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Volume I, Issue 3 SMID Newsletter May 2002
Two USACE Districts Wins State Quality Award
Fort Hood Texas Receives Top State
Quality Award
Army Wins Top Honors in 2000 PQA Program
HQDA Announces Army Timeline for 2001 PQA Program
The Army
Performance Improvement Criteria (APIC) 2000 is now available
Total
Army Quality Training Available
Army Materiel Command Unit Recognized for Reinvention Excellence
Army Organizations Compete for the President’s
Quality Award
Two Army Projects Receive Recognition for Technical Innovation
NIST Releases 2001 Baldrige Criteria
Secretary of the Army Productivity Enhancement Program
Secretary of the Army
Recognizes 2000 AIEP Suggesters of the Year
Two USACE District Teams Win Vice President's Hammer Award
U.S.
Army Corps of Engineer Consolidates Reinvention Activities
Events from FY 1999
Events from FY 1998
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U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Rock Island District, wins one of Illinois "2000 Lincoln Awards"
The Lincoln Foundation for Business Excellence was established to help organizations in Illinois prepare for the changes occurring in the world market place. Organizations seeking to improve their results have used the Lincoln Criteria for Performance Excellence.The Lincoln Award criteria provide a model for continuous improvement, along with the Lincoln Award recognition program, to candidate organizations in search of excellence in five sectors: Industry, Service, Health Care, Education, and Government. The continuous improvement model is patterned after the Malcolm Baldrige criteria, adapted for Illinois needs. So long as organizations attain the necessary level of excellence, there is no limit to the number of Awards presented.
Fifteen organizations submitted applications for review and evaluation in 2000. Upon review by the Lincoln Panel of Judges, nine Illinois organizations have received recognition with either The Progress Towards Excellence Award or The Commitment to Excellence Award.
Congratulations to the new District Commander, COL William J. Bayles, the district leadership, and to the district's Strategic Planner, Kelly Gilhooly, for receiving one of "The Commitment to Excellence Awards."
For further information about this award, go to http://www.lfbe.org/.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Nashville District, Wins Tennessee Quality Commitment Award Tennessee Quality announced the selection of Nashville District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, as a winner of the 2000 Tennessee Quality Commitment Award on 29 December 2000. Quality Commitment Award recognition is provided to organizations that have demonstrated, through their commitment and implementation of quality management principles, progress in building sound and notable processes. These organizations have documented a solid approach to system-level quality management and are implementing plans and procedures.
"The search for success in business," said Marie B. Williams, president of the Tennessee Quality program, "has become a search for excellence. The 2000 Tennessee Quality Award (TQA) winners represent the best of Tennessee. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Nashville District, and many other organizations have done a great service to Tennessee by setting high standards for others to follow. They have had the courage to change and the diligence to work," Williams said.
Tennessee Governor Don Sundquist echoed those sentiments. "I applaud the accomplishments of the 2000 Tennessee Quality Award winners," said Sundquist. "These organizations serve to enhance Tennessee's reputation as the 'Quality State.' Tennessee Quality encourages organizations to strive for the highest levels of performance excellence through quality management practices. In today's competitive environment, excellence is a necessity, not an option. This year's winners have taken positive steps to meet this challenge.""We didn’t enter this for the award," said Nashville District Engineer Lieutenant Colonel Pete Taylor, Jr., "but instead to measure ourselves against the criteria, to improve service to our customers, and to hit a level of excellence that met their needs. This recognition demonstrates our commitment to quality and that we’re working hard to get even better."
Fifty-one private and public sector businesses applied for the 2000 Award in the four competition categories. Only one, Eaton Aeroquip Gainesboro, received the prestigious Tennessee Quality Excellence Award.
Under the TQA program, a board of examiners who are experts on quality, representing business, industry, trade and professional organizations assess applicants on seven criteria: leadership, strategic planning, customer and market focus, information and analysis, human resource focus, process management and business results.Award nominees receive site visits from trained members of the board of examiners. Every organization receives a feedback report from its evaluation team using information from its award application and the site visit. This report provides valuable information on the applicant's strengths and opportunities for improvement. Nashville District conducted a gap analysis for its upper management to discuss and prioritize the cited opportunities for action planning.
