The House Armed Services’ Readiness Subcommittee dismisses the Obama administration’s latest request to hold a BRAC round in 2019, according to its portion of the fiscal 2017 defense authorization bill.

The language in the draft bill released Tuesday stating that, “Nothing in this act shall be construed to authorize an additional Base Realignment and Closure round,” affirms the committee’s intent to reject DOD’s request to authorize another base closure round, the panel states.

The subcommittee will mark up its portion of the annual policy bill Thursday at 9:30 a.m.

In a change from past years, the legislation includes language clarifying that the BRAC prohibition is not intended to bar the department from preparing an analysis of its infrastructure needs if required by statute or requested by a congressional committee, including the infrastructure assessment required under last year’s authorization bill.

Last week, DOD released an analysis concluding that 22 percent of the department’s capacity is excess compared to a 1989 baseline, with significant variation among the services — the Army has 33 percent excess, the Air Force 32 percent and the Navy 7 percent.

In a bid to make it easier for the services to re-purpose older facilities, the subcommittee mark includes language reclassifying facility conversion as a repair. The change would allow all work within a facility’s existing dimensions to be considered repair, according to the draft bill.

The subcommittee’s mark is available on the Armed Services Committee website.

 

Shared From:  Defense Communities/Author Dan Cohen

http://defensecommunities.org/blog/congress-dod/readiness-subcommittee-retains-ban-on-brac/?utm_source=dc360