides and we remain committed to align our PFAS
research and remediation efforts with the state of the science and
State and Federal regulatory frameworks.
We proactively engage with community members concerned about the
environmental and health effects from PFAS and collaborate with our
local Restoration Advisory Boards (RABs) as we constantly strive to
improve our community outreach programs to be more inclusive and
responsive.
environmental quality
We manage our natural and built infrastructure to reduce risks to
human health, the environment, and the mission; comply with applicable
regulations, executive orders, and DoD policies; and continuously
improve our environmental stewardship. Specific efforts to ensure
compliance include detailed air quality assessments, management and
inspection of underground and above ground storage tanks, hazardous and
solid waste management and disposal, and environmental planning and
permitting procedures. Through these compliance programs, we continue
to protect the health of our Airmen, Guardians, and the environment by
making investments to meet regulatory requirements and promote efforts
to prevent non-compliance through pollution prevention programs and
routine inspections.
We remain firmly committed to a robust program of integrated
conservation management covering a full suite of environmental,
natural, and cultural resources. Conservation funding has allowed us to
invest in natural and cultural activities on and around our
installations and training ranges that provide direct support to
mission readiness. The conservation program FY24 budget of $106.2
million and the FY25 budget of $106.7 million supports ongoing habitat
and species management for 123 threatened and endangered species found
across 54 DAF installations and provides for continued cooperation and
collaboration with the other military Services, Federal Government
agencies such as the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, and
applicable State fish and game agencies. The DAF Cultural Resources
Program supports mission needs through maintaining our Integrated
Cultural Resources Management Plans. These 117 plans work to preserve
6,910 historic buildings and structures and 22,377 archaeological
sites.
Recent efforts carried out at Eglin AFB, Florida exemplify
integrated natural and cultural resources management and effective
partnerships. Archaeologists at Eglin teamed with biologists and
conservationists from the Choctawhatchee Basin Alliance to construct a
series of ``Living Shorelines'' to protect sensitive archaeological
sites from shoreline erosion while also enhancing natural habitat and
water quality.
We remain committed to responsible environmental stewardship. As
trustee for more than 8.3 million acres of land including forests,
prairies, deserts, wetlands, and coastal habitats, we understand the
important role natural resources play in maintaining our mission
capability. DAF collaborated with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
(USFWS), through the DoD Recovery and Sustainment Partnership, to
enhance mission operations and increase range access while protecting
at-risk species. In 2023, the USFWS officially removed the Okaloosa
darter from the Federal List of Endangered and Threatened Wildlife
after more than thirty years of successful recovery efforts and
proposed down-listing of the red-cockaded woodpecker from Endangered to
Threatened status after nearly 20 years of recovery efforts. These
great collaborative accomplishments were made against the backdrop of
the celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the Endangered Species Act.
As part of the recovery efforts in 2023, the AF Wildland Fire program
worked with USFWS, Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Colorado State and
Montana University Cooperators to treat 147,000 acres (of which 145,000
acres were treated with prescribed fire activities) in support of
habitat management for at risk species as well as to increase training
land availability. In addition, this collaboration assisted with
managing 14,000 acres of wildfires on DAF managed lands to reduce
impacts to daily training missions in support of the warfighter. FY24
funding and investments will allow us to continue to support our robust
conservation program.
base realignment and closure (brac)
BRAC received a generous $23 million plus-up for PFAS in FY24,
which will facilitate the execution of Interim Remedial Actions to
remove or treat PFAS and prevent its migration. The FY25 request for
BRAC cleanup and property transfer is $122 million. This funding will
facilitate environmental restoration and property transfer activities
at 34 former DAF installations closed through prior BRAC law and keep
us on-track to transfer the remaining four former installations by
2027.
united states space force
The Space Force was built specifically for Great Power Competition
as a lean, agile, and mission-focused military Service. To enable a
laser focus on primary missions, we have a partnership with the United
States Air Force for infrastructure, logistics, security, medical
services, and a host of other support functions at our Space Force
installations. Formal agreements, directives and instructions codify
stakeholder roles and responsibilities for support to the mission and
the Guardians, Airmen, Civilians, and their families who work and live
on Space Force installations.
Most of the combat-ready space forces that we field are ``Employed-
in-Place,'' meaning they execute Combatant Command missions from their
home station. Mission-ready, resilient installations and facilities are
integral to our readiness and effectiveness. Both the Space Force
Military Construction (MILCON) and Facility Sustainment, Restoration,
and Modernization (FSRM) programs prioritize power resiliency within
the Future Years Defense Program (FYDP). Additionally, assured access
to space procures launch services and delivers on-orbit capabilities
used by joint warfighters, combatant commands, intelligence agencies,
civilian services, and the commercial space industry. Over the next 5
years, our Spaceport of the Future program invests over a billion
dollars into our aging launch infrastructure to guarantee the
Department of Defense's ability to provide world-class launch
capability to public and private partners.
The Space Force receives, prioritizes, and obligates an independent
appropriation for Facility, Sustainment, Restoration and Modernization
(FSRM) funding. We have shown a commitment to resourcing infrastructure
requirements by identifying those projects that directly impact the
performance of weapons systems and prioritizing them for funding
consideration. The Department of the Air Force provides an allotment of
military Construction (MILCON) funding to the Space Force based on the
Space Force's portion of the total plant replacement value. This
approach provides flexibility to resolve resource challenges due to the
Space Force's prioritization of requirements as an independent Service.
We prioritize projects balancing weapons systems, quality of life, and
force support infrastructure requirements to reduce risk to mission and
address the requirements of an independent military Service.
military construction
MILCON increases capacity and readiness for the Space Force. In
FY24, the Space Force requested and was appropriated $132.3M. Projects
include a $15M Commercial Vehicle Inspection Facility, $12M for Final
Denial Barriers at the South Gate, and $15M to complete the
Consolidated Communications Center at Patrick Space Force Base,
Florida; and $90.3M for General Planning & Design (P&D), including $24M
for assured access to Space (Spaceport of the Future). This significant
P&D request was necessary for projects to rapidly develop, providing
accurate estimates and maximizing opportunity to award future MILCON
projects in the year of appropriation.
The Space Force's FY25 President's Budget Request includes $24.9M
for three Unspecified Minor Military Construction (UMMC) projects to
include two projects that support our Spaceport of the Future
initiative. Notably, the Space Force also requested $84.9M for P&D,
including $62.8M for Space Port of the Future.
facility sustainment, restoration, and modernization (fsrm)
We view the FSRM and MILCON programs as interdependent. Together,
these funding streams provide the sustainable foundation for 14 Space
Force installations and more than 70 smaller geographically separate
units, sites, and ranges. FSRM provides flexibility to repair
facilities and infrastructure, maximizing lifespan. The FY25 budget
request of $417M reflects a 39% decrease from FY24 requested levels.
The Space Force requested $679M in the FY24 President's Budget request.
The large increase in the FY24 request compared to FY23 includes funds
repair of a Pituffik Space Base Power Plant that powers the Missile
Warning/Missile Defense weapons systems, and electrical distribution
projects supporting both the Eastern and Western Space launch ranges.
The decrease in the FY25 request reoptimizes funding; it is a 42%/$124M
increase from the FY23 appropriated amount.
Thank you for the opportunity to discuss the Department's FY25
MILCON program. We appreciate Congress' continued support for our
enterprise and look forward to working with you on our FY25 priorities.
STATEMENT OF MR. BRUCE E. HOLLYWOOD, ASSOCIATE CHIEF
OPERATIONS OFFICER, UNITED STATES SPACE
FORCE
Mr. Hollywood. Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, and
distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to testify on behalf of the United States Space
Force for our Military Construction Program.
The Space Force was established to organize, train, and
equip Space Forces to secure our Nation's interests in, from,
and to space. The majority of our capabilities were built and
fielded in an era when our space systems were unchallenged and
our installations were safe havens.
Now, in this era of great power competition, our
challengers are aggressively fielding capabilities to contest
and control the space domain, fundamentally shifting space from
a peaceful expanse to a warfighting domain. They are also
challenging our installations at home and abroad. It is
impossible to overstate the importance of our Space Force
installations, and we work hard to be good stewards of the
resources you provide.
Our installations serve as home to our guardians, airmen,
mission partners, and their families, who work, live, rest, and
recuperate there. Most of our combat-ready guardians are
employed in-place, meaning they execute, they are combatant-
command-directed, and service missions from their home
stations, using that infrastructure and equipment across the
entire spectrum of conflict to provide essential capabilities
to the Joint Force.
We are strategically examining our bases that may be
impacted by climate change and planning resilience into our
mission operations while protecting the guardians and airmen
stationed in potentially vulnerable locations. The Department
of the Air Force provides an allotment of military construction
funding to the Space Force, providing flexibility to our
capacity to prioritize projects balancing weapons system,
quality of life, and Force support infrastructure. Assured
access to space is a key to the Space Force providing our
capabilities and support to national security.
We thank Congress for the $24 million in planning and
design appropriated in fiscal year 2024 for Spaceport of the
Future that will help keep our launch enterprise globally
competitive, and provide for the exponential increase in launch
activity, further protecting vital United States interests.
Space Force Military Construction Programs are critical to
performing our mission and to the well-being of our guardians,
supporting airmen, and their families. Notably, the Space Force
requests $84.9 million in fiscal year 2025 for planning and
design, including $62.8 million for Spaceport of the Future
requirements.
This Space Force's fiscal year 2025 President's Budget
Request also includes $24.9 million for three unspecified minor
military construction projects to include two projects
supporting Spaceport of the Future.
Thank you again for your generous support for our people
and our missions through the Military Construction Programs. I
look forward to our dialogue. Semper supra.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Mr. Hollywood. We will now begin
a round of five-minute questions for our panel. I ask all my
colleagues to please keep track of your clock and stay within
those five minutes. I will start with the first round of
questions.
My first question is for Assistant Secretary Owens. DOD is
undertaking several significant concurrent infrastructure
programs on Guam, requiring extensive inter-department and
interagency coordination, not to mention base and emergency
funding. It is critical that these efforts do not get bogged
down in bureaucracy, preventing the services and agencies from
making timely decisions aligned with the budget cycle. The
Department also needs to determine requirements, particularly
for the Defense of Guam Program, to inform the MILCON Design
and Construction time line.
Could you describe OSD's role in this process, and how are
you balancing serving a coordinating function with ensuring
speed and decisiveness in developing requirements and executing
on them?
General Owens. Thank you, Chair Sinema, for the opportunity
to talk about this. I have been to Guam one time, and we are
going back again this year because it is such a critical node
in INDOPACOM. One of the things that our office is doing is
working through a series of governance structures. One of them
is the Guam Infrastructure and Community Support Working Group.
This group was pulled together under my office to work through
construction capacity and sequencing. There is a tremendous
amount, as you just pointed out, of work that is going to be
happening there, and the tool that we built to understand
serves as a central repository for all of the things that are
going to be happening.
So the buildings, the operational projects, the
infrastructure, all of those projects need to be executed in
order to do the mission on Guam. And the sequencing tool
enables us to be able to have a common operating picture and
allows us to be able to look at limitations in terms of
construction capacity, project interdependency, mission need
date, budgeting, and it enables us to run scenarios to be able
to understand how we lay down various things.
Because the reality is that projects that are the most
critical might be one or 2 years down the line. What are we
doing now to take up the available construction capacity that
we have in order to implement things that maybe aren't as high
on the list from a criticality standpoint?
So our office is coordinating all these things, and we are
reporting up through the Senior Leader Installation Council and
the Guam Synchronization Oversight Council, which is chaired by
Undersecretary LaPlante and Undersecretary Raven from the Navy,
to be able to bring all these things together and make sure
that we are not going to be having a significant pileup of
projects that are unable to execute in out years.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. Lieutenant General Miller, the
Air Force is still carrying out its recovery program from prior
year hurricanes, and flooding has had a $200 million shortfall,
all while planning and programming for significant needs on
Guam following Typhoon Mawar in May 2023. What is the likely
impact on the Air Force MILCON Program if you were forced to
fund the Typhoon Recovery Program out of base funding rather
than emergency funding, as we typically do for natural disaster
recovery?
General Miller. Thank you, Senator, for the question. In my
view, Senator, there is no ability for the Air Force baseline
budget to absorb a level of magnitude of the disaster that
happened from this typhoon.
For parallel, we have spent $300 million in immediate
direct FSRM dollars to hit the immediate requirements, but this
is on a scale close to twice what the national disaster
recovery requirement was when a Cat 5 hurricane directly hit
Tyndall Air Force Base in 2018. And then also, of course, for
the flood, the national disaster recovery process, that was
through a supplemental through this subcommittee showed great
flexibility in being able to execute the projects in the
sequence. Much like Honorable Owens is describing, the
sequencing is so important, and there is--dependencies
between--we found multiple dependencies a year into the
construction, which weren't immediately available. But to get
to your point very rapidly, supplemental, I think, is the only
path to be able to absorb this.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. Lieutenant General Vereen, this
year's request is heavily focused on training and maintenance
infrastructure and quality of life facilities. At the same
time, Army Test and Evaluation Command has numerous unfunded
minor and major MILCON requirements, including at the Yuma Test
Center at Yuma Proving Ground. Could you just briefly discuss
how you are prioritizing test and evaluation infrastructure
requirements against all the other facility demands across the
Army enterprise, and are you addressing those needs in other
ways?
General Vereen. Chair Sinema, thank you for the question.
So of course, we are absolutely trying to balance our budget
with some other competing requirements. I think there is a
testament to the Army on our focus on barracks, and barracks is
consuming quite a bit of our budget when you look at our MILCON
and our infrastructure requirements. It is consuming a lot of
our dollars and resources. So we are having to make some tough
decisions on what we choose to fund versus what we will have to
defer to another year.
But part of that is balancing both our barracks
infrastructure, where we are investing $2.1 billion, as you
well know, and then balancing it with our operational MILCON,
which is where the other facilities fall in line, and the test
and evaluation is part of that.
So we are going to continue to look at where we can provide
trade opportunities, and our Army senior leaders, and we will
be committed to ensuring that we both balance what we are
trying to do for soldiers and families, versus trying to ensure
that we continue to have an Army that can train and prepare for
its combat mission.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. I would like to yield to Vice
Chair of the Full Committee, Senator Collins, for her five
minutes.
Senator Collins. Thank you very much, Chair Sinema, and my
thanks to the Vice Chair Boozman for his typical graciousness
in allowing me to proceed.
Admiral, let me start with you. This year's request
includes $401 million for the fifth increment of the Multi-
Mission Dry Dock No. 1 Extension at the Portsmouth Naval
Shipyard in Kittery, Maine. Along with New Hampshire's Senator
Jeanne Shaheen, I have visited the shipyard many times to see
the dry dock construction. I am always struck by the complexity
of this monumental task, but I am also impressed with the
progress that is being made.
And of course, modernizing the Dry Dock No. 1 is absolutely
essential to maintaining fleet readiness. Too many of our
submarines are not able to be deployed because they are waiting
for maintenance that is critical. This will help to eliminate
deferred availabilities and provide the capacity necessary to
maintain the Navy's Virginia-Class submarine fleet.
The recently passed National Security Supplemental, I am
pleased to say, included $100 million to support this
modernization effort. Could you give us an update on the
project's progress, and some time line for when you think this
will be completed? And my second question to you, is the
project on track, is it on schedule?
Admiral Jablon. Senator, thank you for that question. As
you highlighted, our Shipyard Infrastructure Optimization
Program is critical to the national defense of our nation. It
addresses our four public shipyards for our nuclear-powered
aircraft carriers and our submarines, increasing the efficiency
of getting those platforms out of maintenance in a quicker time
period to get more players on the field. In fact, the SIOP
investments will get submarines out 8 percent quicker, aircraft
carriers out 10 percent quicker.
As you mentioned, Dry Dock No. 1 in Portsmouth, New
Hampshire is really a complicated endeavor--I am sorry,
Portsmouth, Maine. I am sorry.
Senator Collins. Kittery, Maine, even though it is called
the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.
Admiral Jablon. Yes, ma'am. I was stationed up there for
about 3 years of my career, so I have had two submarines in the
shipyard myself. And I enjoyed it very much. But a very, very
complicated endeavor, Dry Dock 1 is split into north, west, and
east. They are doing the construction with a submarine in Dry
Dock 1 East right now, and I thank Congress for the
supplemental that added $100 million for that construction
effort.
As far as whether it is on-plan or off-plan, it is slightly
off-plan right now by about 1 percentage point off-plan with
respect to time. But the $100 million supplemental will add
flexibility for the project management team to get us back on
plan, and that will meet a mission need date in fiscal year
2027 for our submarine that is going to enter that dry dock. So
we are following this program very closely. It is critical to
our national defense. And again, I thank Congress for that
supplemental.
Senator Collins. Thank you very much. Didn't mean to tease
you about the location, about half the workers are from New
Hampshire, half are from Maine, but it is located in Kittery,
Maine, an issue that went all the way to the Supreme Court at
one point.
Admiral Jablon. Yes, ma'am. I lived in York, Maine, while I
was there.
Senator Collins. That showed good judgment.
[Laughter.]
Senator Collins. General Miller, your unfunded priority
list includes a fuel cell hangar at the Bangor Air National
Guard Base, which is home of what we call the Maineiacs, the
Maine Air National Guard's 101st Air Refueling Wing. I don't
think I need to tell you how critical that wing has been in
doing refueling of so much of our military aircraft. At one
point, it was doing more refuelings than any active duty base
on the East Coast.
So could you explain why this project for the fuel cell
hangar is important and how it can support legacy airframes
like the KC-135, while also preparing for future refueling
tankers?
General Miller. Vice Chair Collins, thanks for the
question. Air refueling is the difference in the reach the
United States Air Force and Navy and Marine Corps has with its
air power. So the tanker mission throughout the globe and the
mission there in particular is absolutely vital. I am an
aircraft maintenance officer, it is what I have done my entire
life. So the maintenance on weapon systems is critical, and the
fuel cell in particular for a tanker mission is open fuel cell,
explosive-proof lighting, air handling equipment, because the
mission of the airplane is to refuel other airplanes.
That agile common hangar that is being planned can
accommodate multiple KC-46 and KC-135. We have evolved in our
thinking on facilities so that when we recapitalize to
different airplanes, we don't have the dimensions restricted
down to the legacy airplane. So thinking forward is going to
help us there. And thank you for that question.
Senator Collins. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. Senator Tester, you are
recognized.
Senator Tester. Thank you for holding the hearing, Madam
Chair, and Ranking Member. Thank you all for your testimony.
I want to start with the Sentinel project. General Miller,
probably not a surprise to you. Wyoming, North Dakota, Montana,
and Montana has got Malmstrom Air Force Base. Can you give me--
has there been a timeline for when this project is to start? I
am not talking about Montana. I am talking about Sentinel, in
general, when is it going to start?
General Miller. Senator Tester, thank you for the question.
Sentinel being everything from land acquisition, which requires
that----
Senator Tester. Yeah. It is a big project.
General Miller. A very big project.
Senator Tester. When is it going to start?
General Miller. So right now, as you know, I know you are
very well aware, the Nunn-McCurdy breach review process is
ongoing.
Senator Tester. And it should be done in probably June, I
hope. So when is it going to start?
General Miller. Yes, sir. I am hearing early July.
Senator Tester. Okay.
General Miller. So there is--separate from Sentinel, there
is other weapons generation facility and other----
Senator Tester. Yeah, but Sentinel, when is Sentinel going
to start?
General Miller. So Sentinel, once the review process, which
we are supporting through the Office of Secretary of Defense, I
think in early July is what I am hearing. If there is any
recalibration of the way forward, we are going to learn it from
that OSD support.
Senator Tester. Sure. But when is the project going to
start? Is it going to start in 2029, 2028, 2027, 2026, and
2025?
General Miller. Senator, I will have to take that for the
record. I will get you an answer.
Senator Tester. Okay. So this is a $96 billion project.
When I came on the committee, the Defense Committee, I was
informed that China and Russia, and you talked about in your
opening statement, are incredible threats. I can tell you from
a deterrent standpoint, the ICBMs have been an incredible
deterrent for the bad guys in this world. I have also been told
and educated, mostly by the Military, by the way, that this is
an essential project if we were going to have it done.
It is going to be over $100 billion, I believe. Probably
well over that. But if there is one thing that you need to
know, and the people above you need to know, and the people
below you need to know, is this project will never happen
unless we have a date to start. And then we have a time line,
and we move forward with that time line.
This is essential. I have been talking about this for
years. Everybody that I have talked to that has come into my
office, and you probably know this, I have asked about the
Sentinel Project. When is it going to start?
If we continue not to have a starting date, this will never
start. And it puts this country at a tremendous risk. I don't
need to tell you that. You are dealing with this every single
day.
So hopefully you can get folks back to me, because we put
$200 million in fiscal year 2024 for Sentinel, which by the
way, I could go down the list and ask you what that is being
spent for, because if we don't know when this project is going
to start, I don't know how you can spend that money in a way
that is cost-effective to the taxpayer and for our Nation's
security.
So if you could get that for me, because the next issue is
workforce. This has an opportunity to do a lot of good things
in Wyoming, North Dakota, Montana, and for the country. But the
worst thing that could happen, and I have told Bechtel this,
and I have told Northrop Grumman this, is if they bring in
4,000 or 5,000 workers, or however many it is going to take to
do this, from outside the state to do this project, it will
create a tremendous animosity towards the Air Force on this.
Montana has built Sentinel 1, and they will build this one,
too, if you give them an opportunity to do that. And I can
help. Montana can help. Our trade schools can help. Our high
schools can help. We can all help. We have people who work with
their hands all the time, and so we do that.
So I would hope that once we get a time line, then we can
start talking about workforce, and start getting this done.
There is $700 million in this proposal for Sentinel, what is it
going to be used for if we don't know when the starting date
is? Okay?
This is really important stuff. And to be honest with you,
I have not been able to, and I sat as chair of the Defense
Appropriations Committee, I have not been able to get a time
line. And people say, well, you know, Nunn-McCurdy is coming
out. Look, there wasn't a time line before Nunn-McCurdy. There
needs to be a time line. There needs to be goals. We need to
get this done. This is a big project. We cannot plan until we
get a time line. Okay? Appreciate that. I appreciate your
service, too, by the way. Go ahead.
General Miller. And the Air Force completely recognizes
that this leg of the triad is the most responsive. It is the
most complicated target, and telegraphing effectively to
communities on the workforce that will be needed enable them to
work through trade schools, all the things that you were just
describing. I believe the program office is looking at a study
specifically on that. I will get with them and----
Senator Tester. But here is the point, and I will get off
this, and I will turn it over to the next questioner. We are
going to study with Nunn-McCurdy, we can study, study, study,
study, study.
If we study, the Chinese are going to eat our lunch. We
have got a plan. We have got to do it right. But this isn't
nuclear physics. It is a lot of damn work, and so we need to
get on it. Please, please, please, please, please do that.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
General Miller. Thank you, Senator.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. Ranking Member is recognized for
his questions.
Senator Boozman. Thank you, Madam Chair. I mentioned that
the chair corrected me in a gentle way on Veterans Affairs; as
my Chairman over here, Senator Tester, not so gentle.
Senator Tester. He never makes mistakes.
[Laughter.]
Senator Boozman. Yeah. So thank you all again for being
here and thank you for your service, very much. I want to
follow up on the Guam question. I know how important it is.
And Admiral Jablon, the Navy submitted 1.3 billion in the
domestic supplemental for MILCON recovery efforts on Guam as a
result of the typhoon. Guam is an important strategic hub we
all agree that plays a crucial role with INDOPACOM. Can you
explain the impact the typhoon had and why it is critical that
we address the infrastructure damage? And if your fiscal year
2025 request addresses any of the requirements or do they
remain unfunded?
Admiral Jablon. Senator, thank you for that question. As a
former Commander of Submarine Force Pacific, my previous job to
this job, I was in charge of the submarines that were forward
deployed, stationed in Guam. So I visited Guam every quarter to
observe my submarine operations and also the infrastructure.
The strategic importance of Guam is not only important to the
Navy, but also the Joint Force, and the Mawar Typhoon that
ravaged the islands did a lot of damage to our critical
infrastructure, and our projects that we were planning to work
on.
Two of the projects that you referenced on the unfunded
priorities list, the Breakwater, Glass Breakwater and the HSC-
25 Hangar, that is an expeditionary helicopter squadron that
flies MH-60 Sierras. Those really need to be repaired and they
are going cost a lot of money as you say, $600 million for the
breakwater, $580 million for the hangar.
The breakwater itself will come out of a restoration and
modernization funds. And the importance of that breakwater is
that if that breakwater fails, and due to the typhoon, there is
greater than 20 percent damage that occurred to the breakwater.
And if that breaches the inbound and outbound traffic going to
Apra Harbor will not be allowed to go in. And so that includes
our submarines, our Navy surface ships, our submarine tenders
that are stationed there. So it is very vital to operations in
Guam.
That is, comes out of Restoration Modernization funds. The
Navy will have to get this going, we are going have to use $300
million of our current restoration modernization funds from
other projects to get a bid out there for funding of this. With
respect to the hangar, right now we are using the Marine Corps
hangar for our helicopters, but we are not going be able to use
that forever. It is located on the Anderson Air Force Base, and
that will use MILCON dollars to repair that hangar, which is of
vital importance.
So it has a substantial affect on Navy's MILCON and
restoration modernization funding if we do not receive
supplemental funding for that.
Senator Boozman. No, I think that is very helpful. Thank
you. As I mentioned earlier, I am concerned about the mandatory
use of the project labor agreements, which can result in cost
overruns and higher construction costs.
I know we are in the early stages of implementation, but
Lieutenant General Miller, can you share some early examples
what the Air Force has seen, and what the impact would be on
the program if this data proved to be an accurate
representation of the PLAs?
General Miller. Thank you, Ranking Member Boozman, for the
question. Effective in February of '24, so as you described, it
is early and we don't have the details. It is still--the first
project for the Air Force that would be affected by this is a
basic military training dorm at Joint Base San Antonio in
Texas. Early indications from the Corps of Engineers is there
will be significant cost increases, unfortunately, at this
point in the stage, we don't have the granular difference
between what is the PLA-affected inflation cost, cost of
construction in that area. Early indications are it is a
significant increase. Unfortunately, at this time, don't yet
have the granular details of it.
Senator Boozman. Well, we look forward to following up as
time goes by and understanding that better. Again, it sounds
like that is going have a major impact.
General Miller. Yes, sir.
Senator Boozman. And with that, I yield back, Madam Chair.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Ranking Member.
I recognize Senator Peters for his questions.
Senator Peters. Thank you, Madam Chair. And gentlemen,
welcome. And again, thank you for your service as well.
Secretary Owens, my first question is for you, and it is
very local in nature, but it also has a major impact in states
all across the country. We are hoping to include additional
planning and design funding for the fiscal year 2025 Bill for
several important projects in my home state of Michigan,
including a new National Guard Readiness Center at the Olympia
Armory in Detroit. I would like you to speak, if you would, to
how important these investments are, investments like the new
National Guard Readiness Center in Detroit, and why it is
critical for the Army to make these investments to ensure that
we have the readiness we need?
