End Game for the $20 Million 'Boondoggle That Won't Die'?
It has been called “the boondoggle that won’t die,” a decades’ old provision within the massive defense appropriations bill that requires a large U.S. Air Force and Army base 4,000 miles away in Germany to heat its facilities with anthracite coal mined in northeast Pennsylvania.
Although the utility at the military base in the small town of Kaiserslauntern in southwest Germany could readily purchase cheaper domestic coal or natural gas to fire its boilers, a legislative mandate dating back to the post-World War II era requires it to use 5,000 to 9,000 tons of Pennsylvania coal shipped overseas. Since 1972 each Department of Defense Appropriations Act has included an earmark requiring the Pentagon to purchase this coal.
Related: The $20 Million Political Boondoggle That Just Won’t Die
Taxpayers for Common Sense and about a half dozen other government watchdog groups have railed against the provision, which costs about $20 million a year, as one of the worst examples of waste in the budget. And late on Wednesday the House was scheduled to consider an amendment to the fiscal 2016 defense appropriations bill to finally knock it out.
Two Californians -- Democratic Rep. Jared Huffman and Republican Rep. Tom McClintock – have co-sponsored an amendment that would finally eliminate the resilient sop to Pennsylvania’s long-withering coal industry.
“It’s about time we stopped burning dirty coal – and taxpayer dollars – to power this military base,” Huffman said in a statement.
Budget ‘Chaos’ Threatens Army Reset: Retired General
One thing is standing in the way of a major ongoing effort to reset the U.S. Army, writes Carter Ham, a retired four-star general who’s now president and CEO of the Association of the U.S. Army, at Defense One. “The problem is the Washington, D.C., budget quagmire.”
The issue is more than just a matter of funding levels. “What hurts more is the erratic, unreliable and downright harmful federal budget process,” which has forced the Army to plan based on stopgap “continuing resolutions” instead of approved budgets for nine straight fiscal years. “A slowdown in combat-related training, production delays in new weapons, and a postponement of increases in Army troop levels are among the immediate impacts of operating under this ill-named continuing resolution. It’s not continuous and it certainly doesn’t display resolve.”
Pentagon Pushes for Faster F-35 Cost Cuts
The Pentagon has taken over cost-cutting efforts for the F-35 program, which has been plagued by years of cost overruns, production delays and technical problems. The Defense Department rejected a cost-saving plan proposed by contractors including principal manufacturer Lockheed Martin as being too slow to produce substantial savings. Instead, it gave Lockheed a $60 million contract “to pursue further efficiency measures, with more oversight of how the money was spent,” The Wall Street Journal’s Doug Cameron reports. F-35 program leaders “say they want more of the cost-saving effort directed at smaller suppliers that haven’t been pressured enough.” The Pentagon plans to cut the price of the F-35A model used by the Air Force from a recent $94.6 million each to around $80 million by 2020. Overall, the price of developing the F-35 has climbed above $400 billion, with the total program cost now projected at $1.53 trillion. (Wall Street Journal, CNBC)
Chart of the Day - October 6, 2017
Financial performance for insurers in the individual Obamacare markets is improving, driven by higher premiums and slower growth in claims. This suggests that the market is stabilizing. (Kaiser Family Foundation)
Quote of the Day - October 5, 2017
"The train's left the station, and if you're a budget hawk, you were left at the station." -- Rep. Mark Sanford, R-S.C.