United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 2008-07-01 monographic deposited born digital 22 p. GA 1.13:GAO-08-902R https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R P0b002ee180384312 f:d08902r DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-23 GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R GAO-08-902R Contract negotiations Contract oversight Defense agreements Defense capabilities Defense cost control Defense operations Defense procurement Department of Defense contractors Equipment maintenance Facility maintenance Joint ventures Maintenance costs Maintenance services contracts Military facilities Military forces Private sector Private sector practices Reporting requirements Strategic planning Policies and procedures Correspondence A82677

For several years, the Department of Defense (DOD) and Congress have encouraged the defense logistics support community to pursue partnerships with the private sector to combine the best commercial processes and practices with DOD's extensive maintenance capabilities. These public-private partnerships can combine the resources, risks, and rewards of public agencies and private companies and are intended to provide greater efficiency, better access to capital, and improved compliance with a range of government regulations. Although DOD has collected information on depot-level partnering arrangements for several years, DOD first issued a policy encouraging the use of public-private depot maintenance partnerships to improve the efficiency and viability of its depots in January 2002. DOD expects these improvements to depot operations to ultimately improve support for the warfighter. Public-private partnerships for depot-level maintenance are cooperative arrangements between a depot-level maintenance activity and one or more private sector entities to perform DOD or defense-related work, to utilize DOD depot facilities and equipment, or both. Pursuant to Section 2474 of Title 10, Unites States Code, the secretaries of the military departments (and the Secretary of Defense in the case of defense agencies) designated their depot-level maintenance activities (other than facilities approved for closure or major realignment under the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Act of 1990) as Centers of Industrial and Technical Excellence (CITE) in their core competencies. Section 2474 states that the secretary concerned may authorize and encourage the head of a CITE to enter into public-private partnerships comprising of government and private sector employees to perform work related to the CITE's core competencies. The statute also permits private industry to use underutilized or unutilized facilities and equipment at the CITEs. House Conference Report 110-477 accompanying H.R. 1585 directed DOD to submit a report to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees on the public-private partnerships at its CITEs that describes the following six reporting elements: (1) common approaches and procedures for DOD CITEs to use in the implementation of partnerships; (2) consistent cost methodologies and reimbursement guidance applicable to maintenance and repair workload performed by federal personnel participating in public-private partnerships; (3) implementation procedures for completing contract negotiation for partnerships within 12 months of initiating negotiations; (4) the secretary's use of commercial practices in partnerships to replace existing inventory and component management, technical publication data, document management, equipment maintenance, and calibration requirements; (5) delegation during a partnership of Class 2 design authority based on commercial practices to maintain the form, fit, and function of a weapons system platform, major end item, component of a major end item, or article; and (6) plans to expand core capabilities through the use of partnerships at DOD CITEs. To assess the completeness of DOD's report, we determined (1) whether DOD's report described each of the six reporting elements as directed by the conference report and (2) for the reporting elements that were described, whether DOD could have included additional information in its report that would have made it more useful to the committees and other interested parties. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R/html/GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R/pdf/GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R.pdf GAO-08-902R https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GAO-08-902R Correspondence GAO-08-902R; Depot Maintenance: DOD's Report to Congress on Its Public-Private Partnerships at Its Centers of Industrial and Technical Excellence (CITEs) Is Not Complete and Additional Information Would Be Useful; Contract negotiations Contract oversight Defense agreements Defense capabilities Defense cost control Defense operations Defense procurement Department of Defense contractors Equipment maintenance Facility maintenance Joint ventures Maintenance costs Maintenance services contracts Military facilities Military forces Private sector Private sector practices Reporting requirements Strategic planning Policies and procedures Title 10 Section 2208(j) Title 10 Section 2469a Title 10 Section 2471 Title 10 Section 2474 Title 10 Section 2539 Title 10 Section 2563 Title 10 Section 2667 Title 10 Section 4543 Title 10 Section 4544 Title 10 Section 7300 10 U.S.C. 2208(j) 10 U.S.C. 2469a 10 U.S.C. 2471 10 U.S.C. 2474 10 U.S.C. 2539 10 U.S.C. 2563 10 U.S.C. 2667 10 U.S.C. 4543 10 U.S.C. 4544 10 U.S.C. 7300 Title 22 Section 2754 Title 22 Section 2770 22 U.S.C. 2754 22 U.S.C. 2770 Conf. Rept. 110-477