The Tennessee Quality program is patterned after the Baldrige National Quality Award, recognized as the national standard of excellence for quality and productivity. Unlike the Baldrige Award, the Tennessee Quality program is open to all business and industry as well as governmental agencies and public and private
Fort Hood Texas Receives Top State Quality Award (1 May 2000)
The Quality Texas Foundation has announced that three Texas organizations will be awarded the prestigious Texas Award for Performance Excellence for the year 2000. The organizations are Headquarters, III Corps and Ft. Hood, the Houston Region of Kelly Services, Inc., and the U.S. Bankcard Operation’s unit of the Associates First Capital Corporation.Based on the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award criteria and process, the Texas Award for Performance Excellence is an annual recognition of Texas organizations that excel in performance excellence and application of outstanding management and quality principles. The Award is given to organizations that are role models for quality, customer satisfaction, and performance excellence in Texas.
III Corps and Fort Hood is the first military installation to receive the Texas Award for Performance Excellence. Located 60 miles north of Austin, Fort Hood trains and deploys more than 40,000 soldiers assigned to the two armored divisions at the post, and serves a daily population of 185,000 soldiers, civilian employees, family members, and retirees. Lieutenant General Leon LaPorte serves as the Commanding General of III Corps and Fort Hood.
The Houston Region of Kelly Services, Inc., is a small organization that operates with 57 full-time employees. Kelly Services is known globally for their temporary staffing solutions. This organization, under the leadership of Carleta Sandeen, Regional Vice President, supports over 2,000 customers throughout Houston and the surrounding communities.
U.S. Bankcard Operations, a unit of the Associates First Capital Corporation, is located in Irving, Texas. U.S. Bankcard employs a staff of over 1,200 and offers Visa and Mastercard credit cards to consumers nationwide through Associates National Bank. Don Burman serves as the Executive Vice President and General Manager, overseeing approximately 3.8 million active accounts.
Announcing the awards, Quality Texas Board Chairman Bo McBee commented, "Quality, performance excellence, and continuous improvement, attained through applying the Texas Award principles, can provide tremendous benefits to organizations. The Quality Texas Board congratulates the three recipients for 2000, and looks forward to their joining past recipients as role models in helping to lead Texas to continued economic advantage through quality management, products, services and employees."
The Quality Texas Foundation, a non-profit Texas corporation, administers the Texas Award for Performance Excellence. The Foundation office in Austin coordinates more than 300 volunteers from all areas of industry, government, education and healthcare who work together to assess and promote quality and performance excellence throughout the state. The Foundation is now accepting applications for the year 2001 Award and is also soliciting applications from those who want to serve as Texas Award Examiners.
An Awards Ceremony for the 2000 recipients will be held on June 22, 2000, in Richardson. In addition to the Awards Presentation, the new recipients will participate in a panel discussion on that date to discuss their experiences and best business practices. Other workshops featuring past Award recipients will also be held at the Award event. For information or reservations, contact the Quality Texas Foundation at (512) 477-8137, or visit their web site at www.texas-quality.org.
Army Materiel Command Unit Recognized for Reinvention Excellence (28 Dec 99)
The Army has taken a major step in ensuring that the U.S soldier is equipped with the best possible individual clothing and personal equipment and that the US taxpayers get the best buy for their money in this process. The new U.S. Army Soldier and Biological Chemical Command (SBCCOM) was established on October 1, 1998 for the purpose of consolidating the development, fielding and readiness of all the items that make up the soldier's individual clothing, shelter, field service, air drop and chemical protective equipment. This is a pivotal decision in taking care of soldiers because this group of equipment contains the highly important life support items that significantly enhance the Soldiers' survivability and quality of life in the dangerous operational environments, immature theaters, and harsh climatic geographic areas into which soldiers are deployed such as Somalia, Haiti and Bosnia. This new command combined the resources of the U.S. Army Chemical and Biological Defense Command (CBDCOM) and the U.S. Army Soldier Systems Command (SSCOM). This action was taken based on analysis and studies which indicated that if these items were centrally managed as an integrated system, soldiers would be better served and taxpayers would benefit by reduced operating costs.
The SBCCOM Integrated Materiel Management Center (IMMC) supports the acquisition, storage, distribution and modernization of these equipment items. The SBCCOM IMMC concept of a decentralized virtually organized IMMC is singular within the DoD. It is one organization, which is headquartered at Natick MA with the major commodities managed from three different locations: Natick, MA, Rock Island Arsenal, IL and Philadelphia, PA. By streamlining management to eliminate redundant efforts and applying the latest information technology, this organization has reduced its overhead costs and personnel staffing by over 25%.
