Adm. Greenert Answers Questions From the Fleet
Navy NewsStand
Story Number: NNS080910-12
Release Date: 9/10/2008 1:50:00 PM
By Mass Commuinication Specialist 2nd Class (SW) Joseph Wax, Fleet Public Affairs Center Atlantic
NORFOLK (NNS) -- Adm. Jonathan Greenert, commander U.S. Fleet Forces Command, recorded a podcast Sept. 5 to answer questions from the fleet about the new sea-shore flow, homeport ashore and individual augmentees (IAs).
Greenert spoke candidly about the adjustment being made to some Sailor's sea and shore tour lengths to bring more stability and predictability to Sailor's career paths.
"The new sea-shore flow will provide an optimal balance between sea duty and shore duty," Greenert explained. "It has the added benefit of giving the Sailors and their families, and I think this is very important, a predictable career path," he said.
The size and the mission of the Navy has changed in recent years, making the new sea-shore flow necessary.
"The last several years the Navy has become increasingly sea-centric," said Greenert. "That means the number of shore billets has decreased while the experience level needed for the Sailors at sea has increased. Also, everybody knows we have been adjusting the size of the Navy and the number of Sailors in the Navy over the last six years. We are very close to stabilizing that number, and we have what is going to be known as the sea-shore flow."
Greenert also answered rumors that shipboard Sailors were going to be given barracks rooms when in-port.
"This is a fact, and it is called homeport ashore," he said. "We have the situation where the fleet surface Sailor is the only one that is required to live in the same place that that individual deploys. The Seabees don't do it. The submarine force doesn't do it. The Marines don't do it, and the Army doesn't do it. And we don't want to do it."
A program that has roots in the 1996 decision to grant shipboard, single E-6s housing allowance takes aim at getting all Sailors off the ship while in port. Nine-thousand Sailors still live aboard ships, down from 25,000 just 10 years ago.
New barracks will soon open in San Diego, Mayport, Fla., Pascagoula, Miss. and Bremerton, Wash., providing approximately 1,100 rooms. Next year, 1,800 more rooms are set to open and soon after 4,000 more in the fleet concentrated areas of Norfolk and San Diego.
"So you add all that up and over the next three-years you are looking at about 7,000 of that 9,000 deficit that we are going to have an opportunity to move off those ships and get ashore," said Greenert.
"This is a big quality of life issue for our Sailors, and we have the added benefit of finding that when we move these Sailors ashore behavioral trends improve. That is a good thing for relationships with the community and it is all good bottom line."
Finally, Greenert discussed concerns some Sailors have with IAs being taken from deploying units.
"We draw the line to prevent the unit, the community and the individual from falling below what we call, red-lines," he said. "I'll give you an example. For an afloat unit, one of the red-lines is that we will not go below 90 percent of that unit's manning. There are more red-lines and I'm not going to bore the audience out there with all of them, but the idea is we do not want to go below those red-lines."
The Navy also tries not to assign people to IAs that are serving in joint billets, are forward-deployed, are going to school, are in the special warfare community or possess nuclear training. The number of Sailors from deployed units serving in IA billets remains low.
"Less than one percent of all the carrier crews are serving on IAs," said Greenert. "If you look at the Truman Carrier Strike Group, we have 54 Sailors serving on IAs and that is out of 9,000. If you are one of those 54 you may have questions about how did I get picked and I understand that. But you can see the statistics would show it is relatively small."
Greenert doesn't see IAs going away in the near future, but the Global War on Terror Support Assignment (GSA) detailing process should improve the process for Sailors going IA.
"GSA detailing should improve the predictability of global war on terrorism assignments. We are going to get out of the rip-to-fill mentality as much as possible and keep from reaching for deploying units or people who have served recently. I am optimistic that we can continue to evolve this process to something our Sailors will find acceptable."
Greenert closed the interview by thanking Sailors for their efforts during the hurricane season and reminding everyone to use their operational risk management when getting behind the wheel of a car or motorcycle.
To view Adm. Greenert's podcast, visit www.cffc.navy.mil/podcasts.htm
For more news from U.S. Fleet Forces Command, visit www.navy.mil/local/clf/.
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