WASHINGTON — A number one House lawmaker is downplaying the worth of an Air Force and Pentagon proposal that might allow services to start out working on recent programs before Congress officially passes a budget funding them.
Rep. Rob Wittman, R-Va., told Defense News last week he’s “still on the opposite side” of backing the so-called “quickstart” proposal. As an alternative, Wittman said from his office on Capitol Hill, “Congress must do its job” and pass spending bills on time.
“All you’re doing [with quickstart] is addressing the symptoms of lack of motion by Congress,” said Wittman, chairman of the House Armed Services subcommittee on tactical air and land forces. “We want to find a way to deal with the underlying causes … of why can we get to a degree where we even need to have a look at quickstart dollars?”
In an earlier September interview, Air Force acquisition chief Andrew Hunter said the quickstart proposal would allow the service to start initial contract work and early-stage program activities, even when a budget hadn’t yet been passed and the military is working under a unbroken resolution, which limits spending to prior 12 months levels.
When the Air Force has to operate under a CR, Hunter said, it could actually hold informal talks with industry on recent programs, but arranging contracts and organising vendor pools is far harder.
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall earlier this 12 months began floating the quickstart proposal, which originally would have allowed the military to make use of as much as $300 million to start out recent programs.
Congress, for essentially the most part, responded unenthusiastically. It was originally in neither the House nor Senate’s proposed versions of the National Defense Authorization Act, although the Senate added this summer to its NDAA version a slimmed-down version that might allow all services to make use of as much as $100 million for brand new starts .
Hunter said within the September interview the Air Force was encouraged by the Senate’s inclusion of a limited quickstart provision, and said the service would keep talking to lawmakers, looking for to persuade the House to incorporate it within the conference version of the NDAA that can ultimately grow to be law.
Kendall said in a Sept. 11 roundtable at an Air Force conference he wasn’t aware of deep opposition to the proposal within the House. He noted he’s “reasonably hopeful” it would ultimately find yourself within the conference NDAA.
Kendall told reporters at that conference there was some confusion on the aim of the quickstart proposal, and that it wasn’t geared towards continuing resolutions.
“It’s not intended to be an alternative choice to CRs,” Kendall said. “It’s really pointed at the traditional budget process, with no CR. Where, due to length of time it takes us to get into the DoD budget, after which have the DoD budget concerted and acted on, you’re already talking about well over a 12 months. And you possibly can save all of that point; we could move immediately … to start and reduce a few of the lead time.”
Asked how he was leaning on the revised quickstart provision, Wittman didn’t explicitly rule it out and said he wants to listen to the conversation in the course of the conference negotiations.
But he otherwise responded coolly to the proposal, expressing concern it may very well be used to sidestep the traditional budget process.
“I don’t desire a situation where someone says, ‘Well, we’ll just put quickstart dollars in there, and we’ll type of get around the method that normally happens with debate and transparency, and what happens with authorization and appropriation,’” Wittman said. “The appropriators like to have their control on things. I’m not one which believes, necessarily, it must be that micromanaged. But additionally, I don’t need to take pressure off of members of Congress.”
Wittman said a greater path for providing more reliable funding for brand new Pentagon programs can be to create “forcing mechanisms” so lawmakers must pass appropriations bills before the tip of the fiscal 12 months. This might include withholding lawmakers’ paychecks or not allowing them to go home in August if spending bills aren’t passed, he added.
“If we did our jobs, you wouldn’t need quickstart provisions,” he said.
Stephen Losey is the air warfare reporter for Defense News. He previously covered leadership and personnel issues at Air Force Times, and the Pentagon, special operations and air warfare at Military.com. He has traveled to the Middle East to cover U.S. Air Force operations.