House Armed Services Committee | The Contracting Education Academy

May 2, 2018 By cs

Reform panel on track to cut DoD-specific acquisition regs by half

Fourteen months after President Donald Trump ordered all agencies to stand up regulatory reform task forces, the Defense Department is making major progress in weeding out what it views as outdated and unnecessary acquisition rules.

The group of Defense officials charged with examining acquisition rules is one of three subgroups currently operating within DoD as part if its regulatory reform task force.

Its particular charge is to undertake an in-depth scrub of the Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement (DFARS), decide what is still relevant, and what is slowing the system down for no good reason.

The review is about midway through, and so far, it is on track to reduce the size of the DFARS by about half. The group is made up of representatives from the military services, plus the Pentagon’s office of Defense Procurement and Acquisition Policy.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsradio.com/defense-main/2018/04/reform-panel-on-track-to-cut-dod-unique-acquisition-regs-by-half/

July 3, 2017 By cs

House begins work on another round of DoD acquisition overhauls

For the third year in a row, the annual Defense authorization bill the House Armed Services Committee will begin considering is chock full of provisions that are meant to reform the acquisition system – including one that would represent the biggest change in decades in the way the government buys commercial goods.

Among the more than five dozen acquisition provisions in the bill is committee chairman Mac Thornberry’s proposal to require DoD to buy its commercial-off-the-shelf products from private sector “online marketplaces” like Amazon. The chairman first floated the idea in a discussion draft a month ago, and the version the panel will consider today is mostly unchanged with two major exceptions: it would apply to the entire federal government, not just DoD, and it would require the government to do its buying through at least two online platforms rather than “one or more.”

But the revised version seems to have done little to satisfy industry’s many concerns with the proposal, including that it does not make clear how agencies would comply with numerous other acquisition laws and regulations – including protections for small business – and that it would bypass the Competition in Contracting Act.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsradio.com/defense-news/2017/06/house-begins-work-today-on-another-round-of-dod-acquisition-overhauls/

May 8, 2017 By cs

Pentagon’s top techie needs purchasing power of closest allies

Terry Halvorsen, who served as the Pentagon’s top tech official for two and a half years before leaving in February, is calling on Congress to imbue his old role with more authorities to pursue emerging technologies.

Speaking before a House Armed Services subcommittee, Halvorsen lamented that he could not pursue even small investments in promising technologies because of outdated acquisition policies during his tenure at the Defense Department’s tech chief, despite overseeing a nearly $40 billion budget. Halvorsen is now an executive at Samsung.

“There is only one nation that doesn’t have this authority in the Five Eyes and that would be us,” Halvorsen said, referencing the intelligence alliance between the U.S. and New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.nextgov.com/defense/2017/04/pentagons-top-techie-needs-purchasing-power-closest-allies-former-dod-cio-says/137384/

February 23, 2017 By cs

April showers bring legislative flowers for defense

April is shaping up to be a pivotal month for Congress, especially for the House Armed Services Committee and the 2018 defense authorization bill.

House Armed Services Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) said he’s hopeful Congress can actually appropriate 2017 funds to the Defense Department before April 1.

The government is now operating in its fifth month at 2016 spending levels due to a continuing resolution and Congress’ inability to come to an agreement on how funds should be spent.

“The fiscal year is marching ahead and so to have any hope of spending the money efficiently we need to get [the appropriations] done quickly, and secondly, 2018 is backing up here,” Thornberry told reporters during a Feb. 16 briefing.

Keep reading this article at: http://federalnewsradio.com/congress/2017/02/april-showers-bring-legislative-flowers-defense/

December 19, 2016 By cs

DoD stuck with too many reforms and not enough staff

Congress is giving the Defense Department too many acquisition reforms and not enough employees to do the job, says one top Pentagon official.

pentagon-seal The leaders of the House and Senate Armed Services committees committed to reforming the bloated defense acquisition system a couple of years ago. So far they have devolved acquisition power to the military service chiefs and reduced paperwork burdens for program managers.

The 2017 defense authorization bill takes things a step further by splitting DoD’s chief acquisition officer position in two and putting an emphasis on fixed-price contracts. The bill does that all while mandating reductions in the Senior Executive Service and in headquarters staff.

Keep reading this article at: http://federalnewsradio.com/acquisition/2016/12/dod-stuck-many-reforms-not-enough-staff/

Fourteen months after President Donald Trump ordered all agencies to stand up regulatory reform task forces, the Defense Department is making major progress in weeding out what it views as outdated and unnecessary acquisition rules.

Terry Halvorsen, who served as the Pentagon’s top tech official for two and a half years before leaving in February, is calling on Congress to imbue his old role with more authorities to pursue emerging technologies.

April is shaping up to be a pivotal month for Congress, especially for the House Armed Services Committee and the 2018 defense authorization bill.

Congress is giving the Defense Department too many acquisition reforms and not enough employees to do the job, says one top Pentagon official.

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