General Owens. Thank you for the question, Senator, and
thank you for the advocacy on behalf of Michigan in this
instance. I think that as with all the training centers that we
have around and deployed throughout the Department of Defense,
they are critical to be able to generate the people that we
need to execute the mission. Beyond that, I would be happy to
get back to you on the specifics for the projects that you are
interested in.
Senator Peters. Right, well, I look forward to working with
you in the future on that.
General Owens. Absolutely. Yes.
Senator Peters. And to have your commitment to do that. I
appreciate it.
General Miller, the Air Force is investing $8.9 billion
over the next 5 years to research and build up to 1,000
unmanned collaborative combat aircraft, as you are well aware.
As part of this process, the Air Force recently down-selected
the two competitors to build the initial versions of this
innovative platform. Given these significant investments in the
rapid fielding time line, what funding is needed to prepare for
the CCAs?
General Miller. Thank you, Senator, for the question. The
collaborative combat aircraft, really, especially for this
subcommittee, I think it is going to look differently than a
traditional, say, fighter operation. Part of the Force design
work that needs to be done is to understand, you know, what
would be the maintenance facilities that are required for that?
What is the crew ratio? Not only for operators, because they
will clearly be uncrewed in the aircraft, but what is the
maintenance turn time, weapon storage areas?
So right now, they are still in the Force design of how
best to use collaborative combat aircraft. I think that will
have implications for the subcommittee when looking at MILCON,
modifications to current facilities, and if there is new
facilities that are required that don't exist today, it really
needs to be informed by that design.
Senator Peters. Yeah. And it is going to be a work in
progress, but critically important. It is going to look
different. And given it is going look different for our active
duty bases, my question for you is, how is the Air Force
allocating funding to Guard and Reserve components to ensure
that they, too, are prepared for the CCAs, both from a basing
perspective, maintenance perspective, and a training
perspective?
General Miller. Yes, sir, great point on--for Guard,
Reserve, and Active Duty, all three components, whether it is a
change to an existing mission or a new mission is ongoing,
feathering through the changes that occur in a unit, and what
MILCON requirements within the Air Force budget has to be done
in a sequenced manner across many years, which I am sure you
have seen over and over and over again.
When the current--the new mission MILCON that is consuming
quite a bit of active duty Air Force MILCON requirements right
now, is a sequence now for Sentinel, as described, B-21, as
that comes online, of course for the Guard, Reserve, and Active
Duty F-35 MILCON requirements, I think the Force design piece
of what this really will mean for a construct for Guard,
Reserve, and Active Duty is not yet known until the Force
design is there. But it has to be feathered together with the
other new military construction that we are doing. So work for
us to do, Senator.
Senator Peters. Um-hum. And I think there is a certain
role, a very important role for Air Guard units when it comes
to CCAs, would you agree?
General Miller. Absolutely, yes, sir.
Senator Peters. Yeah, good.
Secretary Owens, the Army and Air National Guard play a
critical role in supporting Total Force, as you mentioned in
the previous question. However, due to chronic shortfalls in
funding, they often lack modernized facilities to support their
training, their readiness, emergency response, as well as
homeland defense missions, which is a critical part of what
they do. And without these modern facilities, our National
Guard Service members are struggling to meet both global as
well as local challenges. So with this in mind, how does your
fiscal year 2025 budget request support National Guard
construction efforts specifically?
And also a very important follow-up question to that, how
is the Department undertaking to ensure that there is actual
equitable distribution of those funds for Guard and Reserve
components around the country?
General Owens. Thank you, Senator Peters. I think those two
questions are linked very directly. And I think I would start
by saying that the fiscal year 2025 budget is focused on
creating the conditions to implement the Sustainment Management
System that we have been working towards over the course of the
last several years.
What this gives us is granularity in an understanding of
where our FSRM backlog lies. So instead of looking at the
entire facility Sustainment, Restoration and Modernization
backlog as one big chunk, we are looking down at a specific
asset and understanding what risk we are taking in the
underfunding or shifting the funding around. Because a training
center, versus a child development center, versus a warehouse,
has very different profiles when you underfund them, and I
think that in terms of the way that we are going to be able to
get much more granular in our understanding of what risk lies
where and how to trade off that risk when--while we are making
our determinations will give us the ability to have much more
visibility into where the--where we need to surge money in
certain instances and understand what the ramifications of the
risk that we are taking when we are pulling back in certain
circumstances.
Senator Peters. Very good. Thank you. Thank you, Madam
Chair.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. Senator Fischer.
Senator Fischer. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
General Miller, I am pleased to see that the Air Force
awarded the SAOC Program contract last week. Our existing fleet
of E-4Bs must be replaced and there can be no gap in
operational capability. These aircraft are a central component
of our MC-3. In all contingencies, including the worst case
scenarios, the SAOC will ensure continuity of government and
provide national leaders with the ability to command U.S.
Military Forces and execute emergency war plans.
While the President's budget request included significant
funding for the program itself, I was deeply concerned to see
that it did not include any funding for the military
construction projects that are needed to support the SAOC. As
you know, these aircraft and the airmen operating the aircraft,
they need hangars, and maintenance, and supply storage, on and
on. If we expect these new facilities to be ready by the very
early 2030s, we need to start planning and designing for them
as soon as possible.
The Chief of Staff of the Air Force's unfunded priorities
list does include a request for $158 million for planning and
design funding to support SAOC Military Construction projects;
and that is a good start. And I look forward to working with
this committee to include that funding in our fiscal year 2025
Appropriations Bill.
However, General Miller, to be clear, I expect funding for
these Military Construction Projects to be included in the base
budget requests in the future. There is a clear requirement for
these projects, and they must be ready by the time the SAOC
reaches initial operating capability. Clear?
General Miller. Yes.
Senator Fischer. Thank you, sir, very much. And I
appreciate all that you have done in working for Offutt and
making sure that we are moving ahead there. This subcommittee
has worked closely with the Department to reconstitute much of
the capability that we lost in the Indo-Pacific after the Cold
War, while many of these projects will be on Guam, we are also
looking at projects in the Marshall Islands, and throughout the
region.
Secretary Owens, how would you describe the investments
proposed by this budget request to improve our posture in the
Indo-Pacific?
Mr. Owens. Thank you for the question, Senator, on this
critical area. We are investing almost $10 billion in PDI this
year to posture ourselves well. Much of that is going to Guam,
Hawaii, CNMI, throughout the region. We are also investing
money through exercise-related construction, and other forms,
to help bolster our partnerships in the Indo-Pacific,
specifically with the Philippines, for example. And then also
with other places to be able to make sure that we have the
resources that we need to make sure that we have the support
for all the PDI that is going -- that we need to work on.
Senator Fischer. I think all of us are very concerned about
the pace with which we are moving on any project, any project
that is out there. We see delays, very few are able to meet
their schedules. When we look at these, are there any
authorities that Congress can help you with? How do we
accelerate, let alone meet deadlines, how do we accelerate the
construction projects across the board, but specifically in the
Indo-Pacific?
Mr. Owens. Senator, if you could shrink the entire AOR that
would be great. I don't think that is a realistic request, so I
would----
Senator Fischer. Do we need to shrink the bureaucracy?
Mr. Owens. I think that the challenges are tyranny of
distance in many instances. Guam is a very difficult place to
get cement to, to get steel to, and the challenges that we have
in addition to just the tyranny of distance are the limiting
factors of the construction capacity--or sorry, the port
capacity. So Admiral Jablon mentioned that this is something
that is problematic from a warfighting perspective, it is also
problematic from a construction perspective.
If that breakwater fails, then our ability to bring the
things that we need to bring to Guam, to build the
infrastructure, to defend Guam is compromised as well. So I
think there is much more.
Senator Fischer. Besides the AOR and the distances involved
specifically in the Indo-Pacific, are you seeing continuing
issues with supply chain?
Mr. Owens. Continuing issues with supply chain----
Senator Fischer. Can you get the stuff you need?
Mr. Owens. There are challenges that we are working to
overcome. I think part of what the Deputy Secretary did in
putting the Undersecretary of the Navy as the Senior Defense
Official on Guam, for example, was in order to make sure that
the synchronization of all of these efforts was something that
could happen expeditiously.
Senator Fischer. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. Senator Heinrich, you are
recognized.
Senator Heinrich. Thank you, Chair Sinema.
Mr. Hollywood and General Miller, as you both know, New
Mexico is home to many of the Nation's core space assets. We
have Air Force Research Labs, Space Systems Command, the Space
Rapid Capabilities Office, and the incoming Space Force Delta
11 Training Mission. Secretary Kendall and General Saltzman
recently revealed plans to build up a new Space Force Futures
Command, and sort of began to articulate how the Space Force
will look to leverage existing MILCON capabilities, industry
capacity, when considering where to house a new Futures
Command.
So would you both talk to me about how the Air Force and
Space Force are thinking about that sort of existing ecosystem
and infrastructure in the decisionmaking process for that?
Mr. Hollywood. Senator Heinrich, thank you very much for
that question. First, Lieutenant General Miller and the Air
Force take great care of us in providing support on
installations. Space Force Futures Command came out of our
analysis for optimizing great power competition. And we
realized that we had a lot of disaggregated functions and
activities that we were already performing, but we realized if
we can put them together, we can optimize. We will test and
exercise concepts, future missions, equipment, and then we will
put some real analysis behind it so that we can best spend the
dollars to put the maximum capability in as we do our Force
design.
Right now, sir, there are no plans for MILCON. We haven't
made plans or a request. We are working through the design of
what this needs to look like, what things we need to put
together to be effective. And once we do, sir, I will make sure
that we get back with you when we are ready to go through a
basing decision and start putting the structure together.
Senator Heinrich. General Miller.
General Miller. Senator Heinrich, good to see you again. I
don't think I have seen you since I was the installation
commander at Kirtland, actually, several years ago, so good to
see you again.
The only thing I could add to Mr. Hollywood's point is, as
a Department of the Air Force, two services, one department, we
look at all of these aspects as a Department. Mr. Hollywood and
I can almost finish each other's sentences in many of the
meetings we are in, so I can assure you that from a Department
of the Air Force standpoint, there aren't cylinders. It is one
department, and we are looking at it that way.
Senator Heinrich. Excellent. I am glad to hear that. On
base, and this is going be for all of the services, but on base
and privatized housing continue to be one of the top issues
facing rural installations in New Mexico, and I suspect across
the country. Service members and their families at Cannon Air
Force Base, Holloman Air Force Base, White Sands Missile Range,
are consistently facing challenges in finding adequate housing,
and then that negatively impacts mission readiness, recruiting,
and obviously, retention.
So for each Service represented here, walk through for us
what specifically you are doing to ensure that rural
installations are receiving the kind of housing support, and
planning, and capacity that they need. And maybe start with
General Miller, and then just go across.
General Miller. Thanks, Senator. For two parts, one for
accompanied housing--so the maintenance, or not maintenance--
the housing requirements analysis that is done with the
community that we do, multiple-year and five-year increments,
look at the capacity requirement, the distance of driving, what
is the footprint for a family and accompanied housing
requirement, looking at that balance against the inventory that
is on base, privatized housing throughout the United States,
and looking at that inventory.
And then separately, we have talked about dorms, barracks.
There is actually some opportunity at Edwards Air Force Base is
looking at a privatized apartment, which I wouldn't call as a
barracks, but more of a--it is 16 miles from the front gate to
the first building at Edwards, so it is a fair bit of a drive.
Within the footprint of the privatized housing enclave, there
is initial thoughts of having an apartment complex, which would
be not for someone that is in the dorm, but someone who is
either left the dorm, or is unaccompanied and just has, within
the footprint, we think there is a business case there at many
bases, possibly rural bases may have some other opportunity in
New Mexico.
Senator Heinrich. Go ahead.
General Banta. Senator, thanks very much for the question.
So housing, both accompanied and unaccompanied, are incredibly
important to the Marine Corps, specifically with respect to
rural locations, they are looked at, as are all of our other
locations, on adequacy and supply relative to demand. I will
note that in this year's, not in our budget, because this is
our PPV partner in Yuma, who is actually building 60 additional
units to be able to accommodate families there.
From an unaccompanied housing perspective, we are also
looking at potential business case opportunities, we are at PPV
unaccompanied housing, but we want to take a very deliberate
look at that to make sure it works for us.
Senator Heinrich. Great, sir.
Admiral Jablon. Senator, thank you for that question. This
really goes to the point of quality of service for our sailors
and our families. Obviously, if we don't have the housing
available, the right housing that will meet our standards, then
that will affect retention and recruiting. As far as what
General Banta said, the Navy takes the same steps, looking at
privatized housing, unaccompanied housing, and also the housing
available in the area, as far as manning that installation,
especially in rural areas, and the availability of housing for
that. So we have a step process to ensure that we have the
housing available for our sailors before we send them to rural
areas.
General Vereen. Senator, thank you for the question. I
think we are consistent with all the other services. It is
really about understanding the market externally to our
installations. We do pride ourselves, however, we want our
soldiers and families to stay on base housing if they can, and
choose to, and there is housing available. That is our first
option. But again, we are scanning the market to ensure that
those communities can accommodate our families.
Senator Heinrich. Thank you, Chair Sinema.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. Senator Murkowski, you are
recognized.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you. And thank you, gentlemen, for
your comments this morning, and in all that you do. Just to
follow on Senator Heinrich's question about housing. I think
when we talk about quality of life, one of the things that we
are hearing more and more is housing matters and child care
matters.
So specific to the housing piece; and this is directed to
you, General Miller. As you know, in Eielson, we have been
really challenged with adequate housing as we look to bring,
whether it is the F-35s, or just all that is going on at
Eielson. I have been a little disappointed to see that the Air
Force is not necessarily leaning in on the dormitory project
there at Eielson.
We saw the fiscal year '24 Approps Bill that provided the
planning and design to get it to 35 percent, but the budget
request didn't include anything for moving this forward to 100
percent. So if we are able to provide funding in fiscal year
'25 to get the project to 100 percent design, will the Air
Force prioritize it for construction funding than in the next
fiscal year?
Thank you, Senator Murkowski, for the question. The $9.5
million for planning and design is critical, which we will move
to the P&D, which, to get it to the 35 percent, as you
described, so it can become before this subcommittee. For the
Military Construction Project Prioritization that goes across
all the MAJCOMs, that process will not be until this fall. So I
think there is enough time for us to have an answer on whether
we will get the funding for that.
I can go back to that Military Construction Prioritization
Committee and discuss the importance. You have described
actually last year in this discussion of importance of F-35,
KC-135. It is an ecosystem, both accompanied and unaccompanied
housing. Described before, and then our pause is, we do recruit
individuals, but we retain families. And even if you don't have
a family, you are making your decision about whether you stay
in the Air Force or not, probably in that first enlistment.
If we keep someone past their initial enlistment, they stay
with us for a very long time, but they are making that
calculus, that decision, likely before that point in their
life. So we owe it to the Airmen. I will go back and
reemphasize to the MILCON Prioritization Plan exactly your
words.
Senator Murkowski. I appreciate that. We don't need to
discuss more in this committee the significance of making sure
that we have the housing that we need at Eielson, but we know
that we are not there yet. So let us work on this.
General Vereen, also to quality of life issues, you have
spoken to the significance and the importance of that, but yet
we are not seeing any of the quality of life projects for
Alaska making it into the fiscal year 2025 budget. One of them
that we have been tracking for a while is the dining facility
there at Fort Wainwright. I had an opportunity to join some of
the soldiers for lunch there, not too long ago, I am hoping
that this is still on your radar if you can just give me the
assurance that it is.
General Vereen. Senator, having gone to the dining facility
in September of 2023, well aware of the significance of that
facility and it is still on our radar.
Senator Murkowski. Great, great, I appreciate that.
Vice Admiral Jablon, in your testimony in advance of the
hearing, you speak to the Navy's efforts to align with the
National Defense Strategy, and of course included within that,
the NDS specifically, references the Arctic. It is a keen
priority and a focus of mine. But it speaks to the need to
increase maritime domain awareness.
I don't think that we can really do that without access to
a deep-water port. And of course you know that we are moving
forward with the construction of the deep-water port there in
Nome. This will give us an Arctic deep-water port, right now,
the closest to the Arctic that we are with a deep-water port is
about 900 miles to the south. It is just pretty tough to be
responsive.
And so we are working with this. The entities that are
working to build this out are considerable. But I think the
contributions or the potential contributions to national
security for this deep-water port can't be understated. So
given the national security imperative, would the Navy consider
identifying and implementing a mechanism by which they could
financially support construction of the port, or at least to
help with it?
Admiral Jablon. Senator, thank you for that question. And
as you state, the ability of the Joint Force to operate in all
domains, including the Arctic, is really vital to national
security. The Navy has been operating in the Arctic for over 70
years. I myself have operated in the Arctic on a submarine. In
fact, we just finished Ice Camp 2024.
Senator Murkowski. Which was fabulous, by the way, I was
able to go into the ice.
Admiral Jablon. You were there?
Senator Murkowski. Yes.
Admiral Jablon. Fantastic. So on the Hampton and Indiana.
Senator Murkowski. And Indiana.
Admiral Jablon. That is fantastic. So it shows our ability
to operate in the Arctic, to continue operating in the Arctic
in that environment is so important. In 2021, the Navy put out
its strategic blueprint for the Arctic, looking at rotational
forces, pre-positioning forces, possibly base infrastructure in
there. It does not call out Nome as an area to look at. But I
give you my commitment that I will look into that as a deep-
water port for the Arctic.
Senator Murkowski. Excellent, I appreciate that. My time
has expired. But Mr. Owens, know that I am going submit a
couple questions for the record regarding dual-use
infrastructure, the opportunity to be able to partner with the
likes of the National Guard, Coast Guard, state law
enforcement, whether it is for hangars, armories. We used to do
it, we are not doing it. I mean, you are also going see a
question there related to the Ted Stevens Arctic Security
Studies Center and a path forward for making sure that they
have the facilities that they need.
Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Senator Boozman. Madam Chair, I want to go to Ice Camp.
Admiral Jablon. Senator, we can take you.
Senator Boozman. Very good.
Admiral Jablon. Two years from now.
Senator Sinema. Senator, I think that you went underground
in the ice.
Senator Murkowski. Under the ice.
Senator Sinema. Yeah. I have no interest in ice.
Senator Murkowski. Under the ice, yeah.
Senator Sinema. Yeah. Have fun, great.
I now will yield the floor to Senator Hoeven for his
questions; Senator.
Senator Hoeven. Thank you, Chairman Sinema. I was surprised
to see your new role as Chairman here. That is great, yeah.
Senator Sinema. Somebody made a terrible mistake somewhere.
Senator Hoeven. Well, not true at all. And you have an
outstanding Ranking Member, too, so you are fortunate.
Thanks to all of you for being here. Thanks to all of you
for your service. Secretary Owens, we went to Assistant
Secretary Kathleen Ferguson a number of years ago and got an
enhanced use lease from the Air Force and set up Grand Sky
Technology Park, at Grand Forks Air Force Base. And they
specialize in unmanned aviation, and it is incredible. If you
haven't come out and seen it, you ought to. It is unbelievable
what has happened there, what has transpired.
And they are doing just amazing things, and now into space
as well with the Space Development Agency, the old satellites
as well as the whole range ARC Program. It is just as
incredible, companies like, Northrop Grumman, and General
Thomas, and others in there.
This came about because Grand Forks County and the Grand
Forks Air Force Base were able to utilize an enhanced use lease
program, that the very visionary, Assistant Secretary Ferguson
worked with us to establish. But that is the kind of potential
these things have. I would like your thoughts on it, and if you
are working on some.
Mr. Owens. Yes, Senator. I look forward to visiting. I have
been close to North Dakota, but never, never been there, so
that will be great.
Senator Hoeven. That is why you are invited. We would love
to show you.
Mr. Owens. Thanks very much.
Senator Hoeven. I think you will be impressed.
Mr. Owens. So I think that you are exactly right. The
utilization of enhanced use leases to catalyze that type of
investment in R&D is certainly one aspect. But I think that
there is a whole host of other opportunities for us to look at,
whether it is quality of life relat4ed investments, whether it
is energy security related investment, ULs, can be the bridge
to bring third-party financing, and alternative financing into
installations that will enable us to do things that we are just
not able to get after with the budgets that we are working with
now.
Senator Hoeven. Good. Again, we would love to have you come
out and show you just how incredible, you know, this project
has been. And a huge asset for, not just Air Force but DOD.
General Miller, there is one dual nuclear base in the
nation, and you which it is, Minot Air Force Base, and since
they have both the ICBMs, and the B-52s with the ALCMs, soon to
be GBSD and the LRSO, they need a new weapons generation
facility. Would you, please, tell me, how expeditiously, we
will be able to get that accomplished.
General Miller. Thank you, Senator Hoeven, for the
question. And if I may, just on your UL question, the point
before that you were mentioning.
Senator Hoeven. Yes, sir.
General Miller. I have seen the benefit of that at Hill Air
Force Base which actually supports Sentinel, and looking in it.
It is an offset to help quality of life, while providing good
use of government land. So there is lots of opportunity there.
Senator Hoeven. Thank you. Yeah, appreciate that.
General Miller. On your question on Minot in particular. So
the weapons generation facility, the most complex being the one
that is bomber and missile--the only one that is bomber and
missile, which I know you asked me about last year as well.
That is outside of the FY DP currently. You have my commitment
that the weapons storage area sustainment that is required on
the journey to the weapons generation facility. I know Minot
has identified, I believe it is $74 million in requirements,
this is roofs, roads, to keep the WSA viable.
And I realize that much discussion on the LRSO is
classified, but on the unclassified side, the roofs, the roads,
the infrastructure that is required to keep that WSA viable,
until the WGF is built, the Air Force is standing behind that.
And when we look at--even within the constraints we have in our
efforts in our budget, we know how important the WSA is.
Senator Hoeven. Thank you. I appreciate that. And it is an
absolute priority. Again, it is the only dual nuke base. And
that is part of the reason it has been delayed, is you have got
the folks like F.E. Warren, developing the Weapons Gen Facility
on the GBSD, for Sentinel, on the GBSD side, and you have got
places like, you know, Ellsworth, for example, for the B-21.
So they say, well, you know, but we have to learn from
developing the missile facility, the WES Gen Facility, and the
aircraft. And here it has to be both so it is more complicated.
That is fine. But I have heard that for a while now.
General Miller. Yes, sir
Senator Hoeven. And so we need to get going.
General Miller. Yes, sir.
Senator Hoeven. Yeah. And then the one other thing back to
the grant, Sky Grant, Forks Air Force Base, and we haven't had
you out there, General, we would love to have you as well; they
really need an additional fire station, just because of the
growth and development out there. It is incredible what is
happening, and it is a one-of-a-kind, you know, Military
industrial park for you all. But the main, the main fire
station for the base, they can't get out and cover all this
development on the tech part. And that needs to be a priority
as well.
General Miller. Yes, Senator. I understand. So the Defense
Community Infrastructure Program might possibly be an option
for that additional fire station. The time response for a fire
station is being codified for good reasons, obviously. I am
going to look more into that opportunity, because if that is--I
think that is what that program was designed for, and so we are
researching that right now. I am hopeful that can fund it.
Senator Hoeven. Right on. Thanks. I have a lot more great
questions for all of you, because you are doing such great
stuff. But we have a no-nonsense Chairman here. And I have
already gone over my time a little bit. So Thank you, Madam
Chair.
[Laughter.]
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Senator.
Senator Hoeven. Thanks to all of you.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, all, so much for being here
today. This will conclude our hearing today.
I want to thank our witnesses and our colleagues for
participating. I look forward to working together on this
year's Appropriations Bill to ensure we are providing the
Department, Service members and their families with the
Military construction and family Housing resources they need.
ADDITIONAL COMMITTEE QUESTIONS
I will keep the hearing record open for one week. Committee
members, who would like to submit written questions for the
record, should do so by 5:00 p.m., on Wednesday, May 8th. We
appreciate receiving responses to them, in a reasonable period
of time.
Questions Submitted to Hon. Brendan Owens
Questions Submitted by Senator Kyrsten Sinema
Question. Investments in resilient infrastructure should be
synchronized with master planning in order to know we're building
efficiently and in line with installation capacity and needs.
However, many bases are still developing--or have not yet started--
their installation energy and climate resilience plans. While we cannot
stop recapitalizing and modernizing facilities at installations without
these plans, how do you strike that balance in this request?
Is DOD requesting funding for projects at installations that have
not completed an installation climate resilience plan?
Answer. Yes. The DOD's funding request will continue to include
infrastructure investment to support critical mission and quality of
life for military and civilian personnel while installations continue
to complete their backlog of energy and climate resilience plans. For
investments, such as Energy Resilience and Conservation Investment
Program (ERCIP), the Department prioritizes projects that are included
in a documented plan (e.g., Installation Energy Plan) and address
energy, water, and climate resilience.
Question. When will DOD have energy and climate master plans in
place at every installation?
Answer. All installation energy plans are expected to be complete
by the end of calendar year 2026 and all installation climate
resilience plans are expected to be complete in 2029.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Tammy Baldwin
Question. The Department of Defense has reported an extensive
backlog to clean up active and former DOD installations contaminated
with toxic pollutants, including PCBs, Dioxins, PFAS, and other
chemicals. Cleanup is often a long process, but even installations that
have been resourced and completed through BRAC often exhibit lingering
problems. Wisconsin's own Badger Army Ammunition Plant is the site of a
now three-mile long plume of contaminated groundwater that continues to
migrate offsite, in spite of completed cleanup efforts.
What procedures does the Department use to assess the extent of
contamination and to determine whether clean closure has been achieved?
Answer. DoD is committed to protecting human health and the
environment by conducting cleanup under Federal cleanup law, the
Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act
(CERCLA) and the long-standing EPA regulations for all chemicals in our
cleanup program. The CERCLA process includes investigating releases and
determining the appropriate cleanup actions based on risk to human
health and the environment. This process also includes public
participation and is conducted in coordination with environmental
regulators.
As part of the investigation, DoD collects detailed information to
characterize site conditions, which includes determining the nature and
extent of the release (e.g., the source, how widespread the release is)
and assessing risk to human health and the environment. DoD then
evaluates various cleanup alternatives, identifies a proposed cleanup
remedy, and solicits public and regulator comments. DoD provides the
decision document to regulators for review. For sites on EPA's National
Priorities List, DoD and EPA jointly select the final remedy. In
accordance with CERCLA, after the final remedy is selected, DoD reviews
the continued protectiveness of the remedy at least every 5 years in
coordination with the appropriate regulator.
Question. What is the formal process for communities to contest
completed cleanup so that further cleanup is initiated?
