Sanford Bishop Asks Army Official About How Federal Workforce Cuts Will Affect Military Programs

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During a House Appropriations Committee hearing prior to the congressional recess, Rep. Sanford Bishop (D-GA) questioned Sergeant Major Michael R. Weimer of the Army about the effect of federal workforce cuts on quality-of-life military programs.

Transcript

00:00I see my time is up. Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much Chairman Carter, Ranking

00:07Member Wasserman Schultz. Let me thank you for the opportunity to participate in

00:10today's hearing. A warm welcome to each of our esteemed witnesses and I express

00:16my gratitude for your service to our nation. Your testimony is invaluable for

00:24the decision-making that we have to do and safeguarding the welfare of our

00:27soldiers and their families and our national security. Although a question

00:33may be directed to one of you, I welcome input from all of you with respect to the

00:39questions that I ask if you would like to comment. Last year, Congress worked with

00:47the Quadrant Life Panel to approve and authorize a well-deserved pay increase for

00:54the service members, specifically the junior service members. But it seems that

00:58we failed to adequately review the resources that the service members used

01:03for essential services, such as childcare and food programs. The pay increase moved

01:10these service members into higher pay bans, specifically for childcare, and it

01:16made them ineligible for SNAP or WIC programs, essentially canceling out the

01:22good intentions of the pay increase. Sergeant Major Ruiz, how are you tracking

01:29throughout your respective service the second and third order effects of the pay

01:35raise, considering that the service is provided based on household income? I'm most

01:41interested in childcare and food assistance programs. Congressman, thank you for that

01:48question. So April 1st was the first time that young devil dogs got a little extra

01:54on their paycheck and greatly appreciate that they appreciate you for pushing that

01:58so hard. What I would say is that we're watching it closely. Initially, via the numbers,

02:07the data tells us that without any change, maybe another spousal different kind of

02:14employment or they get promoted again. Today, they would they would not climb no

02:21more than one bracket up towards the childcare fees. That's what I have so far, sir,

02:26but as I watch this closely, I'll come back to you to see if those unintended

02:31consequences are more severe than climbing up one more. I would imagine that that for

02:38E6s and above, the pay raise for them, just their annual increase will likely jump them

02:47a little more because the pay increase is a little more substantial. So, but I'll keep

02:50an eye on that, sir, and then I'll give it to my teammates to see if anyone else has anything

02:54else. Yes, sir. Thank you, Congressman. I would like to also add, we have the ability at the

03:00installation level to adjust those fees if there's a need. So, while we're not terribly concerned with the

03:06potential to increase one bracket, it looks like it's a small number per month, under $50 per family,

03:13so it should not completely negate a pay increase. But if a family member, a service member in their

03:19family demonstrates a financial need through their chain of command, the local installation level

03:24command can adjust those fees. They have that authority to offset any financial crisis that may

03:31exist in some acute situation locally. Yeah, we worry about the stigma or the reluctance of a member to

03:39actually approach the command with that. Let me shift gears for a moment, address this to, first, Sergeant

03:48Major Weimar. In your testimony last year, you stated that not receiving predictable federal funding and pay

03:57because of continuing resolutions exacerbates ongoing issues." Add on top of this the uncertainty within

04:07the federal workforce that often places organizations that provide critical care for our service members

04:16and their families. What's the impact in care, funding, or services in support of our military families and

04:26their families in light of the CR and the federal workforce cuts? And do you anticipate, or how are you working to

04:33mitigate the additional burden on service members and their families because of a workforce drawdown?

04:40And are there any barracks, housing, child care centers, or other projects that provide specific care to our

04:48families that will be placed on hold or delayed due to a CR? And each of you can address that if you can.

04:59Congressman, thank you for that and it's good to see you and sorry we couldn't get our schedules to

05:04marry up here in the last couple weeks. So, first off, I definitely have to say thank you for

05:11the 12-month CR is a little bit new territory for us, but we're grateful for some of the new start

05:18reprogramming, some of the above threshold authority, but it is new territory for us.

05:28I don't know exactly how it's going to affect everything. We're not firing up star clusters right

05:34now on current projects. As far as some of the quality of life piece on the employee side, we're

05:41happy to report that our NAF employees have all been granted exceptions and so we're hiring CDC employees.

05:50We've covered most of our medical folks. We do have some folks in our holistic health and fitness

05:57that we're sharing all our lessons learned with our Marine Corps teammates. We do have some freeze on

06:02some of our nutritionists and physical therapists and so we're kind of in a hold, but we've been able

06:07to work well with OSD right now on the exceptions to get those people in there. I would say first

06:16and foremost, anything that affects quality of life has been one of the things we've been asking for

06:21a waiver for first. Our Director of Public Works, DPW, as you've heard us talk about it numerous times,

06:28we're short quite a few people there and that is currently frozen. So that's another one that we're

06:33trying to understand how that affects our infrastructure and quality of life. Sir?

