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MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. - They are the discerning third eye looking after mission readiness. Their mission: To promote integrity, efficiency, credibility and combat readiness throughout the Marine Corps. That’s a tall order that requires the inspector general’s office to rely upon its teams of special agents, inspectors, criminal investigators and auditors, who must all remain impartial, honest and diligent.
Each command aboard Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune has an IG office which provide feedback to Marines and their leadership, said James Rohn, the operations officer with the Marine Corps Installations East – Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune IG office. These offices help curb fraud, waste, misconduct and mismanagement through inspections, assessments, investigations and the handling of inquiries and request mast.
“You have to have the eyes and ears out there, which is what our office does as a [system] of checks and balances just to make sure there is no wrong doing being committed,” said Rohn.
The IG office conducts audits of commands by sending out subject matter experts to analyze anywhere from 30 to 120 functional areas, depending on the nature of the command. Recently, an IG inspection took place at the School of Infantry East, covering about 60 different areas, said Rohn. These functional areas vary from uniforms and drill performance to fire prevention for fire departments and aircraft facilities aboard air stations.
“The process in our office is an administrative one,” said Stacey Humphrey, assistant operations officer with the MCIEAST – MCB Camp Lejeune IG office. A lot of times, Marines feel like we are going to dispatch someone with Criminal Investigations Division or the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. It’s not that type of investigation. It’s a fact finding, paperwork and administrative process.”
Humphrey said that the functional areas are broken down into questions. They are not unlike questionnaires designed to check each area of a command that can be inspected.
Units can access the checklist used during an inspection from the Inspector General of the Marine Corps’ website, so their examination should not come as any particular surprise.
Rohn said that the command has discretion when it comes to utilizing the information garnered in an investigation. Inspectors provide their comments and findings, which are then forwarded to the command for review.
However, this is not to say that the IG limits its scope to the nitty-gritty details filtered from paperwork. Inspections can also include individual Marines.
“Normally with Lt. Col. Jeffrey Johnson, who’s our Command Inspector General, we’ll walk around and talk to the Marines in the unit, which is separate from anything else that is going on,” said Rohn. “We want to get a feel of what the Marines are thinking in the unit. He’s really good about getting out there and will grab various ranks and ask them questions.”
This personal side of the IG carries through to its daily operations. Since they work with request mast and proper management saturations, the MCIEAST– MCB Camp Lejeune IG office routinely receives calls from Marines and dependents. In fact, many of the calls that they receive fall under the responsibility of other IG offices.
Rohn said that his office handles inquiries daily, many from people looking for help but unaware that his office is not particularly responsible for the command that individual falls under.
“We’ll take everything in,” said Rohn. “We’re not going to say, ‘You don’t belong to us. You need to contact them.’ I just got a complaint for another inspector general. We’ll take action on it, but we’re going to refer it to them. We treat everything like it’s ours. Whether it’s ours or not, we’ll take the time to help that person out.”
While it can mean more work for the IG office, the chain of command is still the first approach for handling a Marine’s issues in most situations. The office remains an important outlet for individuals trying to report problems they see.
In fact, many commands have a list of off-limits establishments. These are places that are deemed inappropriate for Marines to frequent as they may be detrimental to that particular Marine or interfere with proper conduct and mission readiness. The determination of off-limits establishments is another activity in which the IG office takes part.
“There are positive things out there and we’re just another aspect, a positive part,” said Rohn. “When someone talks to someone in our office, we want to let them know it was the right thing to contact us.”
For more information or a list of the various Command Inspector General offices, visit marines.mil/unit/hqmc/inspectorgeneral/Pages/CommandInspectorGenerals.aspx.
| Date Taken: | 04.04.2012 |
| Date Posted: | 04.30.2012 09:59 |
| Story ID: | 87596 |
| Location: | MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE, NORTH CAROLINA, US |
| Web Views: | 33 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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