This year’s House and Senate Armed Services Committees’ fiscal 2020 NDAA Reports include updated language in support of increasing Intergovernmental Support Agreement (IGSA) authorities and enhanced use of public-to-public agreements to generate annual installation savings for DOD.
In the House Armed Services Committee’s FY20 NDAA report the panel expressed approval that many installations have entered into IGSAs, which allow DOD and state and local governments to provide, receive and share installation support services, and it highlighted that many of the IGSAs have resulted in millions in savings to DOD.
While the report expresses support for IGSAs, it also notes concern that savings are not being returned to installations that use them to improve services and reduce costs. To address concerns that installations are not financially benefiting from IGSA savings, the panel included language in the House NDAA calling for DOD to produce a new “Report on Fiscal Impacts of Intergovernmental Service Agreements.” The report, which would be due Dec. 31, 2019, would detail the actual savings realized by IGSAs, explore returning a portion of the savings back to installations, and analyze the overall fiscal impact to the military services of IGSAs.
The Senate Armed Services Committee’s Fiscal 2020 NDAA report also expresses support for similar public-to-public partnerships to generate savings, recommending the partnerships should serve as a tool to increase installation readiness and resiliency while also enhancing military families’ quality of life. The panel noted that in 2016 DOD commissioned a report on the use of public-to-public partnerships by installations, including IGSAs, and proposed the agreements may be one approach to enhancing and sustaining operations and services for installations.
The SASC report also expresses interest in new approaches to improve installation readiness and resiliency and is willing to consider new authorities to encourage public-to-public efforts. To explore greater use of the partnerships, the committee has included language in its version of the NDAA directing DOD to provide a briefing to the congressional defense committees on current public-to-public partnerships. The briefing, which would be due by December 1, 2019, would cover the number of public-to-public partnerships in place, the estimated savings of current partnerships, barriers preventing broader use of such partnerships, and new partnerships that are currently under consideration.
Navy photo by Ryan Labadens