This IMMC also provides a major departure from the normal Army measures of performance for materiel management. The traditional model is centered on attaining the goals set within the readiness reporting systems for the high dollar weapon systems such as Helicopters, Missile Systems and Battle Tanks. This new IMMC focuses management attention on the low dollar items that have historically not received the same attention as the high dollar big-ticket items. This new focus on "soldier systems" ensures that a soldier receives the critical items of personal equipment in the fastest possible time.
Establishing the SBCCOM ensures that for the first time, the soldier has a champion for ensuring that the best personal and protective equipment is made available to him. The IMMC also proved that the soldier is best served by a champion in the materiel management arena. Based upon the observed effectiveness of the IMMC organizational structure and the information technology that this team put in place, it is expected that this will become the model organization for logistics excellence within the Department of Defense.
Army Organizations Compete for the President’s Quality Award (21 December 1999)The Office of Personnel Management, administrator of the President's Quality Award (PQA) Program, announced the selection of eight organizations for site visits. Two are Army: The 7th Infantry Division and Fort Carson, Fort Carson, Colorado and the U.S. Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center, Picatinny Arsenal, New Jersey.
Annually, the PQA Program recognizes federal organizations that have improved performance and demonstrated a sustained trend in delivering high quality products and services. The Program was created in 1988 and is the Federal Government's equivalent of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, the highest level of quality recognition for the civilian sector.
In August 1999, the Director of Management (DM), Office of the Chief of Staff, Army, hosted a 47-member Board of Examiners to evaluate 16 applications from Army organizations. Each military service may nominate up to six organizations through the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) for federal government-wide competition. The Army Board of Examiners selected six organizations as the Army's nominations. The DM forwarded the applications through OSD to OPM - the administrator of the PQA program.
An OPM Panel of Examiners reviewed the applications of 18 Federal Government Agencies and selected eight organizations as site visit winners for the next phase of competition. During this site visit phase, OPM examiners review records and interview key personnel to clarify, verify, and supplement information in the award application packages. Examiners will complete site visits by January 31, 2000.
Army organizations winning site visits are the 7th Infantry Division and Fort Carson, CO and the U.S. Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center, Picatinny Arsenal, NJ.
OPM also selected four other Department of Defense (DOD) organizations: Defense Contract Management Command, Santa Ana; Defense Supply Center, Philadelphia; Norfolk Naval Shipyard; and Naval Undersea Warfare Center Division, Keyport, Washington. The Federal Aviation Administration Logistics Center, Oklahoma City, OK and the James A. Haley Veteran's Hospital, Central Florida Health Care System, Tampa, FL complete the field of eight organizations still competing for the year 2000 Presidential Award for Quality.
In the last five years, the Army won the Presidential Award for Quality in three consecutive years. Former Army winners are the U.S. Army Infantry Center and Fort Benning, Georgia (1997); the Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center, Picatinny Arsenal, New Jersey (1996); and the Tank-Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center, Warren, MI (1995).
OPM will announce 2000 PQA awardees in March 2000 and will make presentations in July 2000.
Two Army Projects Receive Recognition for Technical Innovation (10 Dec 99)
Government Executive Magazine sponsors the Government Technology Leadership Award. The awards recognize teams that have made innovative contributions to the use of technology in government. This year, 21 programs were selected from 109 nominations. Two of these winners were Army organizations.
- Tripler Army Medical Center, Hawaii, Internet Tumor Board
After a patient has been diagnosed with breast cancer, hospitals often convene a tumor board, a panel of cancer specialists and general practitioners, to discuss care options and treatment management. But for Tripler Army Medical Center in Hawaii, such consultation wasn't that simple. Tripler is the place service members and their dependents come from far-flung bases in Guam, Japan and Korea when diagnosed with breast cancer.
Because "most [military] facilities don't have cancer specialists, they would just blindly send patients to us," says Mary Nilges, project manager for Tripler's Internet Tumor Board. This meant patients would show up without appointments and would spend months waiting to see a specialist.
Now, Tripler conducts tumor boards on the Internet, effectively making it "a medical center without walls," as Nilges likes to say. The Internet Tumor Board, held every Wednesday using Microsoft Corp.'s NetMeeting software, allows doctors to review digitized radiology pictures mailed to them and type in comments during the session. "It is such a simple idea," says Nilges. "All the doctors need is a PC, a telephone and Internet access."
