Contact: Josh Holly; 202.226.3988
Forbes Floor Statement for Duncan Hunter National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2009
Washington D.C. – U.S. Rep. J. Randy Forbes (R-VA), Ranking Republican on the Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness, today released the following statement for House consideration of the Duncan Hunter National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2009:
“Thank you, Mister Chairman, for the opportunity to stand in strong support of this bill. I'd also like to express my sincere appreciation for Chairman Skelton, Ranking Member Hunter and the Chairman of our Readiness Subcommittee, the gentleman from Texas for their leadership and hard work in crafting a bipartisan bill.
“It is clear to me that years of underfunded procurement accounts have resulted in aging fleets of aircraft, ships, and vehicles. For this reason, I am pleased to support a bill that does much to address the readiness issues facing our military. This bill provides more than $550 million in funding above the President's request to address much-needed equipment repairs and maintenance. This funding will reduce shortfalls in available equipment, particularly in the National Guard and the Reserves. This equipment, along with the additional depot maintenance funding provided in the bill, is a very good step toward restoring readiness.
“The recent videos of barracks at Fort Bragg, as well as our staff’s own fact-finding trips to multiple bases, remind us that the Department’s installation infrastructure has also suffered from less than adequate funding. This is not acceptable, and I’m proud to say that in response, this bill provides $650 million to increase funding to repair aging barracks for the Army and Marine Corps.
“This bill also continues our steadfast commitment to fully funding and implementing the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure round by the September 2011 deadline. And to help communities impacted by BRAC, the bill will allow school districts that face large increases of students due to BRAC to apply for new federal education funds immediately, rather than waiting for the next calendar year.
“While so many of provisions make this is a good bill, there are two points where I think we can do better and I hope we do so in the conference with the Senate. In the first case, this bill explicitly prohibits public/private competitions for three years—competitions that could have saved the military billions of dollars in avoided costs. The government does not have a monopoly on good ideas. If a company can prove in a fair and open competition that it can do the government’s work for less, that company should have that opportunity.
“In the second case, there is a very well-intended provision to ensure we have world class facilities at the new Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, and at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. Unfortunately, the more we’ve learned about the impact of this provision, the more I am concerned that it would result in broken construction contracts and delays that would cost the taxpayers millions of dollars in redesign and construction costs -- with no tangible benefit to our servicemen and women.
“With those exceptions, I am extremely proud of this bill, and I urge all my colleagues to vote yes on this bill as it will do much to restore the readiness of our military.”
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