Federal Manager's Daily Report

A House Appropriations Committee report on a DoD spending bill echoes concerns raised in a separate authorization bill regarding staffing levels at headquarters functions—and in particular the Pentagon’s compliance with a self-imposed 20 percent reduction in headquarters spending.

The committee said it “is concerned by the size and cost of headquarters and administrative functions, particularly at the Pentagon, including the size of the Services’ civilian workforces.” The measure orders DoD to “conduct a systematic determination of the personnel requirements for headquarters organizations, including the Pentagon, and the support organizations that perform headquarters-related functions, and to implement a process for conducting regular future determinations.”

DoD also is to submit a report to Congress “detailing the implementation of the twenty percent headquarters reduction at the Service, component, and headquarters level of detail. This report should provide both the funding baseline being used for the reduction, the baseline number of military, civilian, and contracted workforce at each headquarters and support organization, the timeline for implementation of the reductions, and the revised funding and size of the military, civilian, and contracted workforce by headquarters and support organization after the reduction is fully implemented.”

The report also criticizes DoD for a “pattern of over-budgeting” for civilian personnel costs by requesting—and getting funding for—more slots than it ends up using. Further, the military services need to better track and project their full-time equivalent staffing needs, it said, citing Air Force budget documentation in particular as “unclear, riddled with errors, and poorly justified.”

The measure directs the DoD IG to audit civilian pay and personnel programs at the service and component level.