Answer. When the cleanup levels do not allow unrestricted use of
the property, DoD monitors the long-term protectiveness of a cleanup
remedy, to include monitoring site conditions and performing 5-year
reviews. DoD provides the draft 5-year review report to EPA and the
State regulatory agency, as appropriate, for review and comment. If a
community believes it has information indicating that changes in
toxicity values or changes in land use assumptions affect the
protectiveness of the remedy, the community can provide this
information to the appropriate Military Department representative and
the appropriate regulator. If the installation has an established
Restoration Advisory Board, community members can also present cleanup
concerns in that forum. When the cleanup goals have been met, allowing
for unlimited use and unrestricted exposure of the property, the
cleanup is considered complete. For BRAC locations, under section
120(h) of CERCLA, DoD is required to conduct any additional response
action found to be necessary after the date the property transferred
out of DoD. While an informal process, should a property owner have
information indicating releases of hazardous substances that were not
previously considered in the completed cleanup, they should contact the
appropriate Military Department representative and the appropriate
regulator. A citizen suit can be initiated under section 310 of CERCLA
to formally contest completed cleanup.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Lisa Murkowski
Question. Building military infrastructure in Alaska is a process
fraught with hurdles, including cost, timing, and harsh environmental
conditions. One area I believe we should be focusing on is the
construction of dual- or multi-use infrastructure that can be utilized
by your partners, including the National Guard, Coast Guard, and State
and Federal Law Enforcement. We've done it before in Alaska with
projects like hangars and armories, but we haven't done it like that in
a while.
As focus shifts to Alaska as an intersection between the
IndoPacific, the Arctic, and Europe, what opportunities do you see to
construct projects that serve multiple departments and agencies?
Answer. Master planning for our military installations is meant to
consider DoD requirements at that location and includes engagement with
adjacent Federal, State, and local jurisdictional organizations. For
major construction investments, joint use consideration is part of the
process. Specifically for Alaska, functional infrastructure tied to
seaport, airport, logistical, and training facilities are areas of
opportunity for joint use. Planning and programming joint use projects
adds a layer of complexity since our facility investments are focused
on DoD requirements and any additional capacity or increased capability
by these non-DoD organizations would need to be compatible with the DoD
mission and companion funding.
Question. I worked for some time to ensure the Department has
adequate resources to stand up the Ted Stevens Center for Arctic
Security Studies. They have been operating now for several years and
are doing an excellent job with what they have been given. One of their
remaining challenges is the lack of a physical facility. The center has
not yet found a home which makes gathering for the purposes of
providing education, engagement, and research quite difficult. They
have identified several possible paths forward, but I don't see a
request for FSRM funding in the FY25 budget request.
Has OSD identified a path forward to either remediate an identified
facility on Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson or acquiring a lease off
base?
Answer. The Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) has primary
responsibility for addressing facility requirements and solutions by
working with the Air Force in determining a path forward with
supporting the Ted Stevens Center (TSC) for Arctic Security Studies
currently located at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson. The TSC is
currently supported in the former Mt. Spurr Elementary School. The
existing infrastructure is in poor condition and is not able to support
full operational capability for the TSC. The mission is being met by
personnel teleworking and limited in office operations. An analysis of
off-base facilities did not identify a lease solution. DSCA and the TSC
are working with the United States Army Corps of Engineers to identify
facility investment requirements and with the Air Force to determine
courses of action sufficient to address TSC facility requirement,
including the need to seek additional funding or reconsider other short
or long-term options for the TSC.
______
Questions Submitted to Lieutenant General Kevin Vereen
Questions Submitted by Senator Kyrsten Sinema
Question. DOD is undertaking several significant concurrent
infrastructure programs on Guam requiring extensive inter-Department
and inter-agency coordination, not to mention base--and emergency--
funding. It's critical that these efforts do not get bogged down in
bureaucracy, preventing the services and agencies from making timely
decisions aligned with the budget cycle. The Department also needs to
determine requirements--particularly for the Defense of Guam program--
to inform the Milcon design and construction timeline. What are the
most significant challenges in executing your respective programs on
Guam?
Answer. The most significant challenge executing MILCON programs in
Guam is the definition of requirements in a timely fashion. The Guam
Installation and Community Support Working Group has been extremely
helpful to align stakeholders across the DoD to have a common site
picture so that projects can be identified, planned, designed, and
executed. National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) requirements are not
being completed as quickly as desired, but lack of well-defined
requirements is partially responsible for the delays. With the recent
publication of Guam military population planning numbers the Military
Services will be able to address the support requirements needed to
enable the beddown of the Guam Defense System.
Question. This year's request is heavily focused on training and
maintenance infrastructure, and quality of life facilities. At the same
time, Army Test and Evaluation Command has numerous unfunded minor and
major Mil-Con requirements, including at Yuma Test Center at Yuma
Proving Ground. Could you discuss how you are prioritizing test and
evaluation infrastructure requirements against all the other facility
demands across the Army enterprise?
Are you addressing these needs in other ways?
Answer. All projects (including ATEC candidates) are reviewed for
completeness and feasibility, then ranked based on prioritization
criteria that has been validated by the DCS G-3/5/7. These criteria
consider facility type (e.g., Permanent Party Barracks, Training
Facilities, Vehicle Maintenance Facilities, Laboratory Facilities,
etc.), command priorities, mission priorities, deficit fulfillment, and
replacement need of failing facilities. The project list is then sent
to DCS G-9 for review. The breadth and depth of project types submitted
allows maximum flexibility for ASL to make final decisions on which
projects (ATEC and others) move forward in the process.
One of the other ways ATEC's needs are being addressed is via
Congressionally directed funding for major projects, minor projects and
Planning and Design specifically for Army Labs projects. We currently
have eight minor Army Labs projects that are under design: 7 projects
in FY22, and 1 project in FY23, the Radar Operations and Maintenance
Building at Yuma Proving Ground. The Army is also executing advance
planning on the Yuma Proving Grounds Airdrop Rigging Facility in
preparation for design as a minor project. The Army is grateful to
Congress for this beneficial program which assists the Army in
addressing recapitalization of its laboratory inventory.
Question. I commend the Army for the decision to attack
unaccompanied housing needs by including seven barracks projects in its
request this year. Does the Army have a long-range plan to address its
barracks capacity and condition quality shortfall?
Answer. Yes, the Army has a long-range plan to address its barracks
capacity and condition quality shortfall. In FY25, the Army is
requesting $2.5B in barracks funding which includes $935M for nine new
unaccompanied housing projects for Active Duty and Army Reserve. The
Army is also requesting 100% of the requirement to sustain barracks in
FY25, an investment of $680M with similar amounts across the FYDP. The
Army intends to submit similar requests for barracks funding across the
FYDP to address deficit and condition shortfalls.
The Army recently submitted our FY24 NDAA Section 2839 condition
report which identifies how the Army intends to repair our 225 Q3 and
Q4 barracks over the Fiscal Year Defense Plan. The cost to repair and
renovate these barracks is $4.1B which includes 55 barracks that
require $1.3B in Restoration and Modernization funding not currently
planned in the FYDP. The remaining $2.8B in funded requirements are
programmed and funded in the Army Facility Investment Plan, which
addresses barracks capacity and condition issues by prioritizing the
requirements for deficit construction, restoration & modernization, and
inventory disposal. The Army will maintain and update this plan
annually to ensure it captures the most current facility and cost data.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Lisa Murkowski
Question. I truly appreciate your focus on supporting our
servicemembers by advancing projects that improve their quality of
life. I understand that several facilities at Joint Base Elmendorf-
Richardson are in poor condition, particularly several of the Company
Operations Facilities and the Tactical Equipment Maintenance Facility,
are in desperate need of investment. Can you speak to how improving the
facilities that our Soldiers work in would advance both readiness and
quality of life?
Answer. Our foundational priorities continue to be people,
readiness, and modernization and we remain focused on all three.
Improving facilities where soldiers both live and work is imperative to
both quality of life and readiness. Our soldiers spend nearly as much
time in the facilities where they work as in those where they live. In
particular, we recognize the importance of Company Operations and
Tactical Vehicle Maintenance facilities to maintaining unit readiness
and overall mission accomplishment. Improving facilities not only
supports Army's readiness, but also the holistic approach to Soldier
wellness in every form. Our readiness depends on resilient and
determined soldiers and begins with equipping and training the force
with safe and modernized facilities.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator John Hoeven
jamestown readiness center
Question. For the last few years, the NDNG's top military
construction project has been the Jamestown Readiness Center. How will
you prioritize this project moving forward?
Answer. The North Dakota Army National Guard (ARNG) has submitted
Project Number 380113--Readiness Center, Jamestown, ND for
consideration through the FY24 ARNG Installation Requirement Plan (IRP)
process. The IRP process addresses the competing requirements from all
54 States, Territories, and D.C. for inclusion in the last year of the
Army's upcoming Future Year Defense Plan (FYDP) 2027--2031. This would
make it eligible for FY31 consideration. Projects in the first 4 years
of that FYDP have already been selected and are proceeding through
project development. The project is currently at 0% design.
lodging for camp grafton's regional training institute
Question. Congress was able to secure funding last year to fully
fund the planning and design of a lodging wing at Camp Grafton's
Regional Training Institute (RTI). How will you prioritize this project
moving forward?
Answer. Project Number 380115--Institutional Post-Initial Military
Training Unaccompanied Housing received Advanced Planning & Design in
FY23. The State received Initial Design Authority on 25MAY23. Once the
project meets 35% validated design, the ARNG intends to submit the
project as a Chief of Staff of the Army Unfunded Priorities List (CSA
UPL) candidate. This project is currently at 2% design. The project
must have an approved 35% design no later than 31 August 2024 to be
submitted as a CSA UPL candidate and potential FY26 construction
funding.
______
Questions Submitted to Lieutenant General Edward Banta
Questions Submitted by Senator Kyrsten Sinema
Question. DOD is undertaking several significant concurrent
infrastructure programs on Guam requiring extensive inter-Department
and inter-agency coordination, not to mention base--and emergency--
funding. It's critical that these efforts do not get bogged down in
bureaucracy, preventing the services and agencies from making timely
decisions aligned with the budget cycle. The Department also needs to
determine requirements--particularly for the Defense of Guam program--
to inform the MilCon design and construction timeline. What are the
most significant challenges in executing your respective programs on
Guam?
Answer. To date, USMC DPRI MILCON program is not significantly
affected by excessive bureaucracy associated with additional/concurrent
infrastructure programs on Guam. Approximately 1 year ago, OSD
Infrastructure Modernization & Resilience set up the Guam Installation
and Community Support Work Group (GICSWG) to help the Services
synchronize the unprecedented DOD growth in Guam. Early on, the GICSWG
noted DPRI is tied to an International Agreement and the USMC has
enjoyed favorable deconfliction in MILCON design and construction
timelines within the DOD on Guam. The Marine Corps on Guam has
experienced episodic minor delays in some permitting actions due to the
sheer volume of work confronting the relatively small Government of
Guam staffs. Other challenges have predominantly dealt with cost linked
to supply chain issues, previous uncertainty with H2B Visa extensions
and destructive weather events.
Question. As you noted in your testimony, the Marine Corps has
begun a Barracks 2030 initiative to holistically address challenges in
your barracks portfolio. Installations such as Marine Corps Air
Station--Yuma have significant unaccompanied and transient housing
needs and I'm cautiously optimistic that this initiative will help
transform how the service addresses barracks management and investment.
That said, planning and design for this initiative was included as an
unfunded requirement rather than being built into the FY25 program.
Could you discuss resourcing plans for this barracks modernization
program for future fiscal years?
Answer. This year's constrained budget put the Marine Corps in a
position to make difficult decisions because of the topline growing by
only 1% due to the funding level set by the Fiscal Responsibility Act
of 2023. The Marine Corps is committed to starting our Barracks 2030
initiatives in earnest by FY26, but the Marine Corps is doing
everything we can now.
Programming $274 million in FY25 (a $61 million increase from
previous years) underscores our dedication to improving our barracks.
With reprogrammed funds in FY24 and FY25, the Marine Corps will hire
civilian barracks managers, purchase new furniture, and accelerate the
modernization of barracks.
In March, we concluded our 100% wall-to-wall Environmental, Health,
and Safety (EHS) inspections of every barracks room to establish the
baseline conditions of habitability. Our recent EHS inspections will
inform our future investments. If additional funds are made available,
the Marine Corps can accelerate Barracks 2030 and execute additional
FSRM and other investments of $410M in FY25.
______
Questions Submitted to Lieutenant General Tom Miller
Questions Submitted by Senator Kyrsten Sinema
Question. The Air Force is in process of standing up an AF-SOC
Power Projection Wing at Davis- Monthan Air Force Base which will
require infrastructure investments as more than a half dozen squadrons
will be relocated to and activated at the installation. To what extent
are units able to effectively utilize existing infrastructure?
Answer. The Department of the Air Force (DAF) has worked
extensively with subject matter experts within Air Force Special
Operations Command (AFSOC) and Air Combat Command (ACC) preparing
infrastructure plans that minimize costs associated with the standup of
the Power Projection Wing at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. Coordination
between AFSOC and ACC allowed for existing facility reuse through
Facilities Sustainment, Restoration, & Modernization (FSRM) funding to
the greatest extent possible. Only in cases where unique and specialty
mission requirements dictate will new facilities be constructed and
Military Construction (MILCON) funding utilized for the standup.
Question. When do you anticipate identifying and programming
specific MilCon requirements to facilitate the establishment of the
wing, and will when those be shared with Congress?
Answer. The DAF is evaluating MILCON requirements to support the
AFSOC Force Projection Wing at Davis Monthan AFB. However, initial
estimates are approximately $450M. There are currently 2 projects in
the FYDP, both in FY26, totaling $155.4M, to support future basing of
the AFSOC Force Projection Wing: $30.4M for Communications Headquarters
Facility, and $125.0M for MC-130J Hangar/Aircraft Maintenance Unit.
Question. We are confirming details for some of the requested/
projected MilCon projects in Arizona, and we were wondering if you
could confirm if the below projects are on the Air Force FYDP, and if
so, what year?
Admin and Storage Building for 944th Fighter Wing at Luke AFB
(Project Number NUEX1098545B)?
Answer. This is an Air Force Reserve project that has been
requested for design funding as a Facility Sustainment Restoration and
Modernization project, not MILCON.
Question. 1b. Luke Air Force Base Child Development Center (Project
Number NUEX203000)
Answer. This project is not in the FY25-29 FYDP. However, it is
currently at 95% design and is being considered for the FY26-30 FYDP
for $41.0M.
Question. Gila Bend North Turnaround (Project Number NUEX153003)
Answer. The Gila Bend North Turnaround project is not positioned
within the Unspecified Minor Military Construction program but
continues to compete against other requirements. Current estimated cost
is $5M.
Question. Morris Air National Guard Base-Base Entry Complex
(Project Number XHEA109012, tracking this is on the UPL this year)
Answer. Project XHEA109012 was funded at $12M in FY23 and is
currently out for bid. Based on current cost estimates, a $5M cost
increase is projected due to the ongoing land acquisition and code
update since the design is 2 years old.
Question. Morris Air National Guard Recruiting Complex (Project
Number XHEA192003, part of the base entry complex)
Answer. Project XHEA192003 is for a separate facility and function
that is adjacent to, but not in scope of the Recruiting Complex. It is
not in the FYDP. This Facility Sustainment, Restoration & Modernization
(FSRM) funded requirement is 100% designed and ready to execute as
early as FY25; however, prioritization of FSRM funds nationwide has put
this requirement in FY27 for funding.
Question. Goldwater ANG Ramp Expansion (Project Number VTNB162484)
Answer. Project VTNB162484 is not in the FYDP. It is another FSRM
funded requirement with scope and cost not validated, designed, or
executable in FY25. ANG is unable to confirm this requirement for FY25
Congressionally directed spending consideration.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Lisa Murkowski
Question. As attention shifts to the Arctic, I believe we will have
to make some difficult decisions about how to prioritize projects in
the region in future years. There are a number of hurdles to
construction in the Arctic, but the two primary challenges are high
cost and environmental factors. For example, coastal radar sites that
make up part of the Northern Warning System are experiencing erosion at
rates much faster than we projected and infrastructure at bases across
the State built on permafrost is destabilizing.
How will the Air Force prioritize and weigh Arctic construction and
FSRM projects in future years?
Answer. The DAF recognizes challenges of construction within artic
areas. Artic climate is considered when developing the cost estimates
and design but does not impact the prioritization process. Despite
extreme locations, all MILCON and centralized FSRM projects are
prioritized based on MAJCOM and mission requirements/priorities.
Question. General Miller, your testimony mentioned addressing
Combatant Commander requirements for construction projects with a
particular focus on INDOPACOM, STRATCOM, and EUCOM.
Should we take this to mean that NORTHCOM's priorities are entirely
addressed in this budget?
Answer. NORTHCOM's MILCON requirements were considered during the
building of the FY25 President's Budget. The Department of the Air
Force has two overseas MILCON projects positioned in the FY25-29 FYDP
to support NORTHCOM. These include: Runway Approach Landing System for
$26.0M in FY26, and a Billeting Support Facilities project for $130.0M
in FY27. Both projects are at Pituffik, Greenland, formally known as
Thule AB.
In addition to overseas requirements, the FY25 President's Budget
includes: $198.0M for the new Homeland Defense (HLD) Over the Horizon
Radar (OTHR) with Land Acquisition, Increment 1 project supporting
CONUS NORTHCOM requirements, and another $787.9M is positioned in FY25-
29 to support OTHR. While OTHR supports NORTHCOM, it is captured as a
New Mission requirement in our FY25 President's Budget request.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator John Hoeven
installations & aging infrastructure
Question. What is the impact to readiness of insufficient
investment in existing basic infrastructure?
Answer. The Department of the Air Force (DAF) continues to balance
risk to infrastructure against other operational requirements. The DAF
is prioritizing efforts to support Great Power Competition to ensure
continued access to essential infrastructure and maintain required
readiness.
Question. What is the plan to bring Minot up to the same level of
investment as other Air Force installations?
Answer. In FY24, Minot identified approximately $147M in additional
Facility Sustainment, Restoration and Modernization (FSRM) projects to
repair and renovate other aging infrastructure on Minot. This includes
dorm renovations, demo/consolidation projects, and apron and runway
repairs. These projects will compete with other FY25 Department of the
Air Force (DAF) FSRM requirements.
The existing Minot Weapons Storage Area (WSA) meets current
operational requirements and will be maintained using FSRM. Minot has
identified approximately $74M in FSRM requirements to maintain the WSA
until the Weapons Generation Facility (WGF) is built. Examples include
repairing roofs, repaving roads, upgrading infrastructure, and
renovating facilities.
The DAF understands the unique mission Minot AFB supports, both
bomber and ICBMs. Minot will be the final WGF in the program to
incorporate lessons learned from the other individual bomber and
Intercontinental Ballistic Missile WGFs. This plan is in line with our
strategic priorities.
fire protection at grand forks air force base
Question. The main fire station at Grand Forks Air Force Base
cannot provide adequate coverage for the full range of missions at the
installation. Grand Sky provides a fire engine, but a satellite fire
station for the base is needed. What is the timeline for designing a
satellite fire station and getting it funded for construction?
Answer. Grand Forks AFB is assessing the requirement for an
auxiliary fire station using Defense Community Infrastructure Program
(DCIP) funds near the Grand Sky Enhanced Use Lease (EUL). The DAF is
aware of the requirement and the project is competing within the
program for potential inclusion in a future year President's Budget
request.
SUBCOMMITTEE RECESS
Senator Sinema. And with that, we stand adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:50 a.m., Wednesday, May 1, the
subcommittee was recessed, to reconvene subject to the call of
the Chair.]
MILITARY CONSTRUCTION, VETERANS AFFAIRS, AND RELATED AGENCIES
APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 2025
----------
THURSDAY, MAY 2, 2024
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, at 10:30 a.m. in room SD-124, Dirksen
Senate Office Building, Hon. Kyrsten Sinema, chairwoman
(presiding).
Present: Senators Sinema, Tester, Baldwin, Heinrich,
Peters, Boozman, Collins, Murkowski, Hoeven and Fischer.
DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS
STATEMENT OF HON. DENIS R. McDONOUGH, SECRETARY
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR KYRSTEN SINEMA
Senator Sinema. Good morning. This hearing of the Military
Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Regulated Agencies
Appropriations Subcommittee will please come to order.
I'd like to begin by welcoming Ranking Member Boozman and
Members of the Committee and our witness today, the Honorable
Denis McDonough, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs.
We appreciate the effort of VA's dedicated staff to provide
medical care benefits and support to veterans, their families,
and their communities every day.
We're here today to discuss the Department of Veterans
Affairs fiscal years 2025 Budget and 2026 Advance
Appropriations Requests.
This committee takes very seriously the obligation to make
sure we provide for the men and women who have fought and
sacrificed to keep our country safe and ensure they have the
medical care and benefits they've earned.
This budget strives to do just that and requests a
mandatory appropriation well over $210 billion and the
discretionary appropriation of $129 billion in fiscal year
2025.
VA also has access to over $24 billion from the Toxic
Exposures Fund that was provided in the Fiscal Responsibility
Act.
These resources are extremely important in providing
funding to carry out the expansion of medical care and benefits
in the PACT Act. Without these resources, VA simply would not
be able to keep up with the processing of new claims or
expediting health care benefits to veterans who are exposed to
toxins and environmental hazards.
The budget also requests Advance Appropriations for fiscal
year 2026, including $131 billion in medical care discretionary
accounts, $23 billion in mandatory resources for medical care
funded by the Toxic Exposures Fund (TEF), and $222 billion in
mandatory resources for Veterans Benefits Programs.
Despite this robust request, I am concerned about medical
care levels in this budget. The discretionary funding request
for medical care is lower than the fiscal year 2023-enacted
level and when including mandatory medical care spending, this
still represents a cut from fiscal year 2024.
As I stated earlier, this committee has an obligation to
provide for the men and women who protect this country and I'll
need your commitment that this budget does just that.
VA has seen a higher reliance on the department for medical
care and greater utilization of benefits and services than
prior years, in part due to the success of the PACT Act.
Veterans are relying on the VA for more care today than
ever before, but the Fleet Reserve Association (FRA) top line
is forcing cuts across government. So the VA must do more with
less.
We know this is impacting staffing level at medical
facilities and that there are programs that will not be
expanded as a result of these levels.
There are a few initiatives within the Budget Request that
I'd like to highlight.
The budget continues to request robust funding for its
Telehealth Program with an estimated $6.4 billion for fiscal
year 2025. However, even with expanded hiring and telehealth
capacity, veterans in rural areas often struggle to access
health care, including due to challenges with transportation
and lack of Internet access.
I continue to encourage the VA to look for innovative and
cost-effective ways to close these access gaps.
At the end of last year VA signed an updated agreement with
the Indian Health Services. The new agreement allows VA to
reimburse IHS for additional health care services, including
long-term care, home health services, and durable medical
equipment.
I encourage VA to continue establishing agreements with the
individual tribal health programs to further eliminate barriers
to care for American Indian and Native Alaskans who serve their
country.
Women are the fastest-growing demographic entering the
military and now represent nearly 20 percent of service
members. The women veteran population is also the fastest-
growing demographic within the VA. This population is only
anticipated to grow and caring for these veterans should be an
area of bipartisan support.
This budget requests a historic $13.7 billion for women
veterans' health care, including $1.1 billion in gender-
specific care. I hope we can include that level of funding in
this year's appropriations bill.
The Electronic Health Record Modernization Program
continues to be in the strategic pause to assess and address
issues discovered during the first five site deployments.
VA recently deployed the new system to the Lavell Federal
Health Care Center in Chicago. However, it's still too early to
determine if this deployment was a success.
The Budget Request shows a substantial cut to the EHR
Program and the request assumes no new deployments will happen
this year. While patient safety is our Number 1 priority, VA
needs to commit to getting this program back on track to
deliver a safe and secure health record.
Last year VA surpassed its goal of housing 38,000 homeless
veterans. This is significant but there is still more to be
done.
The most recent point-in-time count numbers show a 7.4
increase over 2022 in veterans experiencing homelessness. The
budget requests $3.2 billion to continue to ensure VA has the
resources to secure housing and case management support for
this veteran population.
Secretary, it's clear that much is expected from the
department. Providing health care requires facilities,
technology, and clinicians, and quickly providing benefits
requires staff and technology support. For the department to
success in these efforts, you must be resourced appropriately.
I look forward to working together to provide veterans with
the services and benefits they've earned and deserve.
Thank you.
And now I'll turn it over to Ranking Member Boozman.
STATEMENT OF SENATOR JOHN BOOZMAN
Senator Boozman. Thank you, Madam Chair, and, Mr.
Secretary, it's good to have you here today. Thank you for
coming to discuss VA's fiscal year 2025 and 2026 Budget
Requests.
The budget request of $369.2 in fiscal year 2025 for the
Department of Veterans Affairs, including medical care
collections, the Transformation Fund, the Toxic Exposures
Funds, representing a 9.8 percent increase over the fiscal year
2024-enacted levels, this includes a $129.1 billion in
discretionary funds, a 5.7 billion or 4.2 percent decrease from
fiscal year 2024.
The request includes 235 billion in mandatory funds of
$41.8 billion or 21.6 percent increase over fiscal year 2024.
Within this amount of $24.5 billion in the TEF, $4.2 billion
increase over fiscal year 2024.
The budget also requests a total of a $131.5 billion in
medical care advance appropriations for fiscal year 2026, a
$118.9 billion more than in the fiscal year 2025 advance
appropriations and $22.8 billion in advance for the TEF.
Finally, the request includes $222 billion in advance
funding for veterans benefits.
Mr. Secretary, I think we could agree that the Budget
Request can reasonably be characterized as tight and that's not
your fault. It's just the circumstances that we're in.
In my more than 20 years working on veterans issues in both
the House and the Senate, I can't recall a single year when the
budget request for veterans health care went down.
I recognize that VA has more funding streams than ever
before, including the TEF, but, nevertheless, this
requeststands as an outlier.
In recent years I've asked you about the amount of risk VA
takes in crafting its community care request, but this year I
will want to know more about the level of risk VA is taking
across its whole enterprise.
In your testimony you refer to fiscal year 2025 planned
obligations which will grow by more than five percent, even
though the base request is lower than last year. I'll want to
hear from you about what risks this may open the VA up to.
I understand it's not about you. Again, we're just in a
situation where money's tight.
The PACT Act has certainly been a dramatic change for
veterans and I also think VA has a very good story to tell
about its implementation and the veterans enrolling and the
number of PACT Act-related claims received and processed.
Again, I know that you and your staff throughout the VA
have worked so hard to make that a success.
It also gave VA new tools to recruit and retain its
workforce and I look forward to hearing about your plans to
ensure you have the right people in the right places to take
care of our veterans.
I also want to note that it's been a little more than a
year since you announced the reset of the Electronic Medical
Records Program. As this reset continues I hope to hear more
about the timeline top bring the deployed sites up to standard,
when we can expect deployments to resume. DOD stumbled out of
the gate in its efforts but after a pause, it's successfully
completed deployments throughout the country and abroad.
I hope the VA has learned from that and we'll be able to
get this program moving forward again soon. We have more than
11 billion in taxpayer money invested. It's time to start
seeing a return.
In addition to updates on those big picture items, we also
look forward to hearing details about the department's request
for mental health services, including efforts to prevent
veteran suicide, initiatives to prevent veterans homelessness,
resources dedicated to care for women veterans, and efforts to
improve care for our rural veterans.
