We recommend further that, to obtain from the Congress funds in the proper appropriations in future years, the Secretary of Defense direct the military departments to prepare and include in their budget requests realistic estimates of the numbers and cost of military personnel and civilians they plan to use in noncombat functions in compliance with DOD's policy.

MATTER FOR CONSIDERATION BY THE CONGRESS

We recommend that, if the Congress wishes to permit early action on the substitution of civilians for an equivalent or greater number of military personnel, DOD be authorized to transfer such funds as may be required from the appropriate fiscal year 1973 military personnel appropriations to the appropriations from which civilians are compensated.

CHAPTER 5

SCOPE OF REVIEW

Our review was made during fiscal year 1971 at selected organizations of the following military installations.

Fort Carson, Colorado

Naval Training Center, Great Lakes, Illinois
Naval Activities, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii

Travis Air Force Base, California

Marine Corps Base, Camp Pendleton, California

We reviewed DOD directives and instructions relating to the assignment and utilization of personnel. At the installations visited, we reviewed such documents as we deemed necessary to permit us to evaluate the manner in which these directives and instructions were being carried out. Installation officials were apprised of our findings concerning positions filled by military personnel which, under existing DOD policy, should be occupied by civilians. We obtained from these officials either their concurrence in our findings or their reasons for believing that certain of the positions should not be converted to civilian positions.

Copies of reports prepared by personnel survey teams were obtained, reviewed, and discussed with installation officials, to determine the extent to which conversion of military positions to civilian positions was considered during the teams' reviews.

We have considered the findings and recommendations contained in the draft GAO Report, "Extensive Use of Military Personnel in Civilian-Type Positions" (OSD Case #3317). Our comments, on behalf of the Secretary of Defense, appear below.

The Report cites instances found at five installations of military
personnel being used in civilian-type jobs to a greater extent than
intended by DoD policy, and concludes that this results from a lack
of staffing guidance and ineffective control and monitoring pro-
cedures. To correct these deficiencies, GAO recommends that
the Secretary of Defense designate each job in DoD as suitable
for civilian and/or military incumbency, furnish these determinations
to installations as specific guidelines, and have survey teams
monitor compliance with the DoD policy.

Constraints to Civilianization in the DoD

We do not agree with the GAO conclusion (page 12) that a lack of
staffing guidance at the installation level is the major restriction
to "full application" of DoD policy on the use of civilians. The
principle constraints have been restrictions on civilian employment
and budgetary limitations, which are fully discussed in the Report.
These constraints will continue to limit progress towards increased
civilianization unless and until installation commanders can be
assured of receiving the funds and if necessary, the civilian
spaces, for each military position to be civilianized and also a
reasonable certainty of retaining these resources as long as the
workloads require them.

APPENDIX I

These are several measures which can, and should, be taken to encourage greater use of civilians consistent with DoD policy. These are: (1) a policy of assurance by the Congress that the funds, and civilian spaces if necessary, will be provided for each military-to-civilian conversion, and (2) authority from the Congress for the Secretaries of the Military Departments to transfer funds between appropriations to convert military jobs to civilian incumbency as these opportunities occur. A precedent for this authority is provided in the DoD Appropriations Act of 1955 (see Proviso in Section 720 at page 18 of P. L. 458 approved June 30, 1954) which reads as follows:

"That, whenever, in the opinion of the Secretary of the
Military Department concerned, the direct substitution
of civilian personnel for an equivalent or greater number
of military personnel will result in economy without
adverse effect upon national defense, such substitution
may be accomplished without regard to the foregoing
limitation (i. e., civilian ceiling), and such funds as may
be required to accomplish the substitution may be trans-
ferred from the appropriate military personnel

appropriation to, and merged with, the appropriations
charged with compensation of such civilian personnel. "'

Staffing Guidelines for Installation Commanders

We will consider further GAO's recommendation that specific guidelines be provided all military installations for use in determining whether individual positions should be filled by military personnel or by civilian personnel. It is not necessary, however, that all personnel positions in DoD be reviewed to develop these guidelines, as GAO recommends. It is clear that positions in the strategic and general purpose forces (i. e., in divisions, wings, air defense, and the fleet) must continue to be staffed with military personnel. We will consider, therefore, the need for establishing staffing guidance for positions other than those in forces for which military incumbents must be provided.

Some actions have already been taken. DoD Directive 1100.9 "Military-Civilian Staffing of Management Positions in the Support Activities" has since 1957 required management position staffing delineations to be reflected in staffing guides and similar documents. This Directive was reaffirmed and reissued by the Secretary of Defense on September 8, 1971.

APPENDIX I

Staffing guides of Department of Army implement these provisions of DoD Directive 1100.9. These guides specifically identify each position in the activity addressed as suitable for staffing with military personnel or with civilian personnel. These guides have long been available to and used by Army installation commanders and by manpower utilization survey teams. A brief extract of one of these staffing guides is enclosed. We will consider the feasibility of a similar system for Navy and Air Force.

The use of staffing guides should, however, be understood. They are designed to assist installation commanders in determining, among other things, positions suitable for staffing with military personnel and with civilian personnel. The guidance is not mandatory, principally because of the necessity to reserve billets which may otherwise be suitable for civilian staffing for the periodic rotation of servicemen from stations overseas.

11

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The determination of which billets must be reserved for rotation purposes can only be made at the military department headquarters, since it is only at that level that the changing personnel inventories can be matched to changing overseas requirements.

Installation commanders do not have this overall perspective and therefore may be unaware of rotation requirements, as GAO auditors found. A number of the examples cited by GAO of the use of military personnel in civilian-type positions were instances of servicemen assigned to rotation billets (see enclosure).

We do not consider it practicable, therefore, to require (as GAO recommends) installation commanders to document justification in official records for personnel assignments which deviate from staffing criteria. Also, action has already been taken to control such assignments. The ASD(M&RA) asked the military departments on February 22, 1971 to establish controls over the authority of installation commanders to use military personnel temporarily in jobs vacated by civilians and to review cases where this existed so as to take early corrective action. A copy of this memorandum is enclosed.