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FOCUS: Installations to serve as flagships

Army News Service

Release Date: 2/2/2004

By Sgt. 1st Class Marcia Triggs

Editor's note: This is the fourth in a weekly series of articles on Army Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Schoomaker's focus areas. WASHINGTON (Army News Service, Feb. 3, 2004) -- "We have pledged to rid the Army of Camp Swampy -- substandard installations," said Geoffrey Prosch, the acting assistant secretary of the Army for Installations and Environment.

When Army Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Schoomaker announced that "Installations as Flagships" would be one of the Army's 16 immediate focus areas, there were already more than 74,000 people working the issue, Prosch said.

The Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff for Installation Management vowed in 2002 to improve installation business practices by cutting out layers of bureaucracy, and managing its $15 billion budget through one agency, Prosch said.

Spacious barracks rooms with walk-in closets and homes with garages and driveways had already been built. They are good examples of how ACSIM was working to improve where Soldiers work, train and their families live, Prosch said.

To end the impression that there are "have and have-not installations," all Army posts will operate under Installation Design Standards, a written policy that will outline what the minimum standards are, officials said.

"Right now we are in the process of developing an implementation plan for the Installation Design Standards," said Lt. Col. Paul Mason, chief of the Transformation team for ACSIM.

"The design standards will give installations a framework for building or renovating billeting, setting up force protection, and landscaping. Installations will then initiate their own Installation Design Guides based on the standards we outlined in the IDS," Mason said.

The endeavor is not to make all installations the same, Prosch said, but to ensure consistent quality among Army installations.

The Army Community and Family Support Center is also playing a part by placing family services and Morale, Welfare and Recreation programs on a level plateau, Mason said. Everything from the Child Development Center to the post gym will be managed to standard, he added.

Soldiers should share the same quality of life as those they have pledged to defend, Mason said. By improving the installation infrastructure, the Army is recruiting and retaining Soldiers and their families, he added.

Residential Communities Initiative, the Army's housing privatization plan, is one of the best things the Army has done for its Soldiers, said Prosch, who spent 31 years as an infantry officer. There are currently 26 RCI contracts serving 31 installations. By 2007, RCI contracts will be awarded to improve 80 percent of the Army housing, Prosch added.

"We're not just building row houses, we're building communities," Prosch said. "We have put an equity investment of $335 million into RCI, and our private partners have been able to borrow $7.2 billion. We would not have been able to obtain that type of money through military construction dollars from Congress."

Other future plans to improve billeting on post are to spend $1 billion to upgrade lodging facilities for Soldiers who are on temporary duty or in-processing and to upgrade the barracks for Soldiers who are deployed.

"When Soldiers come home from a deployment, we want to make sure they see improvements," Mason said. "A time schedule is being reviewed, but it has not been determined if the renovation will take place for the Soldiers who are participating in the second rotation of Operation Iraqi Freedom and the fifth rotation of Operation Enduring Freedom."

Installations must be resourced to be holistic communities and secure sanctuaries, but also deployment platforms with robust reach-back capabilities, officials said.

The Army exists to fight and win wars, Prosch said. The job of ACSIM is to ensure that the installations have the resources to deploy its active-duty, and mobilize and demobilize its reserve troops, he said.

"There is currently a plan to revise the number of mobilization sites, Mason said.

"We do not want our installations to be choke points for mobilizing troops," Mason said. "Our goal is to design an area that will house all the organizations that fall under the deployment process."

"Deploying Soldiers is one of our focuses, but training is also an installation's core," Mason said. "Ranges will evolve from single-use, stand-alone platforms to be able to support both individual and collective training simultaneously."

Mason said Soldiers should start to see more live and virtual training in fiscal years 2007 or 2008. With the Installation Management Agency focusing on the post facilities, commanders can focus on training and war fighting, Mason added.

While Soldiers are training for a war, ACSIM will continue to outsource non-war-fighting functions, such as utilities, to private industry because they have the expertise and money, Prosch said.

As of Oct. 1, funds for installations started going directly to the garrison commanders to be used for their intended purposes, instead of being funneled down through major commands, Prosch said. Installations may find that they still don't have enough money. But, at least the money will be accounted for, and it will be easier to justify to the Office of the Secretary of Defense and Congress why more money is needed, he said.

IMA has seven regions, but there is only one banker, Prosch said. The IMA headquarters is located in Virginia, and there are four regions located stateside and three located overseas.

"In the year that we've been open, we've been able to save money and get a standard quality of work by obtaining contracts to cover whole regions," Prosch said. "We've regionally contracted security guards, furniture renovation and building demolition as examples."

Army leadership knows the importance of installations, Mason said. The changes that are taking place are not merely enhancements or band-aid fixes, he said. New and fresh approaches are being taken to make installations efficient and effective worldwide, Mason added.

(Editor's note: The 16 focus areas include: The Soldier; The Bench; Combat Training Centers/Battle Command Training Program; Leader Development and Education; Army Aviation; Current to Future Force; The Network; Modularity; Active Component/Reserve Component Balance; Force Stabilization; Actionable Intelligence; Installations as Flagships; Authorities, Responsibilities, and Accountability; Resource Processes; and Strategic Communications. To view a brief synopsis of each area, visit The Way Ahead.)