We look forward to discussing these other issues and again
very much appreciate you being here.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Ranking Member.
Mr. Secretary, we'll now proceed with your opening
statement. You have five minutes.
SUMMARY STATEMENT HON. DENIS MCDONOUGH
Secretary McDonough. Madam Chair, thank you very much.
Congratulations on the new assignment.
Senator Boozman, other Members of the Committee, thank you,
Senator Baldwin, for the opportunity to be here today.
I'm willing to just put my prepared remarks into the record
and get straight to your questions if you are amenable to that.
So I'm happy to go straight to questions.
[The statement follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Denis R. McDonough
Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, and distinguished Members of
the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today in
support of the President's FY 2025 Budget and FY 2026 Advance
Appropriations (AA) Request for VA.
VA is honored to serve the Nation's heroes-our Veterans. Over the
last 3 years, we have delivered more care and more benefits to more
Veterans than at any other time in our Nation's history. VA is working
to provide Veterans, their families, caregivers, and survivors the best
care in the world, the benefits they have earned, and a dignified last
resting place that honors their service and sacrifice. Last year,
Veterans submitted over 2.4 million claims-a record, and 39% more than
in 2022. Veterans also submitted nearly 2.3 million intents-to-file-
another record, and 65% more than in 2022. In FY 2023 alone, the
Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) completed more than 1.9 million
disability compensation and pension claims, breaking the previous
year's record by nearly 16%. VA delivered a record $163 billion in
earned benefits to over 6 million Veterans and survivors- and provided
more than 118 million clinical visits for over 6.5 million patients
including roughly 42 million in-person appointments, 29 million tele-
health and telephone appointments, and 47 million community care
appointments, which surpasses the previous record by more than 4
million. The Board of Veterans' Appeals processed over 103,000 appeals,
more than in any previous year. Additionally, more than 46,000 Veterans
were permanently housed, far surpassing the Department's goal of
38,000. And more than 4.1 million Veterans of every war and conflict,
now rest in VA national cemeteries.
The Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring our Promise to
Address Comprehensive Toxics (PACT) Act of 2022 (Public Law 117-168)
represents the largest expansion of Veterans' benefits in a generation,
and I am immensely proud that our broad efforts have yielded
outstanding results as we continue to see steady increases in the
number of toxic exposure- related disability compensation claims
processed. VA just recently fully implemented section 103 of the PACT
Act, ahead of schedule, which expanded health care eligibility to all
Veterans who were exposed to toxins and other hazards while serving our
country at home or abroad and all Veterans who served in the Vietnam
War, the Gulf War, Iraq, Afghanistan, or any combat zone after
September 11, 2001, or were deployed in support of the Global War on
Terror.
Nonetheless, we can do more to ensure that every eligible Veteran
receives the benefits and health care they have earned. Our focus
remains on increasing Veteran outreach, timely and accurately
processing of claims, providing more and better-quality health care,
modernizing our information technology (IT) systems, and ensuring that
we have the necessary staffing with the right skills to deliver on our
promise to Veterans.
fy 2025 budget and fy 2026 aa request
VA's total 2025 request is $369.3 billion (mandatory and
discretionary, including collections and the Recurring Expenses
Transformational Fund (RETF)), which is a $32.9 billion or 9.8%
increase above the 2024 level. This includes a discretionary budget
request of $134.0 billion (with $4.4 billion from medical care
collections and $307 million from RETF), an $8.9 billion, or 6.2%,
decrease from 2024. The 2025 mandatory funding request is $235.3
billion, with $24.5 billion from the Toxic Exposures Fund (TEF), an
increase of $41.8 billion, or 21.6%, above 2024.
The decrease in discretionary funding of $8.9 billion from 2024
reflects the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 (Public Law 118-5),
which set overall non-Defense discretionary budgetary ceilings.
Nevertheless, we project that the 2025 request will provide the
necessary resources to meet VA's commitment to deliver timely access to
world-class health care and earned benefits to Veterans. The request
fully funds over 9.1 million enrolled Veterans, including the continued
operation of the largest integrated health care system in the United
States and support for care delivered through community providers
consistent with the MISSION Act. In 2025 it will also provide
disability compensation benefits to nearly 6.9 million Veterans and
their survivors and administers pension benefits for over 224,000
Veterans and their survivors. The 2026 Medical Care AA request includes
a discretionary AA of $131.4 billion, plus a mandatory advance
appropriation request of $22.8 billion for the TEF. The 2026 mandatory
AA request is $222.2 billion for Veterans benefits programs
(Compensation and Pensions, Readjustment Benefits, and Veterans
Insurance, and Indemnities).
pact act
As of March 23, 2024, VA has received more than 1.3 million PACT
Act-related claims and completed over 1,149,000 claims. Using the new
PACT Act authorities, VA has granted service connection for over 10,000
terminally ill Veterans. VA will continue to award disability
compensation to those Veterans who were subject to a presumption of
service connection from the PACT Act. At the same time, in accordance
with Title II of the PACT Act, VA is exercising the new presumptive
decision process by studying acute and chronic leukemias and multiple
myeloma as potential presumptions due to exposure to particulate matter
in Southwest Asia. VA is also evaluating other conditions and exposures
that may require formal reviews in the future.
In calendar year 2023, more than 361,000 Veterans were newly
enrolled into VA health care, an increase of more than 73,000 from FY
2022. Our 2023 health care enrollment efforts focused primarily on
bringing in Post-9/11 combat Veterans during a 1-year special
enrollment period created by Section 111 of the PACT Act. This targeted
effort contributed to one of the largest health care enrollment growth
periods in VA history. The special enrollment period for combat
Veterans ended in September 2023 and, in that month alone, we enrolled
48,763 Veterans in VA health care. In comparison, the prior year's
monthly enrollment total around that same time was about 26,000
Veterans.
VA expects our enrollment to continue to grow with the expedited
implementation of Section 103 of the PACT Act. Originally planned to be
phased in over several years, VA made this new health care eligibility
effective in its entirety as of March 5, 2024. That means that toxic-
exposed Veterans and those who supported certain overseas contingency
operations will be eligible for care earlier than expected, affording
our heroes with the world-class health care they have earned sooner.
investing in our people
Providing world-class service is only possible with employees who
are the best and brightest in their respective fields. We are focusing
on improving the employee experience so that they, in turn, deliver
exceptional care and benefits to Veterans and their families,
caregivers, and survivors. We are increasing the use of incentives for
recruitment and retention, maximizing the use of existing pay and
scheduling authorities as well as the new authorities recently enacted
by Congress in the PACT Act, expanding scholarship opportunities, and
providing more education loan repayment awards than ever before. From
October 1, 2021 through March 23, 2024, we have hired 14,447 new VBA
claims processors--growing our claims processing workforce by
approximately 58%--and increased the total size of VBA to more than
33,900 employees, resulting in a record level of claims processing. As
a result, VBA has completed 1,030,089 rating benefit claims in FY 2024,
as of March 5, 2024, 35% greater than this point in FY 2023. Also, the
disability compensation and pension claims backlog (comprised of claims
pending for longer than 125 days) as a percentage of all claims
received is at 38% as of March 5, 2024, compared to 70% in 2013, which
is the last time the rating claims inventory was nearly this high.
Forecast modeling continues to show VA remains on track to bringing the
claims backlog to 100,000 claims or fewer by the end of 2025. Likewise,
the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) hired nearly 62,000 new staff
in FY 2023 and, together with substantially improved retention rates,
grew the health care workforce by 7%.
During 2023, VHA administered 4,845 scholarships for clinical
education to employees and increased the number of new Education Debt
Reduction Program (EDRP) awards to 3,398, which brought the total
active EDRP participants to over 9,000. Additionally, the percentage of
staff receiving recruitment, retention, and relocation incentives (3R)
increased from 12% to 18%. At rural facilities, the use of 3Rs
continued to climb in FY 2023, increasing from 19% to 20%. In addition,
for some critical shortage occupations, such as medical technicians
(18% to 33%) and police (13% to 29%), the use of 3Rs increased even
more dramatically. These incentives reduced losses for critical
shortage occupations and helped VA successfully compete for health care
and entry level staff. Additionally, VHA adjusted over 1,700 special
salary rates, resulting in a 10% average increase in salaries impacting
nearly 41,000 health care workers in support of PACT Act
implementation. VHA also authorized critical skills incentives for over
28,000 employees in 37 different occupations as of the beginning of FY
2024. The average critical skills incentive amount received by these
employees was approximately $7,900.
Thanks to the robust hiring efforts in 2023, VBA and VHA are well-
positioned to serve Veterans and need not continue the staff growth of
2022 and 2023 in 2024. Consistent with the 2025 budget, VA will
strategically focus its hiring in key areas, to include mental health
providers and front-line health care workers in regions with shortages.
focusing on wellbeing of veterans
The FY 2025 budget provides the resources that support Veterans'
overall health and economic well-being. The FY 2025 request includes $4
billion in discretionary funding for the VBA General Operating Expenses
account, $136 million more than the 2024 President's Budget. This
includes funds for increased overtime funding for the timely processing
of claims and investments in artificial intelligence to improve key
processes.
The President's Budget provides disability compensation and
survivor benefits to over 7 million Veterans and their families,
delivers education and job training benefits to 1.1 million Veterans
and qualified dependents, guarantees 433,000 home loans, and funds 5.6
million total lives insured for Veterans, Service members, and
qualified dependents.
VA remains steadfast in our commitment to assist Veterans, active-
duty Service members, and eligible surviving spouses in retaining their
homes and avoiding foreclosure, having assisted over 145,000 borrowers
to retain their homes in FY 2023. VA has leveraged a suite of
traditional and COVID-19 related loss mitigation options to aid
borrowers who have trouble making mortgage payments. To address the
needs of Veteran borrowers still experiencing the effects of the COVID-
19 pandemic in a rising interest rate environment, or other economic
shocks, VA plans to launch the Veterans Affairs Servicing Purchase
program on May 31, 2024. This program will provide Veterans an
affordable, scheduled monthly mortgage payment that reduces the debt
owed over time at a rate much lower than the current market interest
rate while eliminating the uncertainty resultant from balloon payments
and payoffs.
preventing veteran suicide
Suicide prevention requires a comprehensive public health approach.
With a focus on evidence-based clinical interventions and community-
based, evidence-informed prevention strategies, we aim to reach all
Veterans-both those inside and outside of our system with life- saving
interventions.
Suicide is a complex public health and national security issue. In
addition to mental health risk factors for suicide, the evidence
indicates that we assess a broader array of socio- economic and socio-
cultural risk factors. With no single cause, there is no single
solution, and we must be comprehensive in our approach as we know some
Veterans may not receive any services from VA. To support this
nationwide effort, the budget specifies $583 million for suicide
prevention outreach programs, in addition to $2.7 billion in suicide
prevention-specific treatment. Additionally, the budget plans to spend
$17.1 billion in FY 2025 for mental health care, a critical component
of suicide prevention.
Our 10 year National Strategy on Preventing Veteran Suicide (2018)
has been codified through VA's Suicide Prevention 2.0 Initiative,
Suicide Prevention Now initiative, new laws including the 2020
Commander John Scott Hannon Veterans Mental Health Care Improvement
Act, the Veterans Comprehensive Prevention, Access to Care, and
Treatment Act of 2020, the National Suicide Hotline Designation Act of
2020, and emerging innovations like Mission Daybreak, combined with
research and program evaluation. These efforts together help VA to
reach all Veterans, not only those engaged in VA services. For example,
in September 2023, the Staff Sergeant Parker Gordon Fox Suicide
Prevention Grant Program (SSG Fox SPGP) awarded $53 million to 80
community-based organizations across 43 States, the District of
Columbia, Guam, and American Samoa. These organizations provide or
coordinate the provision of suicide prevention services for eligible
individuals, including Veterans and their families. VA prioritized
grants to rural communities, Tribal lands, Territories of the United
States, areas with medically underserved groups, areas with a high
number or percentage of minority Veterans or women Veterans, and areas
with a high number or percentage of calls to the Veterans Crisis Line.
Twenty-one grantees serve Tribal lands including the Navajo Nation,
Cherokee Nation, Choctaw Nation, Alaskan Native Tribes, and others. VA
published the Notice of Funding Opportunity for the SSG Fox SPGP on
January 26, 2024, for a third year of services.
increasing access to mental health care
Telehealth, especially video mental health care including substance
use disorder treatment, has played a crucial role in improving access
to mental health services. Video mental health care now constitutes 33%
of total mental health care visits, showcasing the significant role of
telehealth during and beyond the pandemic. In FY 2023, over 1 million
Veterans benefited from nearly 6 million video telemental health (TMH)
care visits, marking a 5% increase in Veterans and a 1% increase in
visits compared to FY 2022; 96% of these TMH visits occurred in a
Veteran's home or offsite location, emphasizing the convenience and
accessibility of the service. Because most mental health visits can be
conducted using TMH, it increases the available options for providing
mental health care to all Veterans, no matter where they or their
providers are in the U.S. This helps increase health care equity and
access. Telehealth offers Veterans greater choice and removes their
individual barriers to care-barriers such as stigma, transportation,
distance to facility, childcare, financial constraints, logistical
issues, and lack of access to in-person specialists who can deliver
evidence-based interventions. Telehealth has become a primary
consideration for Veterans seeking mental health care, with those in
rural areas using video services at rates comparable to others. With
plans to increase telehealth support staff and specialized providers,
VA is continuing to enhance its nationwide TMH network so even more
Veterans can access mental health care virtually.
Among the risk factors for suicide, substance use disorder (SUD) is
strongly implicated. In addition, drug overdose fatalities have
escalated. The President's Budget includes $254 million to improve VA's
opioid safety initiative and to continue our joint work with the
Department of Defense (DoD) in the field of pain management, consistent
with the requirements of the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act
of 2016 (Public Law 114-198, Title IX, Subtitle A, 11Sec. Sec. 911-912,
the Jason Simcakoski Memorial and Promise Act). VA is also expanding
evidence- based SUD treatment and harm reduction initiatives consistent
with the Biden-Harris Administration's National Drug Control Strategy.
The President's Budget includes $264 million to support VA initiatives
that address Veteran specific needs, including employment, case
management for Veterans experiencing housing instability, peer support,
as well as in-patient, residential, and out-patient SUD care, delivered
in-person and via telehealth, inside and outside specialty care
settings.
Furthermore, VA's budget continues to support expansion of its
Psychotropic Drug Safety Initiative to address the growing number of
Veterans with stimulant use disorder and crisis of overdose fatalities
associated with illicit stimulant use. This initiative increases
Veterans' access to evidence-based treatments for stimulant use
disorder and overdose prevention, while also ensuring the safe and
appropriate prescribing of stimulant medications. Evidence-based
treatments for stimulant use disorder include cognitive-behavioral
therapy and contingency management, both of which are recommended by
the 2021 VA-DoD Clinical Practice Guidelines (CPG) for the Management
of SUDs.
health care budget request
Providing Veterans access to the soonest and best care is at the
core of our mission. At a time when VA is expanding access to health
care for millions of Veterans and delivering record numbers of
appointments, VA is laser-focused on making sure that Veterans have
access to world-class health care whenever and wherever they need it.
In 2025, planned obligations for VA health care, including TEF, are
projected to be $149.5 billion, an increase of 5.4% above the 2024
budget.
VA offers affordable, timely, and high-quality health care for the
Nation's Veterans. In 2023, ,nearly 70% of VA hospitals receiving 4 or
5 stars in the annual Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Hospital
ratings, compared to just 41% of non-VA hospitals. VA hospitals
outperformed non-VA hospitals in all 10 core patient experience metrics
in Medicare's latest survey of patients and, most importantly, more
than 91% of the Veterans we serve trust VA with their care, a level
unmatched anywhere in the private sector.
VA will ensure that every eligible Veteran has a chance to access
VA care, including community care. We can now offer Veterans VA care at
almost every turn, whether that is through an in-person appointment,
telehealth appointment, placement in our community living centers, or
another option. And that is exactly what we want to do.
women veterans' health care
In 2023, VA celebrated 100 years of providing health care to women
Veterans. The budget requests $264 million for women's health and
childcare programs. This funding level supports $210 million for the
Women's Health Innovation and Staffing Enhancement Initiative (WHISE).
VA is strategically enhancing services and access for women Veterans by
hiring women's health personnel nationally to fill any gaps in capacity
across all Veterans Integrated Service Networks. Through WHISE, VA is
funding over 1,000 women's health personnel including: primary care
providers, gynecologists, mental health providers and women's health
care coordinators, including maternity care coordinators. VA is also
using WHISE funding to purchase needed clinical equipment such as new
or replacement mammography equipment, exam tables designed for women
with low mobility, and breastfeeding privacy pods.
Among eligible women Veterans receiving VHA care, more than half
have at least one mental health condition and many struggle with
multiple mental health concerns, medical comorbidities, and
psychosocial challenges. These include gender-specific conditions, such
as premenstrual dysphoric disorder, postpartum depression, and
perimenopausal depression, all of which are associated with heightened
suicide risk. VA has implemented numerous initiatives to ensure that
women Veterans seen at any VA medical facility have access to mental
health clinicians with the knowledge and skills to treat gender-
specific mental health conditions, including reproductive mental health
concerns. Examples include the National Reproductive Mental Health
Consultation Program, comprehensive training in reproductive mental
health across the lifespan, evidenced-based treatments tailored for
women Veterans (as recommended by 2023 VA- DoD CPG for the Management
of Pregnancy), and at least one designated Women's Mental Health
Champion at each VA medical center (VAMC).
Women Veterans often feel a sense of connection and trust with peer
specialists who can relate to their experiences in the military.
Evidence shows that peer support is effective for alleviating some
conditions unique to a woman's experience, such as postpartum
depression. The President's Budget includes $2 million to support
expanding peer support services for women Veterans. VHA is committed to
honoring women Veterans' specific needs and treatment preferences by
implementing national peer support training initiatives and
disseminating novel, gender-tailored peer support interventions. These
interventions are developed to be delivered both in person and via TMH
to ensure greater access for women Veterans who often report barriers
due to caregiving responsibilities.
homelessness programs
The 2025 budget provides $3.2 billion for Veterans' homelessness
programs, with the goal of ensuring every Veteran has permanent, safe,
sustainable housing with access to high- quality health care and other
supportive services to end and prevent future Veteran homelessness. The
budget includes funds to assist with designing and developing expanded
services for aging and disabled Veterans, a growing need and area of
focus for the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)--VA
Supportive Housing (VASH) program. In addition, funds will be used to
provide a medical home model and population tailored approach to
provide in-home primary care and wrap around services to Veterans
actively enrolled in the HUD-VASH program, provide additional resources
to increase outreach and community engagement efforts, as well as the
expansion of Veteran justice services, such as treatment courts and
Veteran- focused criminal justice initiatives. Funding will also
support the VA Grant and Per Diem program to increase per diem rates to
community partners actively supporting VA's effort to end Veteran
homelessness.
On December 15, 2023, HUD, released the 2023 Point-in-Time Count,
the annual effort to estimate the number of Americans, including
Veterans, without permanent housing. Data show that on a single night
in January 2023, 35,574 Veterans experienced homelessness in theU.S.
Although this reflects a 7% increase in the number of Veterans
experiencing homelessness from 2022, VA and our Federal partners have
reduced Veteran homelessness by more than 52% since 2010. During
calendar year 2023, VA permanently housed 46,552 homeless Veterans,
surpassing the goal to house 38,000 Veterans by more than 22%.
research
The 2025 budget requests a total of $927 million for research,
which includes $59 in mandatory through the TEF funding. These
resources will improve Veterans' health and well- being through basic,
translational, clinical, health services, rehabilitative, genomic and
data science research; apply scientific knowledge to develop effective
individualized care solutions for Veterans; attract, train, and retain
the highest-caliber investigators and nurture their development as
leaders in their fields; and ensure a culture of professionalism,
collaboration, accountability, and the highest regard for research
volunteers' safety and privacy.
In 2025, the Office of Research and Development will coordinate
with environmental exposure focused programs as part of the
implementation of the PACT Act by building capacity (including the
number of researchers funded to conduct military exposures research)
and strengthening inter-governmental partnerships. This includes
continuing to implement an interagency workgroup on toxic exposure
research, called for in section 501 of the PACT Act, to identify
evidence gaps and craft a strategic plan to address gaps. The budget
invests $59 million in 2025 for military environmental exposures
research, an increase of $13 million from the current estimate for
2024.
caregivers
The budget recognizes the important role of caregivers in
supporting the health and wellness of Veterans and offers support and
services through the Program of General Caregiver Support Services to
family members and friends caring for a Veteran as well as through the
Program of Comprehensive Assistance for Family Caregivers (PCAFC) to
family caregivers caring for Veterans who meet specific eligibility
requirements. The $2.9 billion included in the budget supports
staffing, stipend payments, training, education, and other services to
empower caregivers of Veterans. VA is currently undertaking a broad
programmatic review of PCAFC to ensure it meets the needs of Veterans
and their family caregivers. While this review is underway, VA has
suspended annual reassessments for PCAFC participants. While the
current eligibility criteria are examined, VA will not discharge or
decrease stipends or support to PCAFC participants and their family
caregivers, based on an annual reassessment. VA is also expanding
services to family caregivers, to include specific suicide prevention
training, mental health services, and respite services.
connected care
The 2025 budget includes $440 million for the Connected Care
program and supports the ongoing expansion and enhancement of
telehealth services directly to Veteran homes (e.g., video-to-home
services); goals to standardize the availability of digital services
for all Veterans; expansion of regional telehealth hubs, novel access
and experience innovations; and the need to sustain previous expansion
efforts funded with the support of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and
Economic Security Act and the American Rescue Plan funding. VA
delivered over 11.6 million telehealth episodes of care to Veterans in
the last fiscal year. This includes over 9.4 million episodes of care
to Veterans in their home or other locations and more than 2.9 million
telehealth episodes of care to rural Veterans. Overall, VA provided
telehealth services to over 2.4 million unique Veterans, representing
about 40% of Veterans served in VA.
aging veterans
Because they make up a significant portion of the Veterans we
serve, aging and older Veterans must be a significant priority now and
in the future. Veterans over the age of 65 represent about 50% of all
VHA enrollees. Currently, VA is expanding home- and community- based
services. This expansion includes programs such as Veteran Directed
Care, Medical Foster Home, and Home-Based Primary Care programs. All
are aimed at enabling Veterans to age in place with the necessary
support and services. VA is focused on implementing the VHA Institute
for Healthcare Improvement's Age Friendly Health Systems initiative and
VA's Geriatric Emergency Department Accreditation from the American
College of Emergency Physicians initiative to prepare VA facilities and
staff with the leading evidence-based care practices. VA is on a strong
path to become the largest integrated age-friendly health system in the
world. As of January 8, 2024, 132 VAMCs have earned formal Age-Friendly
recognition in 305 care settings. The new 2024 VA Age-Friendly Health
System initiative action community has projects registered for another
410 teams from 126 facilities. As of December 2023, 68 of the VA's 111
Emergency Departments earned Geriatric Emergency Room accreditation and
others are actively in the process for 2024.
infrastructure
The President's 2025 Budget includes $2.8 billion for construction
requirements, including $2.5 billion in Major and Minor Construction
appropriations and an estimated $307 million from the Recurring
Expenses Transformational Fund (RETF) for VHA Minor Construction
requirements. This request is $593 million greater than VA's
discretionary 2024 request.
Funding for two major medical facility projects includes the West
Los Angeles New Critical Care Center, Central Utility Plant,
Demolition, and Renovations to Building 500 and Dallas Clinical
Expansion for Mental Health, Expansion of Parking Facilities, and Land
Acquisition, together supporting over 400,000 Veteran enrollees. The
2025 budget also includes $45 million in Major Construction funds for a
gravesite development project at Fort Logan National Cemetery in
Denver, Colorado. The budget requests $687 million for Minor
Construction, inclusive of RETF. This amount includes $174.1 million in
Minor Construction funds to address gravesite expansion and columbaria
requirements to keep existing national cemeteries open as well as
address infrastructure deficiencies and other requirements necessary to
support national cemetery operations. In addition, VHA's Medical
Facilities account includes $2 billion for non-recuring maintenance.
Also included in the 2025 budget are nine major medical facility
leases totaling over 1.9 million square feet of space supporting a
workload of over 2.3 million outpatient visits and bed days of care per
year. These leases are key to modernizing VA's clinical points of care
and increasing access for the increasing number of Veterans anticipated
to access VA care because of benefit expansion offered by the PACT Act.
Further, VA is aggressively working to pursue implementation of the
goals of Executive Order 14057, which creates a broad set of
challenging goals and requirements for Federal agencies to eliminate
their carbon footprint and make their operations more sustainable and
resilient. In support of this, VA's 2025 budget request includes Minor
Construction funding totaling $7 million for the National Cemetery
Administration (NCA) and VBA electric vehicle charging requirements.
information technology serving veterans
The 2025 budget provides $7.6 billion for VA IT systems and
telecommunications support, including $6.2 billion in base
discretionary funding and $1.4 billion in TEF, reflects the Office of
Information and Technology's efforts to deliver modern, innovative,
secure, and efficient solutions for the Nation's Veterans. To increase
Veterans' access to VA information and services, strategic IT
investments through the limited, controlled expansion of modernization,
cybersecurity, and IT workforce, will allow VA to make key investments
in Federal initiatives, including Zero Trust Architecture, Artificial
Intelligence, and improved access for Veterans with certain
disabilities through Section 508 Compliance.
To create a 21st Century VA focused on meeting the demands of
Veterans in the digital age, IT modernization is critical in achieving
digital transformation goals. The 2025 budget sustains the increased
investments made in the 2024 budget and supports the continued
operations and maintenance of VA's existing aging and legacy systems.
VA continues to expand critical modernization initiatives bolstering
the Department's ability to serve the Veteran including: the
Infrastructure Readiness Program to reduce technical debt, Financial
Management Business Transformation (FMBT) to enable compliance with
financial management legislation and improve stewardship of resources,
and Supply Chain Management to provide cost-effective logistics and
ensure the delivery of world-class health care and benefits to
Veterans.
When Veterans leverage technology to access VA services, they trust
that the underlying digital ecosystem is safe, reliable, and secure.
The 2025 budget invests $670 million in cybersecurity and VA's Zero
Trust Architecture acceleration effort will deliver a robust and
resilient security posture for the nine million Veterans that use VA
for care and benefits and the hundreds of thousands of VA employees and
contractors spanning over 600,000 connections to the network.
Investing in the IT workforce makes VA an attractive employer for
top talent that can better deliver services to Veterans. The 2025
budget supports the Special Salary Rate authorized in 2023 for IT
technical positions under PACT Act authorities. VA will maximize these
incentives for targeted expansion of IT services--including Artificial
Intelligence--to VA employees and Veterans during a period by record
growth in health and benefits delivery. This investment is critical for
VA to continue delivering world-class IT products and services to
millions of Veterans, their families, and caregivers.
electronic health record modernization
As part of an Electronic Health Record Modernization Program Reset
(Reset) announced in April 2023, VA deferred work on future deployments
of the Federal electronic health record (EHR), the sole exception being
the successful joint VA and DoD deployment at the Captain James A.
