CRS: Deferred maintenance “has also caused safety concerns for some federal employees in GSA-controlled buildings”. Image: DCStockPhotography/Shutterstock.com
By: FEDweek StaffThe deferred maintenance backlog in federal buildings, which has increased by 57 percent in just the last five years, “may place the health of employees or the ability of an agency to accomplish its mission at risk,” says a Congressional Research Service report.“
As these assets age, their component systems, such as roofs and pipes, require ongoing maintenance to ensure they function properly and remain in service as long as possible. When needed maintenance and repairs are deferred to a future time, then the problem may become more costly, more severe, and shorten the life of the asset,” it said.
Deferred maintenance “has also caused safety concerns for some federal employees in GSA-controlled buildings” as well as for members of the public visiting those buildings, it says. It cited a recent report from the GSA inspector general finding some 36,000 unresolved “risk conditions” at those buildings, including the presence of lead, asbestos, other cancer-causing agents and other hazardous materials.
However, it said that while the backlog “has been a long-standing concern for stakeholders,” it has continued to grow to an estimated $80 billion as of 2022. It cited reasons including underfunding the Federal Buildings Fund, a revolving fund used for such improvements, and higher costs of both the materials and the labor that would be needed. Some of the increase may be attributable to changes in how the backlog is accounted for, it added.
It said that options, in addition to better funding of the building fund, include increasing efforts to “dispose of assets that are not critical to an agency’s mission” by sale, donation, or demolition”; expanding use of arrangements where a private sector company funds improvements to a federal property in exchange for use of that asset or a portion of the savings generated by the improvements the company made; and establishing a separate capital revolving fund for major construction and renovation projects.
It also said that making it easier to search for, sort, and download data on the central source of information on agency real property assets, the Federal Real Property Profile, would enable better insights for making decisions about property.
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