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JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas (Feb. 26, 2020) -- Mission and Installation Contracting Command officials are realigning their capabilities and establishing three new centers to strategically support its major mission partners and command objectives.
The three centers are the Installation Readiness Center at Fort Sam Houston, Texas; the Institutional Training Center at Fort Eustis, Virginia; and the Soldier and Family Readiness Center at Fort Knox, Kentucky. Centers will support installation readiness, institutional training, and Soldier and family readiness objectives respectively.
“This is not a re-organization, it is a realignment of capability to strategically support our major mission partners, Army Materiel Command readiness priorities and lines of effort, Army Contracting Command transformation efforts, and Army category management objectives,” said Lorraine Massie, chief of the MICC Contracting Operations Directorate Field Support Division at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston, Texas.
Overall objectives include standardizing business practices with mission partners, improving contract execution and mission support, capitalizing on standardized products, improving employee skill sets through repetitive processes and reducing workload, especially for installation-level contracting offices. Major contracts will be executed at the readiness centers with decentralized contract administration.
The initial focus entails a restructure at the Field Directorate Office-Fort Sam Houston. A directorate-level office will report directly to FDO-Fort Sam Houston and execute installation readiness contract support for food service requirements as well as facilities including base operations, minor construction, job order contracts, grounds maintenance, architect and engineering services, and custodial services.
The MICC-Fort Eustis contracting office in Virginia will accomplish institutional training contract support. The 418th Contracting Support Brigade will retain test range contract support within its footprint at Fort Hood, Texas, Dugway Proving Ground, Utah, and Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona. MICC-Fort Knox in Kentucky will continue to execute and administer contracts in support of Soldier and family readiness services.
The goal is to increase contract savings and efficiencies; reduce procurement acquisition lead times and bridging actions; and reduce corrective actions through the development of standardized approaches and consistent application of enterprise standardization initiatives.
The centers are slated to reach initial operational capability March 1, 2021, using current manning authorizations. Massie said that includes “developing enterprise operating procedures to include establishment of an initial migration plan and business processes, as well as filling key leadership positions.”
“We established a planning team in 2019 to determine the optimal MICC posture for effective and efficient implementation of the AMC’s readiness priorities, ACC’s transformation efforts, and strategic Army category management objectives,” said Wiley Cox, a senior procurement analyst and facilities and construction team lead for the field support division. “We conducted mission analysis in coordination with contracting support brigades, field directorate offices, and MICC headquarters staff offices in order to provide leadership with the key data points needed to make an informed decision on the way ahead.”
He added the process involved identifying facts, assumptions, limitations, constraints and risks. Extensive workload and spend analysis was conducted by the team. The integrated process team identified challenges with the current capability to execute and administer recurring high dollar complex actions across the MICC footprint including inconsistent contract line item number structure, contract type, terms and conditions. The team also noted inconsistent contractor management and lack of accountability; inability to develop source selection expertise; excessive procurement acquisition lead time and bridging actions; and personnel turnover.
The decision to establish readiness centers within specific contracting support brigades and field directorate offices allows the command to optimize AMC lines of effort and implementation of category management initiatives.
“The approved course of action centralizes procurement execution for complex actions, which serves to realign MICC capabilities to strategically support major mission partners and command objectives,” Massie said.
After a center awards a contract, it then transfers the action to a local MICC office for contract administration.
Each readiness center will have a migration manager assigned to maintain advance acquisition planning for all contract requirements that migrate. Follow-on installation readiness requirements aligned to centralized readiness centers will migrate 24 months in advance of the target award date. Category management team leads at the MICC headquarters will maintain synchronization with readiness migration managers. Prior to migration, the migration manager will ensure all requirements documents are completed.
Massie said institutional training and Soldier and family readiness centers represent minimal impact with the majority of complex work already centrally executed at MICC-Fort Eustis and MICC-Fort Knox. She added installation readiness requirements constitute approximately one third of the annual MICC spend; and execution of these requirements is decentralized across the MICC footprint.
“The installation readiness center represents the predominant change and impact to the workload alignment structure,” Massie said. “Realigning capability by centralizing installation readiness requirements provides a significant opportunity to build highly proficient subject matter experts and achieve cost savings and efficiencies.”
About the MICC:
Headquartered at JBSA-Fort Sam Houston, Texas, the Mission and Installation Contracting Command consists of about 1,500 military and civilian members who are responsible for contracting goods and services in support of Soldiers as well as readying trained contracting units for the operating force and contingency environment when called upon. As part of its mission, MICC contracts are vital in feeding more than 200,000 Soldiers every day, providing many daily base operations support services at installations, facilitate training in the preparation of more than 100,000 conventional force members annually, training more than 500,000 students each year, and maintaining more than 14.4 million acres of land and 170,000 structures.
| Date Taken: | 02.26.2021 |
| Date Posted: | 12.28.2021 13:15 |
| Story ID: | 412029 |
| Location: | US |
| Web Views: | 84 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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