Lovell Federal Health Care Center (North Chicago, Illinois) in March
2024, while the Department prioritizes improvements at the 6 sites and
22 clinics that currently use the Federal EHR. The purposes of the
Reset are to: optimize the current state of the Federal EHR, closely
examine and address the issues that clinicians and other end users are
experiencing, and position VA for future deployment success. VA is
seeing incremental, but accelerating progress as it addresses the
issues that clinicians and other end users are experiencing and as it
optimizes the current state of the EHR system to ensure the enterprise-
wide foundation is in place for success when deployments resume. The FY
2025 budget of $894 million supports the Reset and sustainment/
maintenance of the six sites. VA acknowledges that an updated
deployment schedule is critical to demonstrating commitment to
providing the Federal EHR to end users across the enterprise and will
provide that schedule to the Committee once it has been determined.
financial management business transformation (fmbt)
The 2025 budget includes $313 million for FMBT, a program that is
improving VA's fiscal accountability and enhancing analytic and
resource management capabilities for our employees who serve Veterans.
Deployment of the Integrated Financial and Acquisition Management
System (iFAMS) is taking place in phased implementations across VA
Administrations and Staff Offices. Looking ahead, iFAMS will be
implemented for VBA's Loan Guaranty Service, and the program recently
initiated the first VHA implementation.
honoring veterans' legacies
The President's 2025 Budget includes $495 million for NCA's
operations and maintenance account, an increase of $15 million (3%)
over the 2024 budget. These funds will ensure Veterans and their
families have access to exceptional burial and memorial benefits
including expansion of existing cemeteries as well as new and
replacement cemeteries. With these funds, NCA will provide for an
estimated 137,440 interments, the perpetual care of over 4 million
gravesites, and the operations and maintenance of 158 national
cemeteries and 35 other cemeterial installations in a manner befitting
national shrines.
While every eligible Veteran may be interred at any one of VA's
open national cemeteries and a significant majority of the 122 VA
grant-funded Veterans cemeteries, VA realizes that proximity to a
cemetery is an important consideration in whether Veterans and family
members choose a VA-funded cemetery for their final resting place. For
this reason, NCA is committed to providing 95% of the Veteran
population with access to first interment burial options (for casketed
or cremated remains, either in-ground or in columbaria) in a national
or state Veterans cemetery within 75 miles of the Veteran's place of
residence. VA has made continuous, significant progress towards meeting
that target. In 2025, an estimated 94% of the Veteran population will
be served with such access. The 2025 budget also includes $60 million
for the Veterans Cemetery Grants Program to continue important
partnerships with States and Tribal organizations. The grants program
plays a crucial role in NCA achieving its strategic target of providing
95% of Veterans with reasonable access to a burial option.
Additionally, the 2025 budget continues NCA's implementation of the
Veterans Legacy Memorial (VLM), the Nation's first digital platform
dedicated to the memory of nearly 10 million Veterans interred in VA's
national cemeteries and VA grant-funded state, territorial, and Tribal
Veterans cemeteries. VLM allows family, friends, and others to preserve
their Veteran's legacy by posting tributes. In November 2023, VLM's
website had its largest expansion yet with the creation of nearly 5
million pages for Veterans in private and other cemeteries who have
received a headstone, marker, or medallion from NCA since 1996.
conclusion
Chair Sinema, Ranking Member Boozman, thank you for the opportunity
to appear before you today to discuss our progress at the Department
and how the President's FY 2025 Budget and FY 2026 Advance
Appropriations Request will serve the Nation's Veterans.
Senator Sinema. Thank you. I really appreciate that.
So we'll start with a round of five-minute questions of our
panel. I ask all my colleagues to keep track of your clock and
stay within those five minutes. I'll start with the first round
of questions.
Secretary, your models project that utilization of VA
health care worldwide but the discretionary funding request for
VA health care is below the levels from fiscal year 2023 and
even including mandatory health care funding, it's $4 billion
below fiscal year 2024.
So what are the current spend rates for the medical care
accounts in fiscal year 2024 and based on these trends, do you
expect to be on target for fiscal year 2025?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Thanks so much.
We anticipate spending about a $140 billion on health care
out of that account in fiscal year 2024. All in fiscal year
2025 in the budget is a 150 billion when you count our various
funding streams, medical care collections, carry-over
importantly about 12.7 billion in carry-over, and then, as you
said, the Toxic Exposure Fund, which is an increase of about
percent in total health care spending.
So there's no doubt as we've talked about a number of times
in the course of the last week that money is tight and that is
a function of the budget agreement but we think that we have
the money that we need here and we have, most importantly, the
people that we need to implement this increased access to care.
Senator Sinema. And, Secretary, at these levels, how can
you make sure that you're able to pay for the care the veterans
receive in the community while also investing to ensure that
the VA is an available option for veterans?
Secretary McDonough. Really good question and this is one
that we spend a lot of time worrying about.
The budget takes a lot of unique steps this year as it
relates to Community Care. Perhaps we've already notified to
you all that we are taking the $1.9 in rescission from other
than Community Care accounts in the VA.
We also ask that we reprogram in the Advance $7 billion in
to Community Care. That reflects what is a very robust set of
referrals over the second half of fiscal year 2023 but also
reflects what has been basically 15 percent year-on-year growth
going back to the enactment of the Mission Act.
This is higher than CBO would have anticipated and that's
one of the reasons that we make these big moves that we make
here.
Notwithstanding those moves, we think that because of the
hiring year that we have had and our ability to continue to
strategically hire where we need it, that we can also meet our
demands for care in the direct care system.
We do not ask for a second bite on the Advance but if we
find out over the course of these next several months that
because of our outreach efforts, we have 550 outreach events
this year, because of our outreach events that we're getting
more veterans enrolled, just since March 5th we've had 12,500
veterans uniquely from the PACT Act cohort having enrolled in
VA, if we see that continued kind of growth, my hunch is we may
be coming back to you after working with OMB to ask for a
second bite if we need to, but, again, margins are tight.
We feel like we have the investments we need. If we begin
to run into problems, we'll definitely come to the committee.
Lastly, we are tracking this very, very closely. We have
implemented a series of budget execution tools. It is our
intention to share those tools with this committee, with your
team.
We're working through all that paperwork on our end of the
street before we do that so you all as a team will be able to
follow along closely with us on the execution of those goals.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Secretary.
The fiscal year 2025 Budget Request, as I mentioned in my
opening remarks, includes a lower level of spending for rural
health programs than was appropriated for fiscal year 2024.
So, first, can you assure me that the VA will direct the
full amount of funding towards rural health programs in 2024?
Secretary McDonough. You have my assurance.
Senator Sinema. Thank you.
And the second question would be what are innovative
initiatives that you're developing to increase access for rural
veterans to address the fact that there is a proposed reduction
in spending for fiscal year 2024?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Well, thanks very much.
Among the more innovative things we're doing right now is
we're enhancing our cooperation with the Department of Defense
and over the course of the last 2 months with the Department of
Agriculture to increase access points in rural settings so we
can get care closer to veterans. That's one innovative
solution.
Second, things like access to cancer treatment. We
announced a new program last week, Close to Me, where we
forward deploy VA professionals to CBOCs, closer to veterans so
they can get their cancer treatments closer to their homes
rather than having to drive all the way to Phoenix, for
example. They'll be able to go to their local CBOC, supported
by their family, not having to drive those longer distances.
We can do that within the confines of our budget because
cancer treatment drugs are 30 percent cheaper for VA than they
are for our private sector partners.
Third, we are forward deploying VA professionals--I saw
this in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan--to community
hospitals, including federally designated health clinics, so
that we can identify vets who are coming in to treatment, not
enrolled with VA. We can then get them enrolled and get them
support in those facilities. Ultimately, that has cost over the
life of the program for VA but no cost upfront.
Lastly, the Office of Rural Health has been basically flat
at $337 million for the last three-four years for the simple
reason that we finance our clinical resource hubs principally
through the Office of Rural Health. That means we're going to
continue to rely on telehealth, as you said in your opening
statement.
Then the rest of the investments out of that office are for
enterprise-wide innovations. Among those innovations that have
come from that office that can be funded at that $337 million
effort are home-based primary care. This is where we are
sending providers into rural settings, like Maine and Arizona
and Montana and Wisconsin and Arkansas, so that we are taking
the care to the veterans, right. So that's the idea, not that
we continue to fund through those Rural Health Care Office but,
rather, we then transfer those to being funded through the
standard Medical Care account.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Secretary.
Senator Collins, you're recognized.
Senator Collins. Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and
again I thank the Vice Chair for his graciousness in allowing
me to precede him.
Mr. Secretary, let me start with two facts. One is that
Maine has one of the highest percentages based on population in
the country of veterans. That's something I'm very proud of.
Mainers have always stepped forward to serve.
Second, Maine is the oldest state in the nation by median
age. So when you combine those two factors, you can easily see
why our state veterans homes are so important. In fact, both of
my parents had the benefit of compassionate care at our state's
veterans' homes at the end of their lives.
In 2022, however, despite the strong demand for these
services, Maine considered closing two of its veterans' homes,
one in Machias and one in my hometown of Caribou.Fortunately,
that was averted, but it would have caused tremendous hardship
to veterans and their families, and Maine is not unique in this
regard.
A recent report indicates that other veterans' homes across
the country have notified the VA of potential closures. 15 have
reduced their bed capacity. Another four have already closed
permanently.
The VA raised its per diem rates in 2023 but, frankly, that
increase has not kept pace with rising medical costs, and the
veterans' homes in Maine, as true across the country, are
struggling financially.
What is the VA doing to support financially troubled state
veterans' homes and what more can be done at the Federal level
to prevent closures or reductions in beds?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Senator, thank you very much for
the question and I couldn't agree more strongly with you about
the importance of state veterans' homes. That's why we bias in
VA funding streams for bigger investments in the state-run
veterans' homes than we do in the commercially-run veterans'
homes and long-term care facilities.
Among the things that we are doing obviously is up to 65
percent of the cost of the facility construction remodeling
grants, importantly nurse recruitment grants, and I'll come
back to that in a second, medical sharing arrangements with
considerable cost-sharings when we can get our personnel into
those facilities to care for vets, and then continued clinical
care education.
Notwithstanding that, and as you pointed out, the per diem
has increased percent in 2023 and again another percent in
2024, higher than our increases for other similarly situated
programs.
Nevertheless, I agree with you that there are big
challenges out there, especially in two areas. One, and one of
the reasons we're hearing from other states, not in Maine but
from other states that they're closing, is they don't have the
staff because the veterans that they're getting are requiring
more complex care.
So greater funding for staff who can provide more complex
care for those veterans is important and this is something that
we'd be more than happy to work with you in Maine on and work
with the committee on.
Secondly, the cost of pharmaceuticals for those veterans
who end up in state-run veterans' homes. By tradition, the
states take on the cost of those pharmaceutical treatment
patterns. They also don't have access to our more price
competitive formularies.
So we'd like to also work with you on that to figure out
how is it that we address these significant costs associated
with pharmaceutical treatments because our veterans are living
longer with more complex health care systems.
So those are two areas where we would like to try to
enhance our support to states like Maine.
One, how do we make sure that we can afford the staff that
we need for the complex care they get. Two, how can we ensure
that we are not just passing on a very unmanageable
pharmaceutical treatment regimen that the states can't afford
but the veterans need.
Senator Collins. Thank you.
I only have 19 seconds left, but just to put on the record
there's also a problem with transporting veterans from rural
areas to the one VA hospital that we have in the state of Maine
and I hope that that's something that we can also work together
on.
Secretary McDonough. Count on that and we have a
legislative proposal on that. I've been studying up on this
since you and I discussed. So we have some ideas on that.
Senator Collins. Thank you.
Secretary McDonough. I'd like to work with you on those.
Senator Collins. Terrific. Thanks so much.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Vice Chair Collins.
I recognize Senator Baldwin.
Senator Baldwin. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Mr. Secretary, there has been a steady and significant
decline in the number of veterans being prescribed opioids for
pain management since 2014.
The implementation of the Comprehensive Addiction and
Recovery Act in July of 2016, which included the Jason
Simcakoski Memorial and Promise Act, has contributed to this
trend.
Secretary McDonough. Very much.
Senator Baldwin. From a nationwide high of more than
878,000 veterans prescribed opioids in the last quarter of
2013, the number decreased to fewer than 300,000 at the
beginning of this year.
That 67 percent decline in prescription rates over the last
decade is extraordinary and is really a testament to the
progress we can achieve if we work diligently and resource the
VA appropriately.
This decrease in opioid prescription rates does not mean
that the VA isn't treating pain. Rather, it means that the VA
is treating pain responsibly. For example, the Tomah VA Medical
Center spearheaded the Pain University Initiative to achieve
improved pain management through comprehensive solutions
without the use of opioids.
So, Mr. Secretary, how else can Congress enable the VA to
provide these integrative health options for our veterans and
what does this committee need to do to support and continue the
efforts to responsibly manage pain and that pain care for our
veterans?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Senator, thanks very much.
I think the tools that you pointed out are really important
and I thank you for making sure that we got them and I thank
Marc Simcakoski and the Simcakoski family for the dedication
that they've manifested since Jason's death.
We asked for $254 million for pain management and opioid
safety prescription drug monitoring in the budget. We think
that's an appropriate and prudent investment. That's the first
thing we would ask.
Secondly, we need to continue to staff up. We're not yet at
a hundred percent of facilities with pain management teams.
That's required in your law. We're north of ninety percent but
we're not yet at a hundred percent, so continued investment to
allow us to build out those pain management teams.
Third, the Whole Health Initiative allows us--you know,
Tomah is also a flagship effort here that allows us to deploy
new clinically proven pain management techniques that are non-
pharmacy-based. So those range from acupuncture, yoga,
meditation, all of these things are really important to making
sure that we can manage holistically that veteran's pain.
We're very proud of the progress we've made on opioid
prescription. That's directly a result of your law of
investments in alternatives and of accountability for those
alternatives. I think this budget gets us a long way to
continuing that process.
Senator Baldwin. Great. Mr. Secretary, I've heard you say,
and I know you feel this deeply, even one veteran suicide is
too many, and I know you are working to reduce this troubling
epidemic.
I share your concerns and I was proud to lead the
bipartisan legislation that transitioned the VA Crisis Line to
the National Suicide Prevention Hotline 988 number.
During the first year in operation, the Veterans Crisis
Line fielded nearly one million contacts. The implementation of
this line has not been without difficulty and it will take
commitment to oversight to get this right for our veterans.
So can you please provide both your assessment of the
contribution that the Veterans Crisis Line has made in
addressing suicide among veterans and inform the committee of
what additional resources would help rectify some of the
problems and issues with the Crisis Line that have been
identified?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Thanks so much.
So I'm very proud of our Veteran Crisis Line Team. I've met
with our operators there many times. Their work has proven time
and again to be timely and effective. It's not to say that it's
without faults. You know, we've had really tough hard-hitting
IG investigations on that that relate to training. That's on
us. We have the funding for training. We have the funding for
staffing.
There is an issue on the continued funding of the Crisis
Line itself, the 988. This is not an issue for us, for VA, but
this is an issue at the states. The standup of the line
envisioned a Federal role at the start, handing off to the
states making the investments thereafter.
Remember the way it works for us is as a veteran you call
988, then you press 1. At that point you exit the General
Crisis Line and then you're into the VA-managed Veteran Crisis
Line.
Notwithstanding the substantial increase in the number of
calls in the first year, time to answer shrunk, abandonment
rate shrunk, and follow-up assessments with the veterans in
terms of survey results demonstrate increased satisfaction.
So we think that the execution is going well. That's not to
say again with all faults you'll recall that many of you held
us publicly accountable for an IG report out of one of our
veteran crisis line teams and we're taking that very, very
seriously, but we have the funding we need. We have the
training capacity that we need.
I really hope that we can ensure continuity of the overall
effort through funding from the states but VA, thanks to your
all generosity, is in a very good spot to continue our part of
that Veteran Crisis Line.
I'll say one last thing. We also began executing a year ago
the COMPACT Act. So if a veteran doesn't want to just call 988
and press 1, that veteran can go into a hospital, any hospital,
irrespective of enrollment status with VA, and get care today,
and we will pay for that.
Again, there's growing pains in that program. It's not
perfect, but 47,000, almost 48,000 vets took advantage of it in
the first year. We think it's a really important program.
That's reflected in these Community Care numbers, too, by the
way.
Senator Baldwin. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Senator Sinema. Ranking Member Boozman.
Senator Boozman. Thank you, Madam Chair, and again thank
you, Mr. Secretary, for being here.
As I said earlier, I've really had the opportunity in the
House and now in the Senate to be on the VA Committee for quite
a while. We do have a situation where we have a decrease in
veterans' health care.
So I guess the question is--and I've got all the figures
and we don't need to go through that. You know those, you and
your staff know those better than anybody, but the question is
how much risk we're taking and then what options we have if
those assumptions aren't correct?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Boozman. What do we do?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Well, I think the highest
variability item in this multivariable equation here is
Community Care and I think it's generous to call it variable
because it's variable in one direction and that's up.
Senator Boozman. Right.
Secretary McDonough. And there's a lot of reasons for that
and, you know, frankly, we don't know them all yet and we're
looking at that.
So if there is elevated risk, it would be in there, but our
options to manage that are our ability to come back to you to
ask for some authority to transfer among different accounts in
the Medical Care account so that we're not taking substantial
risk on the provision of care there.
At some point we will take risk on maintenance of the
personnel that we need at VA to carry out the full suite of
care that veterans expect because you can't have a high
variability purchase care program that's increasing every year
and maintain a high cost direct care system with big fix costs
for personnel. That's the trade-off that we're going to
confront at some point. I think we begin to confront it in this
budget which is why we, I think, prudently, especially informed
by last year's very productive hiring year, make some decisions
to downsize VHA and VBA, by the way, as I've promised you we
would do, by the end of 2025.
But, frankly, when you consider those numbers, 10,000 over
a denominator of about 400,000 employees, that's not much
greater than traditional attrition at VHA.
Now we're a little under traditional attrition right now.
Why? Well, because you were so generous to us with funding for
staffing increases, pay increases, and things like the Critical
Skills Incentive.
So this might be a little bit harder, might be slightly
more risk because retention is up, quit rates are down, but I
consider that a high class problem, not a risky problem.
Senator Boozman. Right. One thing I'd like to get on the
table, you know, just being out and about, you know, listening
in various facilities, again just talking to providers, as more
PACT Act claims are processed, many veterans will see an
increase in their disability ratings.
So you can have people at 70 percent go to a hundred
percent and then the problem then is a number of them will
become newly eligible for things like dental benefits, dental
in particular, which I hadn't heard a lot about.
Secretary McDonough. Yes.
Senator Boozman. I guess the question is, you know, this is
rising. The number of veterans eligible prior to the PACT Act
grew by more than 8 percent a year. Last year it grew by nearly
12 percent.
Given that VA Dental currently is operated near capacity,
this growth will likely be addressed by Community Care.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Boozman. So I want to put that on the table and,
you know, see if you have a response, but there's just, I
think, a number of things and this is probably the biggest one
of not unintended consequences but consequences that are out
there that we need to take care of. It's a good thing for
veterans but that's going to cost some money.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. I think you're right that this
is a consequence of PACT. I think, frankly, it's among the
things that veterans are most excited about because of PACT
because there's so much--you know this better than I do--so
much demand for dental and so many people who wish they
qualified.
Senator Boozman. Right.
Secretary McDonough. So just to give you some numbers, 17
percent more hundred percent service-connected veterans today
than before the PACT Act was signed.
Senator Boozman. Right.
Secretary McDonough. It's a substantial number.
Senator Boozman. Right.
Secretary McDonough. If you consider fiscal year 2023, had
690,000 eligible veterans for dental, 567,000 got that care 100
percent onsite, a 123,000 got that in the community, right?
Our dental staff increase in 2023 was about 4.8 percent. So
they saw a similar bump. So we should be able to continue to
grow with dental this year, but the big number out there, the
big bogey here is 2.78 million eligible veterans for dental by
2028, up from 690,00 in 2023.
So our budget gets us going on that process, but you're
right that there's this transition period. Until we have
dentists, hygienists, and chairs in our facilities, there is
this transition period where we're going to be relying on the
community.
Senator Boozman. Right. Great opportunity for veterans. The
only thing that would be bad is if we couldn't--you know, once
we've said the benefit is there.
Secretary McDonough. Can't let them down.
Senator Boozman. No. Exactly.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Boozman. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Senator Sinema. Thank you.
Senator Tester.
Senator Tester. Yeah. Thank you, Madam Chair and Ranking
Member, appreciate you having this hearing, and it's always
good to see you, Secretary McDonough.
Secretary McDonough. Yes, sir.
Senator Tester. Did you sleep here last night? No?
Secretary McDonough. I didn't sleep much last night.
Senator Tester. That's good.
The only thing I would add to the dental care thing is I
think for the veterans' long term this could actually help
reduce health care costs moving forward because you got dental
problems. You've got health problems.
Secretary McDonough. Heart problems.
Senator Tester. Yeah.
Secretary McDonough. Mental health problems.
Senator Tester. Exactly.
Secretary McDonough. There's no question about it.
Senator Tester. You know, every day I get visited by folks
and they bring up issues that potentially impact veterans. You
know how many Native Americans serve, highest than any other
minority, and I met with some Urban Native Americans today.
They told me two things that I want to ask you about.
Secretary McDonough. Yep.
Senator Tester. The first thing they said is that the VA
uses us, the Urban Indian Health Care, they use us, but the
reimbursement is less than adequate. That's Number one. I just
want you to respond to that.
The second thing they said is that they use us because--and
I'll give you the community if you want--because the community
where the VA CBOC is is not fully staffed with doctors, so they
have to have us.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Tester. You guys put a freeze on. I get it. You
need 14,000 new nurses. It's time to take a breath, take a look
at what you got, and then move forward. I don't disagree with
that.
But the question becomes we're talking about Community
Care. We're talking about VA Care. If we don't have proper
staffing, as Jane Lerman pointed out yesterday evening from the
DAV, it forces more folks into the community, those inflated
prices go up. That's one question.
Secretary McDonough. No doubt about it.
Senator Tester. The other question is, is IHS treated
differently when it comes to the Tri-West in my case in
Montana?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Thanks so much.
So the UIOs, I spent time with them the day before
yesterday. They're really great partners. No Secretary had ever
been to a UIO, but I went with Senator Moran in Wichita my
first trip right after I left Montana.
We want our Native veterans to get the care that's
culturally competent for them where they need it when they need
it. That means at a VA facility, at a UIO or at an IHS facility
or, by the way, in the community through the Community Care
Program, and you know this better than I do the number of
Native veterans who are living in urban settings away from
their families and their tribes is extraordinary.
So we negotiated a new reimbursement agreement with the
UIOs, but I challenged them when I was with them on Tuesday.
We've had zero requests against the new arrangement since I
went to the facilities in 2021. We got to do a better job,
right?
Senator Tester. Okay.
Secretary McDonough. Now we also have a new reimbursement
arrangement with IHS and Rosalyn So and I are, I think, working
really aggressively on that.
The Chairwoman mentioned this in her opening remarks. We
have a new reimbursement arrangement with them. We're
finalizing that plan. It's with IHS now. I am really excited
about the opportunity not only for veterans to get care there
but we've also committed to our Tribal Advisory Committee,
which you put into law, that we will begin having CMP exams at
IHS facilities closer to veterans.
But, again, we have the tools there. We just have to figure
out why are people not taking advantage of them.
Senator Tester. Okay. And then talk to me a little bit
about staffing and the impacts that that has on Community Care
which you say is doing nothing but going up.
Secretary McDonough. Yep. It's a Gordian knot. It's a
really tough question because you got the chicken and the egg.
At what point are we not providing care because we don't
have people. This is what you've challenged me to do since I
got here, and at what point are we providing care in the
community because it's easier to do?
That's why we made the very aggressive effort over the last
3 years to staff up as aggressively as we did, one. Two, that's
why we ran an access sprint to test the proposition are these
new clinicians seeing veterans, and we proved that in 25,000
cases they are, but we have to get better on productivity and
then we have to show every time a veteran has a choice, we make
a referral for that veteran to go to the community, we say,
hey, this is where you're qualify in the community, you should
do that if you want, but we'd like you to stay with us and here
are your options there.
Senator Tester. But they can't stay with you unless they
got the staff.
Secretary McDonough. Correct. Which is why we have this
period under the access standard.
Senator Tester. Yep.
Secretary McDonough. The access sprint that we just showed
that we're seeing 11 percent more clinical visits in that
period. We have to extend that and keep those vets in the
system and, by the way, we're going to keep adding vets.
So as we do that, if we need more money, we'll come back
and ask for that in a second bite, but I want to do that
because there's more vets demanding more access, not because we
can't manage our workforce.
Senator Tester. Here's the point I want to make and I'm
going to give it up here in a second.
The point is, is as you go into this hiring freeze, don't
forget to look at the hospitals that are short on Pas, on docs,
on RNs, on all the above, because if we don't do that, you
can't expect Community Care to even begin to level off. It's
going to continue to go through.
So hopefully your VISN directors and the Director of VA
Montana, which, by the way, is doing pretty damn good, will
take a look and say, hey, we'll put pressure on you guys to get
more docs in here because we need them. Otherwise, the
Community Care issue is going to continue to grow and grow and
grow with the emergency care and everything else.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Secretary McDonough. Couldn't agree more.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Senator Tester.
Senator Murkowski.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Mr. Secretary, good to see you.
Secretary McDonough. Thank you, ma'am.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you for your visit to Alaska. You
know you're welcome any time.
Secretary McDonough. Thank you.
Senator Murkowski. The snow is melting and the weather's
getting pretty good.
One of the things that I wanted to raise again with you is
the Palmer Pioneer Veterans Home.
Secretary McDonough. Right.
Senator Murkowski. We made it through the winter without
losing that roof but as you know, this is something that we've
been watching for a long time. This is something where just
last March we got the VA Engineering Office to issue this memo
stating that the threat of a roof collapse does constitute a
life safety issue. It's been reclassified. That's great. It now
goes to what I understand is top of the sub-priority group.
Secretary McDonough. Yes.
Senator Murkowski. So we made it through the winter and we
had a lot of snow, but I am not certain that this roof is safe
moving forward and so the sooner, the faster we can attend to
this. I would just put that before you in terms of a
prioritization.
Secretary McDonough. You got that. The good news is our
engineers have come to the same conclusion you have. So it does
get to the top of the list for us, but I'll stay on top of this
and make sure that we stay in close touch with you.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you. I appreciate that and I know
all of our veterans there at the Palmer Home appreciate it.
I had a meeting about a month ago with a group in Fairbanks
who had been working at this Fairbanks Veterans Cemetery for a
long time, probably about 20 years now, and I appreciate that
the VA has placed the Vet Cemetery there as a high priority
among the projects to establish new cemeteries.
Secretary McDonough. Yes.