06:39Congressman Bishop, similarly the Sergeant Major of the Army stated the majority of our quality of life

06:46employees are non-appropriate fund employees and we're not having any issues with hiring or losing

06:52any of those employees and it's not going to have any effect on any of those programs. Now,

06:58the loss of FY25 budget and CR, that did have a lot of effects on us. That's going to be, you know,

07:04we're not putting shovels in the ground to build new barracks. We're not putting shovels in the ground

07:09to build new CDCs. All those things that, as Chairman Carter mentioned at the beginning,

07:15that y'all did the hard work for in appropriations in setting us that money. We're not getting any of

07:21that work done this year and so hopefully we'll find good money in 26 to get after all those projects.

07:28Congressman, for the core, I think I'll start with six years ago Commandant Berger started the

07:40division of force design 2030. So six years ago we started the process of getting really light

07:47already and getting after the platforms and things and the formations that we think are going to be

07:54needed for the future fight and so that included our civilian infrastructure. So we're going to watch

08:00it closely. Yes, it affects, although I was able to hire a few, a little over 200 barracks managers,

08:07I won't be able to hire additional ones anytime soon and that's critical to maintaining

08:13the barracks that I have been able to refurbish and the ones that are hanging on by a thin thread.

08:17I won't have that so a Marine is instead in place getting after the maintenance of a barracks

08:22instead of doing what they were assigned to do. I think in the recruiting in the accession pipeline,

08:30I would be concerned if the civilians that are assisting in the MEPS in the processing of a young

08:38civilian into a Marine or any service members, if they're not there, I'm afraid that it would slow

08:43it down, the throughput and the momentum that we gained in the last couple of years

08:47will be greatly reduced. So hopefully we get after those exemptions there.

08:55Thank you Congressman. I'll echo the Sergeant Major of the Army. We're thankful for a year-long CR,

09:04I guess only to a government shutdown. So it's not a great option but it's better than shutting down. So

09:10we're thankful that we've got that process in place. But it is not ideal for stability and planning,

09:17especially in our major defense acquisition programs, which I know aren't the major topic

09:21here. But as the CR relates to 25 across the Air Force, that's where we saw the biggest.

09:29We've got a $3 billion top line disconnect that we have to close based off of the CR compared to the

09:35President's budget. And that a large part of that is in research development tests and evaluation.

09:42We've got some MILPERS concerns that we are working very hard to protect, particularly in recruiting and

09:49accession pipelines. We believe and we are on track today to meet our recruiting goals for FY25 and we're

09:56going to protect that at nearly all costs. There is the potential that it could have some negative

10:03effects on some of our rotational forces, permanent change of station, and things like that. But we

10:10we have got to protect our ability to assess the best Americans that we've got.

10:15The CR compromises that? The CR puts at risk a percentage of the MILPERS budget that we have to

10:22close. It doesn't specifically, it doesn't specifically help us in any of those areas. So it's, it then comes to

10:28the Defense Department to mitigate. If it doesn't help, does it hurt? It is,

10:33CRs are unhelpful, sir, in general. Do they hurt or they help? We're working hard to protect,

10:39we're working hard to protect those foundational parts of building our pipeline. We are very

10:45thankful for a congressional plus-up we got in the previous fiscal year to robust and grow our

10:52recruiting pipeline to the tune of nearly 500 new recruiters across the Air Force. And what we don't

10:58want to lose is that momentum. So today we have got the most, we have got the largest delayed enlistment

11:06program. Basically they're young Americans that are waiting to come into the Air Force. So we put

11:12them into this thing called the DEP and our DEP numbers are as big as they've been in over a decade.

11:17We do not want to lose momentum there. It's critical to our ability to to execute the national defense

11:22strategy. You're very diplomatic. Yes, sir. All right. I get paid to execute the decisions you make.

11:31Congressman, thanks. Thanks for the question. As I said in my opening comment, unfortunately,

11:35living under a CR is, you know, over 51 percent of the time as a service has been in existence.

11:40We've been under a CR. But specifically to your question in 25, especially when it comes to quality of

11:46life. Like there were improvements that were supposed to be made at the Peterson, one of the Peterson

11:51Child Development Centers, one at Patrick. And in 25, we're looking for money to start design phase.

11:56So put money against that. We're also supposed to start doing design work on dorm improvements at

12:01Buckley Space Force Base. As we're working through the reprogramming for the budget for 25,

12:06you know, these are all things that could be put at risk. And this is why the stability of funding

12:10is so important to the planning phase to execute, especially when it comes to quality of life

12:14initiatives to make sure we stay on time, on target to deliver that quality of life to our service

12:20members. Thank you. With that, I yield back, Mr. Chairman.

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