Senator Murkowski. But the way the list is stacked, as we
all know, it puts the expansion of existing facilities--there
are multiples ahead of any of the efforts to bring on a new
facility.
I think you've heard the benefits that a veterans cemetery
in this region would serve about 65 percent of the state's
veteran population. We have one small tribal cemetery down in
Metlakatla. We have a second National Cemetery that serves
Southeast in Sitka. We've got the one at JBER but that's
difficult to access.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Murkowski. So this is a very significant region of
the state with a very significant population of our veterans
and again they have been working aggressively on this.
I'm hoping that the committee's going to be able to fully
fund this account for fiscal year 2025 and in future years, but
what we're trying to do is to figure out if there's a way that
there can't be--you know, maybe it's a splitting the grant
funding so that you have a certain percent for expansion
projects and reserve a certain percent for new construction
because as we're looking at this list, it's going to be years
and years before a new construction of a cemetery is going to
be allowed to proceed.
So maybe you have a better idea of a timeline that we might
be able to report back to folks, but I'd like you to take a
look at that list. We're going to try to do our best. I'm
certainly going to put my shoulder into it on the committee
here to see if we can't get that number up, but even if we get
it up, it's going to be a long time before you get to any new
construction.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. So I've asked our team to look
at this particular Fairbanks option in the context of our
overall strategic goal to have, you know, 95 percent of
veterans within 75 miles of a hospital.
Senator Murkowski. Then you definitely need this one.
Secretary McDonough. That's what I mean. So I think this
feels like it probably analytically can--that may be important.
So I've asked for that review.
Senator Murkowski. Yeah. The 350 miles away is the closest
one.
Secretary McDonough. Exactly. So I've asked for that
review. We'll stay in close touch with you and with the whole
delegation on this.
Senator Murkowski. Good. I appreciate that.
Secretary McDonough. We'll make sure the importance of this
is coming through very strongly. I've got it.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you. And I'm running close on
time, but I'm curious about where we are with the claims
backlog and the claims inventory and the backlog because I'm
told that following the PACT Act we've seen that increase
dramatically. We've also seen the claims accuracy backlog.
I'm told that the accuracy rate has dropped to just over 83
percent, the lowest it's been in the last 10 years. I don't
know if this is directly related to the claims backlog, what
we're seeing with the increase, but know that this is an issue
that our veterans are raising in Alaska. I'm sure that they are
in other states, as well.
So I don't know if you can give us an update on that.
Secretary McDonough. Thanks for the question.
Backlog as of this morning was just over 300,000 claims.
Inventory is about 930,000 claims. So I think, if I
remember that right, but I'll get you the specific number by
close of business today, but we're at about a 31 percent
backlog rating. Of the overall inventory, about 31 percent of
the claims are backlogged. That's generally in the zone of what
we have considered healthy for backlog because we're not going
to rush to get a no to a veteran if more development will get
us to yes. That's the first thing.
Second, we did anticipate, by the way, we've been able to
manage this. This is kind of much on the low end of what we
anticipated and, frankly, what our model told us the backlog
would be by now, and it could be, by the way, that we're on the
downside of the backlog, but it's too soon to definitively
state that.
The main input there is people and we have basically
increased the VBA workforce by about 25 percent in the last 3
years, anticipating this influx of claims. So we----
Senator Murkowski. Has that impacted the accuracy because
you're bringing new people on?
Secretary McDonough. Correct. So that's the last point and
this is where I'm not sure where 83 percent comes. I just got
an update yesterday. We're at 93 percent, but, frankly, we have
a dispute with our IG, too, about he scores our accuracy
differently.
So I don't want to over-index the number, but there is
quality concerns which we anticipated because of so many new
people and because of the training requirements. So we have
throughout the course of the summer a quality stand-down which
will enhance training and an update of the training program to
review these quality questions because, again, this is
traditional CESON NVA.
We worry about the backlog when it grows. So we over-index
on the backlog number so then also quality comes down. So we
have to kind of toggle back and forth between these two things.
We've anticipated this. I hope the stand-down that we're
going to undertake over the course of the summer addresses that
and again that's a training issue and then that's an oversight
and management issue and again because we're seeing the same
thing in VBA, enhanced retention of our personnel, I feel
pretty good about our ability to address that.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you for your attention to this.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Murkowski. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Thank you,
Madam Chair.
Senator Sinema. Thank you.
Senator Peters.
Senator Peters. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Secretary McDonough, it's good to see you again. Thank you
for being here.
Secretary McDonough. Yep.
Senator Peters. As service members transition into the
civilian life, it's absolutely critical that they have the
tools and the job training that they need to be successful in
that transition.
In 2020, my bipartisan bill, The Support for Veterans in
Effective Apprenticeships Act, was signed into law. What the
law did is it increases veterans' access to financial
assistance they can use in connection with an apprenticeship
program and requires apprenticeships to factor in the skills,
the training, and the experiences they gain through military
service, which is often extensive, and helps the veteran get
placed in those apprenticeships.
But the fact remains that for veterans to use their GI Bill
benefits on these programs, they have to actually be aware of
apprenticeships in the first place and how those GI funds can
be used to help them get that training to transition.
This committee, as part of the fiscal year 2023 VA funding
legislation, directed the VA to take additional actions to
promote awareness and increased utilization of apprenticeships
among veterans.
So my question for you, sir, is what is the VA doing to
ensure veterans are aware of the opportunity to use GI Bill
benefits on apprenticeship programs and how does your fiscal
year 2025 Budget Request support further outreach to these
individuals?
Secretary McDonough. Yes. Both education, General Education
Program at VBA and the VREP, the Veteran Readiness and
Employment Programming, at VBA because of the committee's
requirements have enhanced and have specific targets to
increase enhancement of communication around apprenticeship
options.
So the budget fully funds those because it fully funds our
programming for both, and we will begin to see data on the
uptake of that. We'll accumulate that data and share that with
you over the course of the coming year.
Senator Peters. Right. I appreciate that.
I also want to ask you a couple of questions related to VA
Inspector General investigations. First, you and I have spoken
repeatedly about my concerns regarding a case of Ian Fishback.
Secretary McDonough. Yes.
Senator Peters. Ian is a native Michgander who tragically
passed away in 2021 following a decline in his mental health as
he and his family and friends worked and worked very hard to
try to gain admittance to a VA medical facility.
I was pleased when the VA opened an Inspector General
investigation into his case last summer following our
conversations, but my question for you, sir, is I know the
investigation is ongoing, but I want to get your commitment
today that once that investigation concludes you will implement
the IG recommendations across the VA as you become aware of
them.
Secretary McDonough. Yes. Ian Fishback was also a national
hero, one. Two, you have my commitment to implement those
recommendations. Three, I've been in close touch with the IG on
this. I have every expectation that he's wrapping up his work
and that that will be public soon and I think the IG does
really important work, really good work. My guess is it's going
to be really tough for us but that's the most important stuff
that we've got to get right and we will.
Senator Peters. Well, I appreciate your commitment and
really your attention to this from the get-go.
I also want to touch on a Detroit VA issue. Back in 2022
Senator Stabenow and I were alarmed to learn about a crisis of
care and, quite frankly, a crisis of leadership at the John
Dingle VA Medical Center in Downtown Detroit.
In response, Senator Stabenow and I called on the VA's
Inspector General to conduct an independent investigation into
that facility, which was launched shortly thereafter.Last
summer, the Inspector General released its report, which
included recommendations to remedy issues found at that
facility.
One of the recommendations related to removing conflicts of
interest within the peer review process and I've introduced
legislation with Ranking Member Boozman to the VA Peer Review
Neutrality Act on the recommendations from that VA system.
So my question for you, sir, is can you provide an update
today on the Detroit VA's implementation of the recommendations
contained within the Inspector General's report?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Thanks so much.
I just talked to our VISN Director this morning. She just
happened to have her monthly update with Chris Csuley, the VMC
Director, in Detroit yesterday.
Importantly, on your question, Recommendations 1, 2, and 8
are still open. 1 and 2 really relate to oversight of the
Surgery Department and Data Collection in that department. The
next meeting with the IG is on the 10th of June. I hope that we
can close those out or get closer to closing those out by then.
Recommendation 8 relates to the demand from the IG that we
get a permanent executive leadership team in place, and he has,
I think, a numeric goal or a time elapse goal on that. So we
just need time on that. So that's not yet closed, but I hope it
will be because our permanent Executive Med Center Director,
Chris Cauley, is doing a really fine job.
Importantly, they have reopened 30 inpatient beds in the
hospital. Imagine in the middle of Detroit we had 30 inpatient
beds closed. Those are opened.
Care as measured by relative value units, RVUs, unique
visits, and clinical encounters are all up right now this year
over last, again an indication of the seriousness of that
leadership team and the staff's interest in getting that team
functioning again, and for the first time in anybody's history,
they're also helping with caseload management with Saginaw,
with Battle Creek in a way that we've long expected them to but
they have not done, similar to the way Ann Arbor helps manage
caseload for veterans functioning as the high level facility
that they should be.
So nothing's permanent obviously. We have to stay on top of
this, but those are indications, I think, we're making
progress.
Senator Peters. Right. Well, thank you. Thank you for
continuing to work on those.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Senator Boozman. Thank you.
Senator Hoeven.
Senator Hoeven. Thank you, Ranking Member.
Secretary, thanks for being here. Thanks for your work on
behalf of veterans. Very much appreciate it.
I want to pick up on something that Senator Murkowski was
talking about but a little bit different twist on it but again
about making sure that our brave veterans have access to
cemeteries and their families have access to cemeteries.
As you're aware because we've talked about it, in Fargo now
we've established a cemetery and just expanded it from five to
35 acres, and it was initiated under the Rural Cemetery and I
think it was the first one established but that was five acres
but to show the need, you know, we were going through that so
fast recently we worked with VA and expanded that to 35 acres.
So now the key is to really enhance the facilities. As
Senator Murkowski discussed, that's a challenge funding-wise.
So we're willing to step forward and actually fund and build a
visitor's center on the cemetery and we're working to do that.
We've worked very closely with the Under Secretary Matt
Quinn, who's really been good to work with. I want to commend
him. But I understand he'll be leaving on May 23rd.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Hoeven. So, first, I want to really thank him and
commend him for the great work he's done, but I want to impress
how important it is that we have somebody in that slot who will
continue this work with us on a project that is really
fantastic for veterans, keeping in mind it was interesting to
listen to Senator Murkowski because the VA National Cemetery,
that serves an area you're very familiar with, all of Western
Minnesota, your home country.
Secretary McDonough. Where the fish are.
Senator Hoeven. Exactly. Great Lakes, great area but a lot
of folks that need access. It's a long way for them to
Minneapolis.
All of North Dakota because this is the only veterans
cemetery, Federal cemetery we have, and a lot of South Dakota
because they have to go all the way to Spear Fish which is on
the very western edge.
So this is situated where it will serve a big population
and we're willing to step up and cover the whole cost in
essence and then donate it, but we obviously have to work
through the bureaucratic challenges that go with that.
So I really need your commitment, particularly as we're
losing Under Secretary Quinn.
And he's done such a great job. Under Assistant Secretary,
I should say, Matt Quinn, but the new replacement. We're going
to need somebody that will work with us.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Hoeven. I need your commitment on that.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Well, first of all, let's not
let this go to Quinn's head. I mean, he's fine. He's fine but--
--
Senator Hoeven. Well, he's from Montana. So, I mean, we got
to be a little----
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Exactly.
Senator Hoeven. And I was going to commend our leaders on
the Full VA Authorization Committee, too, both Senators Tester
and Moran. They've been working with us very closely on this.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah, yeah. So you've got my
commitment on this and I've made that commitment in private and
I'm happy to make it again here in public. We're going to make
this work and I think we've demonstrated that through Matt's
commitment on this. He's routinely out there meeting with your
vets, meeting with local community leaders, and we'll stay on
top of it. You've got my commitment on that.
Senator Hoeven. And you're right about the Lakes. They are
really awesome. That's some great beautiful area up there. But
you know that when I laid that out for you because you come
from that area that the need is there and this is important.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Hoeven. So thank you for that commitment.
The second thing I wanted to talk to you about is veterans'
access to health care in non-VA long-term care facilities. One
of the challenges is that because of the Office of Federal
Contract Compliance Programs, they don't have a permanent rule
that allows these nursing homes to accept VA reimbursement
without a separate exam, separate from CMS.
Now I think it was the MISSION Act, we provided
authorization for the VA to exempt these facilities from OFCCP
separate compliance exams if they were meeting the CMS
requirements for Medicare and Medicaid because it just makes
sense that they don't go through this duplicate study which was
keeping a huge number of them from accepting veterans on VA
coverage, so VA insurance payments to cover their stay.
Now you put in place a two-year rule. We really appreciate
that. That takes us to 2025, but for Tricare you passed a rule
that just exempts it. Okay. We need something like that in
order to get these nursing homes to change their policy and
accept veterans that are on VA reimbursement rather than
Medicare or Medicaid and so it's a two-year but I would really
encourage you to look--because you have the authority now. We
passed that in law, but it would require a permanent rule on
your part to do it.
You did it with Tricare, but you can see why on a two-year
basis a lot of them are reluctant to change their policy----
Secretary McDonough. Definitely.
Senator Hoeven [continuing]. Because they could be right
back to dual exams and that mean might another elevator. That
might mean all these different things.
Secretary McDonough. Fair enough.
Senator Hoeven. And so I'd ask you to take a look at that.
Secretary McDonough. I'm on it.
Senator Hoeven. Okay.
Secretary McDonough. I got it.
Senator Hoeven. And then the last one is one you and I
talked about it, particularly in Rural America access to mental
health care. Telemedicine's helped, but, boy, any and all
initiatives you have to help getting access to mental health
care for our vets is really important.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Well, this is, you know, when we
talk about strategic hiring and that continuing,
notwithstanding our net zero growth on FTEs, you know, over the
course of this year, strategic hiring, you know, front of the
line there, is psychologists, mental health professionals,
mental health social workers. So we'll continue to do that.
Secondly, you've given us authorities and investments to
increase cooperation with tribes and with local communities to
make sure that we're investing in them, as well.
Thirdly, we are also investing--we now have 1,900 peer
specialists in VA. The way I see it as kind of an Irish
American person, they're based on the AA model where we
basically have recovering vets helping other vets, you know,
earlier in their recovery. Vets helping vets and us making
those investments in them is a proven help on substance use
disorder, a proven help on mental health care.
So we're trying to go to every vector there, Big VA,
partners on the ground, and then traditional manifestations of
mental health care providers and those will remain our priority
because our Number one clinical priority is suicide prevention
and we're going to stay on top of this until there's none.
Senator Hoeven. Right. Thank you, Secretary. Appreciate it.
Senator Sinema. Thank you.
Senator Heinrich.
Senator Heinrich. First, I just want to thank Senator
Hoeven for his comments on mental health in particular. That's
an incredible challenge and especially in big rural states like
mine.
Secretary, welcome back.
Secretary McDonough. Thank you.
Senator Heinrich. It's always good to see you.
I want to ask you about the Partial Claim Payment Program
and when that ended relatively abruptly, it was really
destabilizing for a lot of veterans in New Mexico. Obviously
we're in a very different interest rate environment than we
were at the beginning of the pandemic.
What steps is the VA taking to ensure that folks impacted
by that will be included in the Servicer Purchasing Program
that's been stood up?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Well, so we're reaching out to
veterans who our data shows are struggling. We're communicating
also as aggressively as we can to veterans to make sure that
they're aware that we are standing up a new support program
when the current moratorium expires at the end of this month,
end of May, and, you know, we think that by the way, as a
general matter, we're tracking veteran performance on their VA-
backed mortgages because we have a whole series of programs not
even associated with what we call the VASP, which is what will
roll out when the moratorium ends that we want to make sure
that vets can avail themselves of through our Debt Management
Center.
Senator Heinrich. Great.
Secretary McDonough. So we're trying to communicate to vets
individually. We're trying to communicate more generally to
vets and the new VASP Program, which we've kept the committee
up to date on and will develop the implementation targets more
aggressively over the course of the next four weeks, will allow
us to make sure that veterans struggling do not lose their
homes and come up with a more manageable picture, debt picture
over time.
Senator Heinrich. Great. I know Senator Collins raised the
highly rural transportation grant. I was pleased to be able to
work to include some additional funding for that in fiscal year
2024.
Just my understanding because I wasn't here when she asked
her question is that you may have referenced a legislative
proposal in that area.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Heinrich. Do you want to expound on that?
Secretary McDonough. Well, you know, I mean, you're the
first person to have raised this with me and that's what I said
to Senator Collins when we talked about it privately recently.
New Mexico and Maine are uniquely poorly positioned based
on the definition of highly rural as, you know, fewer than
seven people per square mile. We would like to change that in
the statute.
Senator Heinrich. Great.
Secretary McDonough. And we have some proposals on how we'd
do that.
Senator Heinrich. Fantastic.
Secretary McDonough. And then, you know, we would couple
that with an increase, the commensurate increase in funding
because, you know, it's just right now we have too few counties
who can participate.
Senator Heinrich. And I'm certainly not going to speak for
Senator Collins, but I suspect we would both look forward to
working with you on that front.
Secretary McDonough. Great.
Senator Heinrich. You talked a little bit about substance
use treatment or substance use disorders.
One of the challenges we see in New Mexico is that folks
who want to treat their substance use disorder are having real
challenges getting access to the medications that their
prescribed by their doctors, particularly buprenorphine, and
it's been, you know, like literally people can't get their
prescriptions filled. There's a number of reasons for this
because these medications are highly tracked.
But I'd love for you to look into that because we want to
make sure that our vets who want to get treatment can get the
medications they're being prescribed.
Secretary McDonough. It's a major priority for us to
increase medically-assisted treatment and so let's definitely
dig into that.
Senator Heinrich. Yeah.
Secretary McDonough. There's no reason a veteran who's
struggling and wants to take those steps, let's take sure that
we're there for them when they do it.
Senator Heinrich. Yeah. We've had real challenges with some
of the big chain pharmacies just stocking those medications and
we can expand on----
Secretary McDonough. That's interesting.
Senator Heinrich [continuing]. that and we'll get together
and expand on why that is, but we're not going to make headway
on this if we can't get folks the treatment.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. Well, we're really proud of our
medically-assisted treatment options and so that should not be
reliant on any of those big boxes. You know, the question is
maybe there's a mail order pharmacy issue for us, but let me
dig into that.
Senator Heinrich. Okay.
Secretary McDonough. You got my attention on this. If
there's one vet who's struggling to get that, that's too many.
Senator Heinrich. Look forward to working with you.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Heinrich. Thank you.
Senator Sinema. Thanks, Senator.
Senator Fischer.
Senator Fischer. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being here today, and I just
want to start off with thank you for all of the great work
we're seeing the VA do in Nebraska and especially over this
last year.
Secretary McDonough. Thanks.
Senator Fischer. Last year during this hearing we talked
about needing to invest in the Cemetery Grant Program. We did
and the Grand Island Cemetery is now on its way, and in your
most recent budget I was pleased to see that a new medical
center for Omaha is now Number 2 on the Skip List. So thank you
for that. That medical center is nearly 75 years old and
obviously renovations aren't going to cut it anymore. So we're
very excited to see that move ahead and I look forward to
working with you on that.
I appreciated your comments in our conversation about the
Community Care Program and I do remain concerned about the
future of that program. We have over 40 percent of Nebraska
veterans, they live in rural areas, and many are located hours
from the nearest VA facility. So that Community Care Program is
really vital for those people.
In recent months I've heard some of my colleagues call for
tightening or even scaling back on that Community Care Program.
Of course, I want the VA to work on improving the appointment
wait time but that doesn't change the reality that we face in
rural areas and sparsely-populated areas.
So does the VA have any plans to modify the access
standards for that Care Program and can you commit to us today
that rural veterans will maintain access to care through that
Community Care Program?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. You know, the statute is very
clear, the Mission Act that drive time standards will continue
to be impactful for rural veterans.
We have big parts of Nebraska, big parts of the one I keep
pointing out is VISN 7, which is part of South Carolina,
Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi. You know, fully 70 percent of
veterans there are referral qualified by virtue of where they
live alone, so because of drive time.
So it is an important access opportunity for veterans in
rural areas. It will continue to be.
Some of the things we're thinking about is updating the
access standards to reflect the fact that overwhelming amount
of care in VA and in the private sector is offered through
telehealth. So we think our access standards should reflect
that.
So ideally that we'd be able to get that done fairly
quickly but that would be through rulemaking and there'd be
public comment.
Senator Fischer. Then we have issues with connectivity,
though.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Fischer. Broadband deployment because a lot of
these sparsely-populated areas in my state, that's a big issue.
Secretary McDonough. Definitely. We're not going to give a
vet a pig in a poke and say, hey, you should get, you know,
knowing that they don't have Internet access, tell them to go
get Internet access. So we have no interest in that.
So that's probably the biggest change we're anticipating
currently, but, you know, it's been 6 years now since the law
was enacted. Since then we not only had the Mission Act but
then we had the pandemic and now we have the PACT Act. Any one
of those things would be a seismic impact on VA. Three of them
in a row, I think I'm really proud of the way our team has
managed them.
But I think it's reasonable for us to take a step back over
the course of this year and ask what are the impacts of all
those things. If we anticipate changes out of those, we'll come
talk to you about it.
Senator Fischer. Okay. You know, as we talked about on our
call, you have a very tight budget.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Fischer. And given the ongoing implementation of
the PACT Act, which I was very proud to support, I believe it's
important for the VA to ensure that it has staff in place to
meet the needs of access to assist the terms and I know in
Nebraska we added over 200 employees, new employees this past
year to VA facilities.
But with the department's Budget Request, I think you're
envisioning an overall reduction of approximately 10,000 health
care workers.
Can you talk about the department's plans on how it plans
to reduce the workforce and will the reductions be equally
spread across the VISNs and the VA facilities?
Secretary McDonough. Yeah. So thanks so much.
You know, we envision at the end of 2025, so that's
September 2025, to be at about 10,000 fewer FTE. When all is
said and done, frankly, that's if you measure traditional
attrition at VA. That's not much different than traditional
attrition.
However, because retention is so high because you've been
so generous to us for various pay enhancements, we have
historically high retention, historically low quit rates. As a
result, it might be a little tougher.
We are not going to make those decisions from Headquarters.
These are going to be decisions made by our VISN leaders. This
year is going to be a year, as we're calling it, of strategic
hiring where we need people.
A good example is recently in Texas, San Antonio has been
looking for GI experts, one of the most limited capabilities in
health care in the United States right now. They finally found
two. They hired them both, right.
So we'll continue our strategic hiring, but those are going
to be VISN-based and facility-based decisions, not me making
those decisions from here as a politico or as a bureaucrat.
That's not good for veterans.
And we'll track this month by month. We're doing this on
FTE. We're doing it on dollars spent, and we'll talk this
through with your teams so that they can follow along with us
and watch that, and my guess is I think one of our great
strengths is our facility leadership having the kind of
relationship that Omaha does with you with their delegations,
and so my guess is this is going to be a very public, very well
debated effort, and that's the way it should be.
Senator Fischer. Good. Good to hear.
Secretary McDonough. Yeah.
Senator Fischer. Thank you, sir.
Secretary McDonough. Thank you.
Senator Sinema. Thank you, Senator Fischer.
Senator Boozman. No, I don't have any more questions, but I
do want to welcome you to this subcommittee. I had the
opportunity of doing that yesterday in the MILCON part of the
subcommittee, but I know you're going to make a tremendous
difference.
Senator Murray did a great job, but I've enjoyed working
with you on veterans issues in the past and we appreciate you.
We're both blessed with excellent staffs, not good staffs, but
excellent staffs that make us look better than we are.
Senator Sinema. The secret to success.
Senator Boozman. Again, thank you, Mr. Secretary, so much.
We appreciate you and your staff that really are working hard
for veterans.
Secretary McDonough. Thank you. I agree with what you said
about your staff.
Senator Boozman. That was what I asked of you.
Senator Sinema. Thank you so much, Senator.
Secretary, thank you so much for being here today, for the
work that you're doing on behalf of veterans all across our
country.
Secretary McDonough. Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
Senator Sinema. We're very lucky to have a subcommittee
full of Senators who care very deeply about veterans and the
veterans who have served our country so well. So I'm excited to
continue the bipartisan tradition of this subcommittee.
That will conclude our hearing today. I'd like to say again
thank you to the Secretary and our colleagues for participating
in today's hearing.
I look forward to working together on next year's
appropriations bill to ensure that we're providing veterans and
their families with the benefits and care and support that they
need.
ADDITIONAL COMMITTEE QUESTIONS
Finally, I will keep the hearing record open for one week.
Committee members who'd like to submit written questions for
the record should do so by 5 p.m. on Thursday, May 9th.
We appreciate the Department responding to those questions
in a reasonable period of time and with that we stand
adjourned.
Secretary McDonough. Thank you.
Senator Sinema. Thank you.
Questions Submitted by Senator Kyrsten Sinema
indian health services
Question. VA signed an updated agreement with IHS at the end of
last year to expand the costs and services that are eligible for
reimbursement from VA. Have you seen an increase in utilization among
American Indian veterans as a result?
Answer. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Veterans Health
Administration (VHA) and the Department of Health and Human Services
(HHS) Indian Health Service (IHS) entered into a revised and expanded
reimbursement agreement on December 6, 2023. The new agreement expands
the scope of the earlier agreement from direct care services
reimbursable by VA to include purchased referred care (PRC) and
contracted travel and address telehealth, durable medical equipment,
and home care. From December 2023 to April 2024, VA dispersed
$2,666,000 to IHS facilities serving 1,262 unique Veterans for direct
care services. The number of Veterans served during this period was
roughly the same. Currently, IHS is testing its systems with VA and has
submitted test invoices for PRC and contracted travel.
Question. How else is VA trying to help these veterans get access
to care?
Answer. To help American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) Veterans get
access to care, VA is doing the following:
AI/AN Veteran Copayment Exemption
AI/AN Veterans serve at a higher rate compared to any other group
of Veterans. Under 38 U.S.C. Sec. 1730A(b)(2), the Secretary may not
require Veterans who are Indian or urban Indian (as those terms are
defined in section 4 of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act (25
U.S.C. Sec. 1603)) to make any payment for the receipt of hospital care
or medical services. VA amended its regulations to implement section
1730A(b)(2) and exempt eligible AI/AN Veterans from certain copayments
when receiving VA health care. Eligible Veterans also may receive
reimbursement for copayments paid to VA for health care provided on or
after January 5, 2022. The copayment exemption aims to address health
care access and health care disparities experienced by AI/AN Veterans
by eliminating certain copayment requirements so that Veterans are more
likely to use the benefits they have earned.
Approximately 65,000 AI/AN Veterans are enrolled in VA health care.
As of September 2024, more than 5,200 of those Veterans have been
approved for the copayment exemption, and VA has exempted or reimbursed
nearly 240,000 copayments totaling over $4.2 million. These numbers
continue to grow as does VA's outreach to increase applications for the
copayment exemption.
The VHA Office of Tribal Health frequently provides outreach
alongside VA enrollment staff, local VA outreach staff, and minority
Veteran coordinators during events to assist AI/AN Veterans with
enrolling in VA health care and applying for the copayment exemption.
Suicide Prevention
In September 2024, VA announced the third year of $52.5 million
awards to 85 community-based organizations through the Staff Sergeant
Parker Gordon Fox Suicide Prevention Grant Program (SSG Fox SPGP). A
total of 93 grantees across 43 States, the District of Columbia, Guam,
American Samoa, and Puerto Rico are operating in FY 2025. This grant
program enables VA to provide resources to community-based suicide
prevention efforts to meet the needs of Veterans and their families
through outreach, suicide prevention services, and connection to VA and
community resources. SSG Fox SPGP prioritizes the distribution of
grants to rural communities, Tribal communities, territories of the
United States, medically underserved areas, areas with a high number or
percentage of minority Veterans or women Veterans, and areas with a
high number or percentage of calls to the Veterans Crisis Line. In FY
2025, 24 grantees serve Tribal lands, including the Choctaw Nation
Warrior Wellness Program, the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association,
Navajo Nation, Cherokee Nation, and others. The suicide prevention
services provided include indigenous practices, such as Ninelines rites
of passage ceremonies, Alaska Native Cultural Health and Resilience
Gathering, and talking/listening circles.
In 2022, VA also launched the Mission Daybreak grant challenge,
which awarded $20 million to suicide prevention solutions that can meet
the diverse needs of Veterans. Televeda was one of the first-place
winners awarded $3 million and is a suicide prevention project within
the Navajo Nation's Veteran population. Televeda's Project Hozho is
developing the first mental health app and comprehensive operational
plan for AI/AN populations. Televeda designed the tool in partnership
with Tribal communities and Veterans for Navajo Veterans with plans to
adapt and expand for use with other Tribes.
VA and HHS Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration (SAMHSA) with support from IHS are developing new
initiatives, products, and services through adapting the current
Governor's Challenge model to one that is more inclusive and
incorporates indigenous knowledge and traditions. In August 2024,
SAMHSA and VA facilitated a second AI/AN meeting spanning 2.5 days.
On December 15, 2023, as part of implementation of section 101(b)
of the STRONG Veterans Act of 2022 (Public Law 117-328, Div. V), VHA
released a training called ``American Indian/Alaskan Native Suicide
Risk Management training for Minority Veteran Program Coordinators
(MVPCs)'' that is required of all VHA MVPCs. The training is focused on
delivery of mental health and suicide prevention services culturally
appropriate for AI/AN Veterans. All 183 VHA MVPCs have completed this
mandatory training.
Homelessness
At the 2022 Tribal Nations Summit, VA and the Department of Housing
and Urban Development (HUD) launched an interagency initiative through
the Health Committee of the White House Council on Native American
Affairs to increase access to care and services for AI/AN Veterans at
risk of or experiencing homelessness. This initiative includes
collaboration with Urban Indian Organizations (UIO) and focuses on
intake and referral services to ensure that AI/AN Veterans are aware of
and have access to available resources. The initiative took the
following actions in 2023:
--VA and IHS developed an informational brochure (https://www.va.gov/
HOMELESS/docs/WHCNAA-Brochure.pdf) for AI/AN Veterans
experiencing homelessness and made it available on their
website.
--VA developed and implemented training webinars for UIOs to raise
awareness of VA homeless programs among AI/AN Veterans and to
build or increase effective, responsive, and collaborative
relationships between UIOs and VA.
--VA, IHS, and various UIOs collaborated on Stand Down events in
Phoenix, Arizona; Los Angeles, California; Albuquerque, New
Mexico; Anchorage, Alaska; and Fairbanks, Alaska. These one-to-
three-day events brought together Tribal representation, VA
staff, other Federal and State agencies, volunteers, and
community organizations that provide legal services, tax
services, and veterinarian services, among many others.
Organizations at the Stand Down Events provide food, clothing,
health screenings, and more to homeless and at-risk Veterans
and receive referrals for health care, housing solutions,
employment, substance use treatment, mental health counseling,
and other essential services.
--The VHA Homeless Programs Office co-sponsored and participated in
261 Stand Downs across the country in FY 2024. The Stand Downs
are joint collaborations with local VA medical centers (VAMC)
and community organizations, Veterans Service Organizations
(VSO), with local, county, and state participation. FY 2025
projections show at least 250 Stand Down opportunities across
the same catchment areas with the potential for further growth.
and that number continues to grow. Upcoming stand down events
can be found on VA's website.
Clinic-in-a-Clinic
VHA and IHS entered into interagency agreements to offer VA health
care by VA providers at IHS clinics in Chinle and Kayenta, Arizona.
These clinics, launched in February and March 2024, respectively,
expand health care options for hundreds of VA-enrolled AI/AN Veterans
and create more available appointment times for eligible Veterans in
these areas. From listening to the needs of Tribes and IHS, VHA also is
exploring the potential to open more clinics across the Nation to
further meet our AI/AN Veterans where they live.
Indian Health Service (ISH)/Tribal Health Program (THP)/Urban Indian
Organizations (UIO) Reimbursement Agreements Program
The VA IHS/THP/UIO (referred to collectively as I/T/U)
Reimbursement Agreements Program (RAP) provides reimbursement to I/T/U
health care facilities for services provided to eligible AI/AN
Veterans. The RAP was first initiated in 2012, with IHS and THP. In
2022, it expanded to include UIOs. Eligible AI/AN Veterans do not need
VA preauthorization to receive health care services at participating I/
T/U health facilities. The program works directly with I/T/U facilities
and is seamless to the Veterans accessing their health care.
VA recognizes and honors that AI/AN Veterans may prefer to receive
health care from I/T/Us, and the RAP pays for the care provided by I/T/
Us, which creates greater access to care for AI/AN Veterans.
Veterans Affairs Tribal Representation Expansion Project
The VA Tribal Representation Expansion Project aims to collaborate
with Tribal governments to promote access to benefit claims
representation for AI/AN Veterans. The project seeks to expand the
number of Tribal representatives through outreach, training, and
innovative processes. The Navajo Nation and the Gila River Indian
Community are VA-recognized VSOs with accredited representatives to
assist Veterans with their claims.
infrastructure
Question. The Department is facing a significant challenge in
maintaining its aging infrastructure, let alone modernizing facilities
or building new ones. How are you tackling the issue of aging
infrastructure and what forms of innovation are you considering?
Answer. Early this year, VA established the Veteran Facilities
Board of Directors (VFBOD), which is charged with overseeing the
necessary collaboration between VA Central Office (VACO), VHA, Office
of Acquisition, Logistics, and Construction (OALC), National Cemetery
Administration, and Veterans Benefits Administration to address VA
infrastructure. VFBOD is engaged with VHA to identify the full slate of
capital investment requirements, including alternatives, and how to
prioritize them to best meet the needs of Veterans. A ``Top 7'' list of
markets in need of major VAMC capital investment renewal/replacement
strategies are already under analysis. VA is taking several innovative
steps to ensure the right projects are planned for the right locations.
These steps are primarily procedural in nature.
OALC and VHA Chief Strategy Office are continuing efforts to
deliver health care systems optimization and enhancement and portfolio
transformation with the assistance of a strategic consulting contract
currently in the award phase.
1. Master Plan. OALC awarded a contract for a pilot of a new Master
Plan designed to identify the multiple supporting projects in a market
necessary to meet that market's health care demand along with
maintaining or upgrading existing infrastructure. The intent is for
this pilot contract vehicle to be employed broadly across VHA. The
pilot will occur in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
2. Facility Standardization. VA is completing a community-based
outpatient clinic (CBOC) standardization study that is analyzing
several CBOCs nationwide to identify the most successful design
features to facilitate development of updated design standards,
Concepts of Operations, and activation protocols. This study will serve
to align designs with standards of care best practices better, increase
industry familiarity with VA requirements by reducing variability,
minimizing execution cost and time, and ensuring designs best meet the
needs of patients, caregivers, and providers. In March 2024, VA kicked
of a subsequent Health Care Center standardization initiative with
similar aims.
3. Implementing Planning Process. VA continues to refine the
planning process to establish the requirements to improve project
execution performance by delivering the right project, at the right
time, for the right cost. VA piloted a program to transform the VA
project development process by ensuring planning requirements were
complete prior to definition, development, scoring, and prioritization
of project requirements.
community care third party administrators
Question. Recently, VA sent notification that the contract ceilings
for the community care third party administrators needed to be
increased. Is this budget request sufficient to spend what you need in
support of that increased contract?
Answer. The contract ceiling is independent of the budget request.
New projections incorporated into the last few years of the budget had
a higher Community Care Network (CCN) spend. While the budget had
appropriately expanded for CCN, the contract ceiling simply needed to
be increased to execute the funds that were budgeted. The FY 2025 and
FY 2026 budget request supports the following community care account
category costs by activity:
FY 2025 (in the 2025 President's Budget)
Total Obligations $40,939,110,000
Included above:
State Homes $1,809,660,000
CHAMPVA & Other family member programs $2,331,358,000
Community Nursing Home $1,893,463,000
Everything Else $34,904,629,000
FY 2026 (in the 2025 President's Budget)
Total Obligations $45,819,380,000
Included above:
State Homes $1,958,463,000
CHAMPVA & Other family member programs $2,566,726,000
Community Nursing Home $1,993,705,000
Everything Else $39,300,486,000
electronic health record modernization
Question. The FY25 budget shows a substantial cut in the EHR
program funding line, and the request assumes no new deployments will
happen this year. What metrics will you be looking at to determine when
it is safe and appropriate to restart deployments?
Answer. Currently, VA is working to define meaningful, measurable,
and actionable metrics that would allow VA leadership and stakeholders
to assess our progress during the Reset period. Four primary domains
were defined through the Reset goals:
1. Improved User and Veteran Experience: How the Federal electronic
health record (EHR) supports VA users and Veterans.
2. Improved Health System Operations: How effectively the Federal
EHR is supporting VA's business and clinical operations.
3. Mature Product: How well the solutions are functioning and
measuring how the solution is supporting the end users' experience.
4. Mature Program Processes: How enhancements and/or improvements
to business processes support the Federal EHR deployment and
sustainment activities.
These metrics will aid VA leadership in data-driven decision making
regarding transitioning out of Reset and resuming deployment activities
beyond the Captain James A. Lovell Federal Health Care Center (Lovell
FHCC). These fundamental metrics are being reviewed by VA leadership
and will be shared with Congress once approved.
homeless veterans
Question. Despite meeting goals for housing homeless veterans, the
point-in-time count found the total number of veterans experiencing
homelessness has increased. How does this budget support efforts to
expand services?
Answer. The results of the 2024 Point-In-Time Count indicated that
the total number of Veterans who experienced homelessness was 32,882,
which is a decrease of 7.5% over January 2023. The estimated number of
Veterans experiencing homelessness in America has declined by 55.6%
since 2010. The FY 2025 Presidential Budget Submission provides
resources for Veterans homelessness programs of $3.2 billion, with the
goal of ensuring every Veteran has permanent, sustainable housing with
access to high-quality health care and other supportive services to end
and prevent future Veteran homelessness.
The FY 2025 Presidential Budget includes expanded resources to
reach out to and provide support for unsheltered homeless Veterans. In
FY 2025, VA will expand the Homeless Patient Aligned Care Teams mobile
medical units to increase utilization and bring health care services
directly to Veterans in the community setting. By expanding outreach
efforts, VA can ensure that these Veterans are connected with the
necessary services and assistance to help them find stable housing and
improve their overall well-being. Increased staffing will offer the
ability to expand oversight and capacity for the Contract Residential
Services programs. This funding includes both Contract Emergency
Residential Services and the Low-Demand/Safe Haven models of care
designed to serve unsheltered Veterans. The budget also includes funds
to assist with the design and development of expanded services for
aging and disabled Veterans, a growing need and area of focus for the
HUD-VA Supportive Housing (HUD-VASH) program. VA will use the funds to
provide a medical home model and population-tailored approach to
provide in-home primary care and wrap-around services to Veterans
actively enrolled in the HUD-VASH program; provide additional resources
to increase outreach and community engagement efforts; expansion of
Veterans Justice Programs services, including support for Veterans in
treatment courts; and for the development of new Veteran-focused
criminal justice initiatives, such as pre-arrest deflection. Funding
will also support the VA Grant and Per Diem program to increase per
diem rates to community entities actively supporting VA's effort to end
Veteran homelessness.
Moreover, this budget advances the efforts of the United States
Interagency Council on Homelessness' All IN: The Federal Strategic Plan
to Prevent and End Homelessness and VACO Homeless Programs Office's
Strategic Plan 2021-2025 by preventing the initial episode of
homelessness among at-risk Veteran populations. This budget supports
prevention efforts. Specifically, VA homeless programs work together
using their strengths while engaging with community organizations to
best serve Veterans and their families.
In addition, this budget is dedicated to supporting important
programs like the Supportive Services for Veteran Families (SSVF). This
program plays a crucial role in reducing and preventing homelessness
among Veterans and their families. By providing financial assistance in
the form of grants to eligible entities that provide and coordinate the
provision of the necessary support and services, SSVF helps ensure that
those who have served our country have a stable and secure place to
call home. SSVF takes a comprehensive approach by addressing the
housing affordability crisis, providing resources to assist Veterans in
remaining in or obtaining permanent housing, providing emergency
housing options, enhancing health care support, offering access to
legal services, and providing substantial funding to non-profit
organizations. SSVF is actively working to reduce homelessness and
improve the well-being of Veteran families.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Brian Schatz
freely associated states of the pacific (fas)
Question. Under Public Law 118-42, the VA is no longer restricted
from providing services to Veterans residing in the FAS, including
direct care from VA providers, telehealth, and care through contracts
with community providers; shipping medications to the FAS; and
reimbursing Veterans for travel from their home countries to the United
States
What additional resources, if any, will be necessary to expand
access to care to veterans in the FAS in Fiscal Year 2025?
Answer. No additional resources will be needed in FY 2025. VA
anticipates expanding access to care in the FAS in Quarter 3 of FY 2026
based on contingencies to update internal processes, regulations, and
negotiations with FAS governments to complete formal agreements.
Question. Please provide the office and name of the official who is
responsible for overseeing the expansion of care for veterans in the
FAS?
Answer. Dr. RimaAnn Nelson, Executive Director, Indo-Pacific
Veterans Affairs.
Question. Please provide a review of past and planned engagements
with the governments of the FAS related to the expansion of care for
veterans?
Answer. On September 9, 2024, VA notified Congress, FAS
Governments, and stakeholders on VA's decision to exercise the
authority granted by the Compact of Free Association Amendments Act of
2024 to provide hospital care, medical services, and beneficiary travel
to Veterans in the FAS. As of September 25, 2024, VA has reached out to
each FAS government to begin formal engagement and discussions on VA's
implementation plans. During the next several months, VA will be
meeting regularly with the FAS governments to conduct a comprehensive
environmental scan to review the current state of health care within
the FAS. This coordination period will provide critical information
about the local Veteran population and care needs in the region.
In addition, in October 2024, VA, the Department of State, and the
Department of Interior met with each of the FAS governments for initial
kickoff meetings to discuss implementation status, next steps, and the
FAS governments' commitment to aiding VA in providing hospital care,
medical services, and beneficiary travel.
mdma and psilocybin research
Question. In January 2024, the VA Office of Research and
Development issued a Request for Applications from VA investigators to
conduct MDMA and psilocybin research focused on the treatment of mental
health conditions. There is significant interest among investigators
and clinicians within the VA to conduct this research. However, the RFA
noted availability of funds is dependent on Congressional
appropriation.
What is the approximate amount of funding you expect the VA to
invest in this research this year?
Answer. In January 2024, VA's Office of Research and Development
(ORD) issued a Request for Applications (RFA) to solicit proposals from
VA researchers focused on the use of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine
(MDMA) or psilocybin for the treatment of mental health conditions such
as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression. Applications accepted
for peer review began in May 2024. Announcement of funding decisions on
a rolling basis began in October 2024. Studies approved for funding
under the psychedelic-assisted treatment RFA will be funded from the
general ORD award budget. It should be noted that currently there is no
specific funding set aside within the Medical and Prosthetics Research
Appropriation for this effort.
Question. Given the extensive clinician time involved in this form
of treatment, conducting these clinical trials is expensive. Yet, the
maximum amount under the RFA for a two (2)-site trial for 4 or 5 years
is $1.5 million, with an additional $100,000 per site per year for each
additional site. There are concerns that this amount will not be enough
for well powered studies. Does the VA plan to allocate separate funding
toward larger multi-site studies?
Answer. While studies of MDMA and psilocybin involve extensive
clinical time, VA research funding does not pay for clinician time. The
clinician dedicated research time is covered by the local VAMC Medical
Services funding. Therefore, the extensive clinician time commitment to
psychedelic research studies does not impact the ORD research study
budget.
VA research caps for clinical trials support enough subjects
enrolled in the studies to detect meaningful differences.
The current RFA for psychedelic research is limited to 10 sites.
Currently, there is no plan to support larger clinical trials in
psychedelics. VA will accept budget waiver requests, which are
considered on a case-by-case basis and depend on the availability of
funding.
Question. There is also a great deal of enthusiasm within the
Veteran community to access these treatments once FDA approved, which
could be as early as August 2024. How does the VA plan to train mental
health professionals and prepare the infrastructure needed to offer
this treatment? Will the VA have any dedicated facilities prepared to
pilot this treatment upon approval?
Answer. VA is committed to taking all actions necessary to continue
to meet our mission of providing Veterans with the safe, timely, and
evidence-based care they deserve. VA planning is underway so that if
psychedelic medications and psychedelic-assisted therapies are approved
by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), VA can quickly initiate
these treatments to the Veterans most likely to benefit. VA established
an integrated project team (IPT) to develop a comprehensive plan for
training, clinical implementation, and real-world evaluation of MDMA-
assisted therapy (MDMA-AT).
VA will begin clinical use of these treatments when they are
approved by FDA, guidance on rescheduling is released by the Drug
Enforcement Administration (DEA), and effective training and safety
protocols are in place. VA will incorporate this guidance into a plan
to train providers and safely implement MDMA-AT. The proposed protocol
for MDMA-AT is very different than current mental health treatment
practices, and it is imperative that facilities have the resources to
administer MDMA-AT while maintaining access for all Veterans.
rescheduling determination of cannabis
Question. With the forthcoming rescheduling determination of
cannabis from the DEA, what plans does the VA have to research high-THC
cannabis or any of the descheduled hemp-derived cannabinoids?
Answer. In the past 10 years, ORD funded 17 clinical and
preclinical studies focused on potential risks and benefits of
cannabis, cannabinoids, or substances enhancing endocannabinoid
signaling. Of these studies, 6 are completed and 11 are ongoing.
Currently, medical research with these substances takes place
legally through a specific process that involves review of the study
protocol by FDA and obtaining a research registration from DEA. The
forthcoming rescheduling determination of cannabis will change the type
of registration required.
ORD primarily funds such research through the Investigator
Initiated Research (IIR) mechanism. This means that research proposals
for cannabinoid studies are submitted by interested principal
investigators (PI) in response to an RFA for ORD's general merit award
mechanism or clinical trial opportunity. As it is an IIR, the PIs
choose the compounds they wish to study. Typically, ORD does not
mandate work with specific compounds and, therefore, does not have a
specific plan related to high- tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) cannabis or
any of the de-scheduled hemp-derived cannabinoids.
Any submissions that involve researching high-THC cannabis or any
of the de-scheduled hemp-derived cannabinoids would be reviewed in the
same manner as any other submission to ORD, which is a review by a
panel of expert scientists with an emphasis on the quality of the
proposed research and focused on safety concerns for Veterans engaging
in the studies. In addition to the legal requirements involving FDA and
DEA, any human subjects study conducted involving a drug must be
reviewed and approved by the Institutional Review Board.
Question. Has VA considered conducting a system-wide survey of
veterans enrolled in the Veterans Health Administration to determine
the characteristics of veteran cannabis use, including self-reporting
on changes in symptoms? If so, what has prevented VA from conducting
such a study?
Answer. ORD appreciates that determining the characteristics of
Veteran cannabis use can impact our understanding of the scope of non-
medical cannabis use and improve treatment for Veterans with substance
use disorder. Researchers from the Ann Arbor VA Healthcare System
collaborated to lead an ORD-funded study titled, Cannabis Use and
Health among VHA Primary Care Patients. Noting that existing VA health
records do not indicate use that is below the threshold of a cannabis
use disorder, they were concerned that a substantial portion of
patients who regularly use cannabis are not documented or monitored by
their VHA providers.
The primary study goal was to characterize cannabis use among a
representative sample of VHA primary care patients in Michigan. The
project team screened Veterans receiving primary care at three VAMCs in
Michigan to identify a group of 500 patients with regular cannabis use
(that is, at least monthly use during the past year). These patients
completed three in-depth cross-sectional interviews, and initial and
two follow-up interviews at 6 and 12 months, to identify cannabis use,
cannabis use disorder symptom trajectories, and related health,
functioning, and service utilization outcomes. The final outcomes of
the study are pending. It is anticipated that these outcomes will be
used to inform VA services as well as inform a future study with a
broad national sample of Veterans.
Previously, these VA investigators were part of a team that
analyzed data from the 2014 National Survey on Drug Use and Health.
Compared to non-Veterans, the study found that recent cannabis use was
similar or slightly lower among Veterans. However, among those with
past year use, the proportion of those using for medical purposes was
more than double that of the general population. Only non-medical
cannabis use was associated with higher rates of heavy episodic alcohol
use and alcohol use disorder. VA anticipates further studies may
address problematic alcohol consumption among this high-risk group.
Question. Has VA considered conducting a study on the relationship
between treatment programs involving medical marijuana that are
approved by States, the access of veterans to such programs, and a
reduction in opioid use and abuse among veterans? If so, what has
prevented VA from conducting such a study?
Answer. A Senior Research Scientist at VA's Health Services
Research Center in Palo Alto, California, conducted research on
cannabis use and opioids. The study found no evidence to support the
claim that medical cannabis reduces opioid overdoses. The reduced
opioid overdose assertion was based on a single study looking at State-
level correlations. However, the VA's study, which replicated the
single study using the same methods and seven additional years of data,
did not identify any protective relationship between medical cannabis
use and opioid overdoses.
In addition, some medical cannabis providers have encouraged
individuals addicted to opioids to stop taking their FDA-approved
medications (for example, buprenorphine, methadone, and naltrexone) in
favor of using cannabis instead. This poses a risk of adverse
consequences to patients and requires further study.
pact act
Question. Has the VA seen an increase in the number of veterans who
have had their disability ratings reduced resulting in a reduction of
compensation since the passage of the PACT Act?
Answer. As a percentage of the number of total issues completed,
the number of disability ratings reduced has decreased in the time
since the enactment of the PACT Act. The following chart shows the
number of issues resulting in a reduced rating, the number of issues
completed, and the percentage of issues resulting in a reduced rating
from FY 2018, through fiscal year to date (FYTD) 2024, as of December
1, 2024.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Issues Resulting
FY Number of Issues Resulting in Reduced Rating Total Number of in Reduced Rating
Issues Completed (%)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2018............................................................. 31,796 5,585,378 0.57%
2019............................................................. 35,553 5,874,261 0.61%
2020............................................................. 29,350 4,906,963 0.60%
2021............................................................. 35,522 5,545,658 0.64%
2022............................................................. 34,168 6,878,042 0.50%
2023............................................................. 35,186 8,098,247 0.43%
2024............................................................. 40,371 10,873,719 0.37%
2025............................................................. 6,829 1,924,854 0.35%
Total........................................................ 248,775 49,687,122 0.50%
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*FY 2025 data as of December 1, 2024.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Martin Heinrich
telehealth
Question. How will the one billion dollar increase you've requested
for telehealth help rural veterans access to primary care and
preventative care services?
VA has demonstrated success in deploying connected care services to
Veterans, including those in rural areas. In FY 2023, VA provided
telehealth services to more Veterans than in any previous fiscal year
while realizing an increase in Veteran trust (86.9%) and satisfaction
(89.8%) with telehealth for the third consecutive year. Specifically,
VA delivered over 11.6 million telehealth episodes of care to Veterans
in FY 2023. This number includes over 2.9 million telehealth episodes
of care to over 900,000 rural Veterans.
The FY 2025 VA budget includes $5,958,100,000 for the Connected
Care ``Treatment Modality.'' This is approximately $1 billion above the
FY 2023 actuals and $224 million over FY 2024 actuals. This line item
reflects VA's general-purpose expenditures for telehealth services and
includes the proportional salaries of physicians, nurses, and ancillary
care staff to account for their time delivering telehealth care. The
expenditures also reflect the cost of equipment, space, and other
overhead costs to account for the time they are being used to deliver
telehealth. As staff allocate a higher percentage of their care
delivery through telehealth, a higher percentage of their cost,
including their space and equipment costs, becomes attributed to
telehealth in this budget line. The funds that account for these costs
are distributed directly to facilities as part of the general purpose
allocation and can be used for any purpose. The funds are generally not
associated with requirements that telehealth expand or that the staff
continue to deliver telehealth at the same percentage as in previous
years; however, based on the trends of increased telehealth utilization
over time, projections for future years are larger than in previous
years.
VA's FY 2025 budget request also includes $439,920,000 for
Connected Care Program Sustainment and Expansion funding, an increase
of approximately $32 million above the FY 2024 request. This budget
line specifically supports the ongoing expansion and enhancement of
telehealth services. VA is using its Connected Care Program funding to
invest in key strategies that enhance the access and care for Veterans
in rural communities. The strategies include initiatives that (1)
enhance the accessibility of VA health care in rural areas by
delivering enhanced telehealth services in the home, (2) expand the
capacity of VA services in rural and underserved areas by distributing
clinical resources (for example, Primary Care, Mental Health) from
urban centers through clinical resource hubs and specialty telehealth
centers, (3) address health care disparities by bridging the digital
divide. and (4) improve the quality of care through remote patient
monitoring programs and technologies.
Additional Connected Care Program funding, as requested in the
budget, will enable VA to continue expanding connected care services
for Veterans in rural and underserved areas through digital means.
blast overpressure injuries
Question. The Department of Defense Inspector General released a
report 28 March 2023 evaluating the DoD's management of Traumatic Brain
Injury (TBI), which highlighted gaps inconsistent implementation of
policies and procedures for detecting, assessing, and managing TBI
care. This has raised concerns for screening, diagnosis, and treatment
standards at the VA.
What is the VA doing to screen for, diagnose, and treat blast
overpressure injuries, particularly traumatic brain injuries (TBIs)?
Answer. VA continues to screen all post-9/11 Veterans for possible
TBI when they first access VA health care. Those with a positive TBI
screen are referred to a TBI specialist for a comprehensive evaluation,
definitive diagnosis, and treatment plan.
It is important to note that current expert consensus requires an
alteration or loss of consciousness to meet criteria for TBI diagnosis.
Sub-concussive exposures, termed low level blast (LLB), do not result
in a diagnosis of TBI or concussion, but with repeated exposure, they
may result in symptoms seen in individuals diagnosed with TBI. VA and
the Department of Defense research efforts are seeking to better assess
and understand the long-term impact of LLB. While VA expands the
evidence base concerning LLB, VA clinicians document Veterans' military
exposures, including LLB, and provide symptom-based care to address
Veterans' concerns.
rule on emergency transport
Question. We appreciate that the VA has delayed the VA rule on
emergency transport to allow the VA the time to work with stakeholders
to develop a workable contracting proposal that works for Veterans and
other stakeholders. Can you give me an idea of when we might see some
movement on the contracting proposal for emergency air and ground and
how you expect to contract in the time necessary? Or do you think it
may be necessary to delay implementation an additional year?
Answer. VA is engaged in robust contracting efforts to solicit
ground ambulance contracts at facilities for pre-authorized services to
provide contracted rates for ground ambulance transports. VA has
determined that soliciting air broker contracts for pre-authorized air
ambulance services is one viable solution. However, currently, there
are no viable options to contract for non-VA initiated ambulance
services.
An AP89 IPT, including representatives from the Veterans
Transportation Program, Procurement and Logistics Office, and the
Office of General Counsel, has been actively engaged in reviewing
contract options for air ambulance providers. Vendors who choose to
enter into contracts would be reimbursed at the contracted rate, rather
than the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Ambulance Fee
Schedule rate.
VA's air ambulance solicitation strategy is for VHA to continue to
maximize air ambulance providers under contract. There are currently
nine active air ambulance contracts and five in progress. At this time,
no additional air ambulance contracts have been awarded in relation to
the AP89 efforts. Air Ambulance Contract Expansion Efforts Current
Status and Timeline.
On November 7, 2024, 2900-AS19 Final Rule was published delaying
the effective date of VA's final rule, AP89, from February 26, 2025,
until February 16, 2029.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Lisa Murkowski
state veteran homes grant program
Question. The Palmer Pioneer Home in Alaska is our only State
Veteran Home. They have been waiting for an obligation of funding
through the SVH grant program for several years. The priority of this
project was elevated to remedy a life or safety concern.
Can you please provide me with a list of all projects in the queue
for this grant program for Fiscal Year 2024?
Answer. The Under Secretary for Health, Dr. Shereef Elnahal, signed
the FY 2024 State Home Construction Grants Priority List (attached) in
September 2024.
Question. Can I expect to see this project receive funding in
FY2024?
Answer. Historically, the State Veterans Home Construction Grant
Program has received enough appropriated funds to address life or
safety projects in Priority Group 1. We have received documentation in
support of the Palmer, Alaska, project to be ranked as a life or safety
project. The project is listed number four and ranked 1.1H for safety
(roofing) on the VA State Veterans Home Construction Grants priority
list for FY 2024.
construction projects in alaska
Question. The Department's Strategic Capital Investment Plan
identified several potential future projects in Alaska. The first was a
major construction project to demolish and replace the existing mental
health residential rehabilitation treatment program in Anchorage. The
second project is a renovation part of the transitional housing unit in
Anchorage.
Can you speak to the need for these projects in Alaska and commit
to keeping my office apprised of developments in the VA's construction
activities?
Answer. The following two Anchorage, Alaska, projects listed as
found in the fiscal year 2025 budget submission (Volume IV--Section
6.2-30) are potential future year (beyond 2025) projects. The total
estimated costs for each project are preliminary and are subject to
change as projects are further refined. As neither of these projects
have been fully developed; the scope and investment approach
(renovation, construction, leasing, or other) are all subject to
change, but the inclusion of each project in the Potential Future/
Outyear Projects section is a signal of a requirement or need the local
planning team to evaluate in the future.
1. Veterans Integrated Service Network (VISN) 20. Anchorage,
Alaska. Demolish and Replace Mental Health Residential Rehabilitation
Treatment Program Major Const. $126,000.
2. VISN 20. Anchorage, Alaska. Renovate Transitional Housing Unit
Building 944 NRM-IM $11,910.
air ambulance
Question. At the end of last year, the VA announced it was delaying
the enactment of its proposed air ambulance reimbursement ruling until
2025.
How have you been working with providers to ensure that these
critical services are not jeopardized for veterans who have come to
depend on them?
Answer. Since the initial publication of the rule in February 2023,
VHA has engaged with air ambulance providers on an ongoing basis. VHA
has nine existing air ambulance contracts with one national air broker
contract and four local air ambulance contracts pending completion of
the procurement process.
On November 7, 2024, 2900-AS19 Final Rule was published delaying
the effective date of VA's final rule, AP89, from February 26, 2025,
until February 16, 2029.
As of December 2024, engagements with air ambulance companies are
as follows:
--Industry Day 1: May 25, 2023.
--Industry Day 2: July 20, 2023 (two sessions).
--Industry Day 3: August 30, 2023.
--Interview conducted by Contracting: Aircraft Transport Services
January 31, 2024.
--Interview conducted by Contracting: CSI Aviation January 31, 2024.
--Interview conducted by Contracting: Zephyr Aviation February 1,
2024.
--Interview conducted by Contracting: Global Medical Response
February 6, 2024.
annual suicide prevention report
Question. I have heard from VSOs that they would like to see
anonymized data regarding benefit utilization including in the VA's
annual suicide prevention report. This data sharing would allow our
VSOs to strengthen the assistance they provide to veterans who are
trying to obtain certain benefits and ensure that they have better
access to important and life-saving resources.
Can you commit to including more data on benefit utilization in
that report?
Answer. Please note that detailed information regarding benefit
utilization is available from the Veterans Benefits Administration
(VBA) Annual Benefits Report at https://www.benefits.va.gov/REPORTS/
abr/. The report presents information regarding benefit programs
delivered by VBA, the levels of program participation, and the profiles
of beneficiaries. This report provides the most detailed and timely
information regarding VA benefits delivered by VBA.
The 2023 National Veteran Suicide Prevention Annual Report at
https://www.mentalhealth.va.gov/docs/data-sheets/2023/2023-National-
Veteran-Suicide-Prevention-Annual-Report-FINAL-508.pdf included
information regarding:
--Number of Veterans with VHA and VBA contacts in the year or prior
year, for 2019 through 2021.
--Among VBA benefit recipients, prevalence of receipt of categories
of VBA benefits, from 2019 through 2021.
--Veteran suicide rates, overall and for Veteran subgroups defined by
receipt of VBA or VHA services.
--Information regarding VBA contacts by Veteran suicide decedents in
2019 through 2021, including detail by category of VBA benefits
received.
Please note that 2021 was the most recent year for which suicide
mortality data was available. In future VA annual suicide reports, we
plan to include a reference to the VBA Annual Benefits Report, so that
readers have access to its information.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Susan M. Collins
maine state veterans homes
Question. Maine State Veterans Homes provide critical care to
veterans in the State of Maine. As you may remember, I asked you in
last year's VA budget hearing for a timeline indicating when you
anticipated the VA would undertake the rulemaking required by my bill,
the State Veterans Homes Domiciliary Care Flexibility Act, which was
signed into law in 2020. Although I was glad to see that the Department
issued a proposed rule to expand eligibility for domiciliary care to
early-stage dementia patients, that was nearly 7 months ago. It has
been 6 months since the comment period closed on October 31 of last
year.
When do you anticipate the Department will issue a final rule?
Answer. The final rule was published on October 30, 2024, for
Determining Eligibility for Domiciliary Care. VA adopts as final, with
minor changes, a proposed rule amending its medical and State Veterans
Home (State home) regulations to update the criteria used by VA in
determining eligibility for domiciliary care and to implement VA's
authority to waive certain eligibility requirements for receipt of
State home domiciliary care per diem. VA continues to develop
regulations to implement section 3007 of the Johnny Isakson and David
P. Roe Veterans Health Care and Benefits Improvement Act of 2020,
Public Law 116-315 (hereinafter in response to Question 1 referred to
as ``the act''). This new law is very specific and States that ``the
Secretary shall modify section Sec. 51.51(b) of title 38, Code of
Federal Regulations to clarify the eligibility criteria and authority
to waive self-care requirements for per diem for domiciliary care in
the State Veteran Home.'' Because of the feedback received through the
Federal Register, the requirements of the act, and the complex subject
matter, VA is diligently working to develop the regulations to
implement section 3007 of the act, which includes a waiver retroactive
to January 5, 2021. VA is committed to ensuring that the regulations
developed will put the safety of our most vulnerable and elderly
Veterans first and that feedback received from the public is considered
in accordance with the act.
highly rural transportation grants
Question. Maine is a large, rural state, and we have many veterans
living in areas with limited access to healthcare. The work done by the
Office of Rural Health is essential to these veterans and an important
priority for this committee. VA received $15 million in FY2024 to
support the Highly Rural Transportation Grant Program, yet many rural
veterans in Maine still lack options for getting themselves to a VA
medical center. From my hometown of Caribou it is an eight-hour, 500-
mile round-trip drive to get to the Togus VA hospital in Augusta.
Currently eligibility is limited to counties with fewer than seven
people per square mile, and in Maine that means only Piscataquis County
is eligible to receive a grant. I joined several of my colleagues to
introduce bipartisan legislation to expand eligibility for this grant
program and to increase the maximum amount grantees are eligible to
receive.
What is VA doing to increase participation in the Highly Rural
Transportation Grant Program and to expand eligibility to provide this
service to more veterans?
Answer. VA's Office of Rural Health (ORH) and Veterans
Transportation Program (VTP) Office are targeting outreach to VSOs and
State Veterans Service Agencies within eligible areas that are
currently not participating in the Highly Rural Transportation Grant
(HRTG) Program.
VA's FY 2024 President's Budget Submission included a proposal to
amend the HRTG statutory authority to increase the maximum amount per
grant and to expand the scope of this authority to include both Highly
Rural and Rural Veterans. VA also recently testified in support of HR
7504 ``Rural Veterans Transportation to Care Act'' with amendments at a
September 11, 2024, House of Representatives, Committee for Veterans'
Affairs, Health legislative hearing.
______
Questions Submitted by Senator Bill Hagerty
opioids
Question. The Department published the 2022 VA/DoD Guideline for
the Use of Opioids in the Management of Chronic Pain-an important
effort to update the Clinical Guidelines. However, a full review of the
entire therapeutic class has not been conducted since 2017.
In response to the revised Clinical Guidelines and access to real
world data on health outcomes, why has the Department not conducted a
full review of the entire therapeutic class?
Answer. In 2022, a comprehensive literature review was conducted,
which encompassed population health, demographic, sociodemographic,
health care utilization, combined physical/mental health comorbidities,
and many other real world data health outcomes. The entire therapeutic
class of opioid medications for pain was included in this review.
Specifically, the literature review included immediate-release/short-
acting opioids compared to extended-release/long-acting opioids, and
route of administration/delivery alternatives such as transdermal,
buccal, sublingual, intrathecal pumps, abuse deterrent formulations,
tramadol, dual-mechanism opioids, buprenorphine, and methadone.
Question. Will the Department commit to reviewing the entire
therapeutic class this year and update the VA National Formulary to
ensure appropriate access to pharmaceutical drugs with abuse deterrent
formulations that have demonstrated the ability to reduce the risk of
abuse, misuse or overdose?
Answer. In 2022, a large evidenced based review of the entire
therapeutic class of opioids was accomplished and the study's key
questions 4 and 9 address the comparative effectiveness and risk
mitigation aspects of all opioids, including abuse deterrent
formulations.
Abuse deterrent formulations have shown some promise in preventing
minor forms of abuse such as crushing, snorting, or injecting opioid
medications. They have not shown to result in a reduction in misuse or
the most common forms of abuse, such as taking additional doses orally,
or in reducing overdose. Thus, the clinical practice guideline did not
have sufficient evidence to make a recommendation regarding the abuse
deterrent formulations.
Question. Another critical tool to prevent opioid addiction before
it starts is to incentivize the use of VA approved non-opioid pain
management options, including drugs and devices. I recently joined many
of my colleagues in a letter asking for information about the access to
non-opioid pain alternatives. When will I receive that response?
Answer. VA provided a response to the referenced letter regarding
access to non-opioid pain alternatives on June 6, 2024.
VA is implementing several non-opioid pain management options to
facilitate access to existing high quality specialty pain management
initiatives such as the active Management of Pain, Medication
Management in Pain Management Teams, Whole Health Coaches in Pain
Management Teams, Mental Health Integration in Pain Management Teams,
and Acute Pain Service Expansion Program for acute pain after surgery.
These pain specialty initiatives are instrumental in improving access
and quality of care, reducing risk of catastrophic outcomes like
overdose and suicide through investment, and integration of evidence
based non-opioid modalities.
financial efficiency inspection va memphis healthcare system
Question. Your Department is charged with one of the most critical
missions in the Federal Government: to fulfill the promise this nation
made to our bravest men and women and their families who have
sacrificed more than we can ever repay.
Ensuring Tennessee veterans receive the quality care they
rightfully earned will continue to be one of my most important duties;
as such, I have been closely monitoring VA centers across my state,
specifically VA Memphis Healthcare Systems. On February 14, 2024, the
VA's Office of Inspector General released a disturbing Financial
Efficiency Inspection of the VA Memphis Healthcare System, which
uncovered a wide array of unacceptable financial negligence and poor
oversight1. This report cited training issues, inadequate staffing
levels, poor oversight, and data validity issues that affected the
healthcare system's stock levels. I am afraid this VA center in my home
state has been the victim of negligence and abuse for far too long with
no concrete plan for solving the underlying issue.
Reference: 1 ``Financial Efficiency Inspection of the VA Memphis
Healthcare System in Tennessee.'' Department of Veterans Affairs, 14
Feb. 2024, www.vaoig.gov/reports/financial-inspection/financial-
efficiency-inspection-va-memphis-healthcaresystem-Tennessee.
As the Senate continues considering the VA's Fiscal Year 2025
Presidential Budget Request, Congress needs reassurance that the VA is
fulfilling its fundamental duty to efficiently manage the benefits our
veterans and their families were promised. What steps is the VA taking
to bolster centers falling behind and not meeting the basic care
standards our veterans deserve?
Answer. To ensure Veterans receive the care they deserve, VHA
monitors the quality of the care it delivers and identifies
opportunities for improvement by applying multiple methodologies,
including internal tools, such as the Strategic Analytics for
Improvement and Learning value model (SAIL), which is a web-based
balanced scorecard model developed by VA that provides information on a
range of measures such as length of stay, adverse events, and patient
experience, and external reviews such as the CMS Overall Hospital Star
Ratings and Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and
Systems, to help ensure the health care system provides the highest
quality of care to Veterans and that our Journey to High Reliability
and Health Care Quality efforts are successful. VHA reports clinical
medical center performance to CMS Care Compare at https://
www.medicare.gov/care-compare/and The Joint Commission; evaluates
performance under VA's standards for quality; and posts VAMC
performance metric results to the VA Access to Care website at https://
www.accesstocare.va.gov/, which provides Veterans with information on
wait times, health care quality data for VA facilities, Veteran
satisfaction metrics, and other useful health care data). VISN, VA
facility and VACO leadership review appointment wait time data for
Integrated Veteran Care needs and productivity, efficiency, and
staffing data for VAMC operational use. VHA leadership also uses
information entered in the patient safety reporting system to identify
and implement system-wide changes that help prevent inadvertent harm.
Together, VAMCs use these data to monitor the quality of the care they
deliver and identify opportunities for improvement.
One framework VHA employs to provide oversight and support to VA
facilities is the Engagement Protocol for Improvements in Quality
(EPIQ), which guides VHA leadership in promoting collaborative quality
improvement support at the appropriate levels across the organization
by (1) identifying VA medical facilities in need of structured
improvement support and (2) providing them with subject matter
expertise aimed at partnership, collaboration, and support in their
quality improvement journeys. EPIQ uses data from the SAIL value model,
and information from the John S. McCain III, Daniel K. Akaka, and
Samuel R. Johnson VA Maintaining Internal Systems and Strengthening
Integrated Outside Networks Act of 2018 (MISSION Act) Quality Standards
Tracking Report. EPIQ stratification results are reported to VA and VHA
Leadership and Congress on a quarterly basis.
When VA facilities in need of improvement are identified by the
EPIQ protocol, VHA's National Improvement Office (NIO) steps in to
provide on-site and virtual assistance. The NIO teams are focused on
three primary areas: (1) Continuous Process Improvement, (2) Clinical
Operations, and (3) Data Analysis. The NIO team also will bring in
subject matter experts regularly to assist depending on the identified
issues. They offer a consulting approach to help leaders with the big
picture and with tightly focused perspectives, and they also support
the site in implementing long-term solutions that will bring lasting
change.
VHA also has committed to becoming a High Reliability Organization
(HRO), implementing the HRO Pillars of Leadership Commitment, Culture
of Safety, and Continuous Process Improvement, which are fundamental to
VHA's HRO Vision of Becoming the Safest Health Care System for All and
our collective goal of Zero Preventable Harm. HROs experience fewer
than anticipated accidents or events of harm, despite operating in
highly complex, high-risk environments. Leaders demonstrate their
commitments to HRO through their integration within operations and
culture, displaying high reliability leader behaviors contributing to a
Just Culture, and by supporting the work of HRO Leads and Champions
across facilities, VISNs, and VHA Central Office organizations for
tailored implementation and sustainment. VHA also fosters a Culture of
Safety through the application of foundational practices (Tiered Safety
Huddles, Safety Forums, Leader Rounding, and Visual Management
Systems), which facilitate oversight and risk mitigation, workforce
psychological safety, and a Just Culture for Veterans, their families,
and staff members.
Over the last year, multiple external reviews have shown that VA
quality of care is extremely high. In this year's CMS Overall Hospital
Quality Star Ratings at https://news.va.gov/press-room/va-health-care-
outperforms-non-va-care-in-two-independent-nationwide-quality-and-
patient-satisfaction-reviews/, more than 58% of VA hospitals included
received 4- or 5-star ratings compared to 40% of non-VA hospitals. This
year is only the second year VA hospitals have been included in this
review, and VA has outperformed non-VA health care in both years. VA
also outperformed non-VA hospitals in the most recent CMS Hospital
Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems star ratings at
https://news.va.gov/press-room/va-health-care-outperforms-non-va-care-
in-two-independent-nationwide-quality-and-patient-satisfaction-reviews/
, with 79% of VA facilities receiving a summary star rating of 4 or 5
stars compared to 40% of non-VA hospitals. This quarter represents the
ninth consecutive quarter in which VA facilities have outperformed non-
VA counterparts.
These findings come at a time when Veteran trust in VA (https://
department.va.gov/veterans-experience/trust/veteran-trust-in-va/)
outpatient care has reached an all-time record high of 92%, based on a
survey of more than 440,000 Veterans. In addition, these findings are
consistent with a recent systematic review at https://news.va.gov/
press-room/studies-va-health-care-better-equal-non-va/that found that
VA health care is consistently as good as or better than non-VA health
care. These reviews are a testament to VHA's commitment to high quality
health care.
SUBCOMMITTEE RECESS
Senator Sinema. [Whereupon, at 11:50 a.m., Thursday, May 2,
the subcommittee was recessed, to reconvene subject to the call
of the Chair.]
LIST OF WITNESSES, COMMUNICATIONS, AND PREPARED STATEMENTS
----------
Page
Baldwin, Senator Tammy, U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, Questions
Submitted by...................................................
68.............................................................
Banta, Lieutenant General Edward D., Deputy Commandant,
Installations & Logistics, United States Marine Corps:
Prepared Statement of........................................
36.........................................................
Questions Submitted to.......................................
71.........................................................
Statement of.................................................
35.........................................................
Boozman, Senator John, U.S. Senator from Arkansas, Statement of..
Collins, Senator Susan M., U.S. Senator from Maine, Questions
Submitted by...................................................
118............................................................
Hagerty, Senator Bill, U.S. Senator from Tennessee, Questions
Submitted by...................................................
118............................................................
Heinrich, Senator Martin, U.S. Senator from New Mexicao,
Questions Submitted by.........................................
115............................................................
Hollywood, Mr. Bruce E., Associate Chief Operations Officer,
United States Space Force
Prepared Statement of........................................
41.........................................................
Statement of.................................................
49.........................................................
Hoeven, Senator John, U.S. Senator from North Dakota, Questions
Submitted by
Jablon, Vice Admiral Jeffrey T., Deputy Chief of Naval Operations
for Installations and Logistics, United States Navy:
Prepared Statement of........................................
31.........................................................
Statement of.................................................
30.........................................................
McDonough, Hon. Denis R. McDonough, Secretary of Veterans
Affairs:
Prepared Statement of Hon. Denis McDonough...................
79.........................................................
Statement of.................................................
75.........................................................
Summary Statement Hon. Denis McDonough.......................
78.........................................................
Miller, Lieutenant General Tom D., Deputy Chief of Staff for
Logistics, Engineering, and Force Protection, United States Air
Force:
Prepared Statement of........................................
41.........................................................
Questions Submitted to.......................................
72.........................................................
Statement of.................................................
40.........................................................
Murkowski, Senator Lisa, U.S. Senator from Alaska, Questions
Submitted by
Owens, Hon. Brendan, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Energy,
Installations, and Environment:
Prepared Statement of........................................
5..........................................................
Questions Submitted to.......................................
67.........................................................
Statement of.................................................
1..........................................................
Summary Statement of.........................................
3..........................................................
Schatz, Senator Brian, U.S. Senator from Hawaii, Questions
Submitted by...................................................
112............................................................
Sinema, Senator Kyrsten, U.S. Senator from Arizona:
Opening Statement
Questions Submitted by
Vereen, Lieutenant General Kevin, Deputy Chief of Staff,
Department of the Army:
Prepared Statement of........................................
25.........................................................
Questions Submitted to.......................................
69.........................................................
Statement of.................................................
24.........................................................
SUBJECT INDEX
----------
Page
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
Military Construction and Family Housing
Additional Committee Questions...................................
67.............................................................
Adopting Human-Centered Requirements.............................
6..............................................................
Army Family Housing..............................................
27.............................................................
Barracks 2030, Family Housing, and Child Development Centers.....
37.............................................................
Base
Operating Support and Facilities Sustainment, Restoration and
Modernization..............................................
34.........................................................
Realignment and Closure (BRAC)...............................
48.........................................................
Child Care.......................................................
28.............................................................
Combatant Commander Infrastructure...............................
44.............................................................
Construction on Guam.............................................
21.............................................................
Creating Resilient and Healthy Defense Communities...............
5..............................................................
Defense Environmental Restoration Program........................
11.............................................................
Energy Resilience................................................
15.............................................................
Environmental:
Justice......................................................
24.........................................................
Quality......................................................
47.........................................................
Resilience...................................................
18.........................................................
Restoration..................................................
47.........................................................
Stewardship..................................................
47.........................................................
Evolving Our Strategy to Operate at Scale........................
31.............................................................
Existing Mission Recapitalization................................
45.............................................................
FY25 Air Force Milcon Program....................................
44.............................................................
FY25 Military Construction Budget Request........................
38.............................................................
Facility Sustainment, Restoration, and Modernization (FSRM)......
49.............................................................
Fire Protection at Grand Forks Air Force Base....................
73.............................................................
Facility Sustainment, Restoration, and Modernization (FSRM)......
45.............................................................
Housing..........................................................
9..............................................................
Construction, Operation and Maintenance......................
45.........................................................
Improving Mission Resilience.....................................
12.............................................................
Infrastructure Resilience........................................
13.............................................................
Industrial Base and Supply Chains................................
29.............................................................
Innovation.......................................................
17.............................................................
Installation:
Management Innovation........................................
29.........................................................
Resilience
And Environmental Stewardship............................
39.....................................................
Installations....................................................
42.............................................................
And Aging Infrastructure.....................................
73.........................................................
Jamestown Readiness Center.......................................
70.............................................................
Lodging for Camp Grafton's Regional Training Institute...........
71.............................................................
Military.........................................................
Aviation and Installation Assurance Siting Clearinghouse.....
23.........................................................
Construction
Budget Request...........................................
25.....................................................
New Mission Bed Downs............................................
44.............................................................
Native American Lands Environmental Mitigation Program...........
23.............................................................
Natural:
Disaster Recovery Efforts....................................
43.........................................................
Resources Stewardship and Restoration........................
30.........................................................
Other Facilities.................................................
27.............................................................
Other Programs and Initiatives...................................
20.............................................................
Optimizing Our Footprint.........................................
7..............................................................
Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances..............................
11.............................................................
Planning and Design..............................................
45.............................................................
Privatized Housing...............................................
46.............................................................
Quality of Service (QOS).........................................
33.............................................................
Responsible and Resilient Chemical Management....................
17.............................................................
Retention of Critical Training Land in Hawaii....................
20.............................................................
Safety and Occupational Health...................................
28.............................................................
SIOP.............................................................
32.............................................................
Special Interest Items...........................................
43.............................................................
Spouse Employment................................................
28.............................................................
Taking Care of our People........................................
8..............................................................
Taking Care of People: Child Development Centers and Dormitories.
43.............................................................
The Office of Local Defense Community Cooperation................
22.............................................................
Transforming Portfolio Management................................
7..............................................................
Unaccompanied Housing--Barracks..................................
26.............................................................
United:
States:
Air Force................................................
42.....................................................
United States Space Force................................
48.....................................................
__________
DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS
Additional Committee Questions...................................
107............................................................
Aging Veterans...................................................
84.............................................................
Air Ambulance....................................................
117............................................................
Annual Suicide Prevention Report.................................
117............................................................
Blast Overpressure Injuries......................................
115............................................................
Caregivers.......................................................
84.............................................................
Community Care Third Party Administrators........................
110............................................................
Connected Care...................................................
84.............................................................
Construction Projects in Alaska..................................
116............................................................
Electronic Health Record Modernization
Financial:
Efficiency Inspection VA Memphis Healthcare System...........
119........................................................
Management Business Transformation (FMBT)....................
86.........................................................
Focusing on Wellbeing of Veterans................................
81.............................................................
Freely Associated States of the Pacific (FAS)....................
112............................................................
FY 2025 Budget and FY 2026 AA Request............................
79.............................................................
Increasing Access to Mental Health Care..........................
81.............................................................
Indian Health Services...........................................
107............................................................
Infrastructure
Information Technology Serving Veterans..........................
85.............................................................
Investing in Our People..........................................
80.............................................................
Health Care Budget Request.......................................
82.............................................................
Highly Rural Transportation Grants...............................
118............................................................
Homeless Veterans................................................
111............................................................
Homelessness Programs............................................
83.............................................................
Honoring Veterans' Legacies......................................
86.............................................................
Maine State Veterans Homes.......................................
118............................................................
MDMA and Psilocybin Research.....................................
112............................................................
Opioids..........................................................
118............................................................
Pact Act
Preventing Veteran Suicide.......................................
81.............................................................
Rescheduling Determination of Cannabis...........................
113............................................................
Research.........................................................
83.............................................................
Rule on Emergency Transport......................................
116............................................................
State Veteran Homes Grant Program................................
116............................................................
Telehealth.......................................................
115............................................................
Women Veterans' Health Care......................................
82.............................................................
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