Over the past two years, the Internet Tumor Board has prevented 19 unnecessary medical evacuations at a cost of about $5,000 each. Tripler has also added a nursing case manager who schedules all appointments with specialists such as surgical and radiological oncologists. This eliminates the long waits for specialists. "Now, the day patients hit the runway they are actually seeing specialists," Nilges says.
Contact: Mary Nilges, Project Manager, (808) 433-1082
Web site: http://www.tamc.amedd.army.mil/U.S. Army Corps of Engineers: 'Meandering Path' Geophysical Explorations Military base closures have left an estimated 15 million acres contaminated with unexploded bombs, artillery shells and other ordnance on land that is now privately owned.
The Army Corps of Engineers is responsible for decontaminating those sites. Some are as small as a dozen acres, but others cover hundreds of acres. Regardless of the size of the property, the danger of searching for hidden ordnance on overgrown and possibly dangerous landscapes always looms large.
In the past, the Corps would deforest an entire site at a cost of up to $2,500 an acre. Engineers used standard surveying techniques, which require a clear line of site. The Corps also used geophysical surveying, sending signals into the ground to investigate its contents.
With advances in Global Positioning System (GPS) technology, the Corps now can send a team out into the woods armed with a GPS receiver and a mobile geophysical surveying unit. The team takes what is called a meandering path through the brush collecting data on the possibilities of buried ordnance. Computers and statistical models tell the engineers how far they have to walk to accurately investigate a given site. After synchronizing the geophysical data with the GPS technology and uploading it to computers, the team can get an idea of where the site is contaminated.
Now teams clear forests only where they are sure of contamination. "We've got sites where we are digging up the most current ordnance the military is shooting," says Roger Young, a senior geologist in the Corps' Huntsville Center. "There are other sites where we are looking for Civil War ordnance and everything in between. At one site at West Point we are looking for Revolutionary War ordnance."
The ordnance just sits there and remains dangerous for long periods of time, Young says.
Contact: Roger Young, Senior Geologist (256) 895-1629
Web site: http://www.usace.army.mil/The winners received their awards at a ceremony during the third annual Government Technology Leadership Institute Meeting held 1-2 December 1999 in Washington, DC.
NIST Releases 2001 Baldrige Criteria (9 Jan 01)
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Dept. of Commerce, has released the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence for the year 2001 (http://www.quality.nist.gov). Among the many changes for 2001, the Organizational Profile replaced the Business Overview, the number of items is reduced from 19 to 18, and the number of Areas to Address increased from 27 to 29.
The Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence provide a systems perspective for understanding performance management. They reflect validated, leading-edge management practices against which an organization can measure itself. With their acceptance nationally and internationally as the model for performance excellence, the Criteria represent a common language for communication among organizations for sharing best practices.
The Criteria are also the basis for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (for private business/industry, health, and education organizations, including Army health and educational institutions) as well as the 2001 Army Performance Improvement Criteria (to be published EOM February 2001) and the 2002 President's Quality Award Program to (be published mid May 2002).
Secretary of the Army Productivity Enhancement Program (10 Nov 99)
On 25 October, the Secretary of the Army approved the concept and initial funding for the establishment of the Secretary of the Army Productivity Enhancement Program (PEP).
This program will provide financial resources to organizations to facilitate implementation of good ideas that will generate a quick return on investment. The program also--
- Provides an additional incentive to organizations for enhancing productivity,
- Invests in the future and quickly (within 3-5 years) garners savings, and
- Builds on demonstrated successful quality and reinvention programs throughout the Army.
In the 1980s, Headquarters, Department of the Army, implemented a similar program called the Productivity Capital Investment Program (PCIP), AR 5-4. It was a decentralized program allocating funds to the major Army commands (MACOMs) and restricting the use of funds only for capital investments. The PCIP funds were linked to Office of the Secretary of Defense's Productivity Investment Funds (PIF). Although AR 5-4 remains in effect, when the Office of the Secretary of Defense stopped programming PIF in 1989, the Army did the same for PCIP.
The Director of Management (DM), Office of the Chief of Staff, Army, as the program's proponent, will design and centrally manage the Secretary of the Army PEP. As soon as the design phase is complete and the Secretary of the Army approves it, we will request MACOMs to forward their projects and ideas for funding.
The funded program will encourage organizations to submit proposals that would yield quick, high returns on investment. After a cost/benefit analysis review, the ideas projecting faster productivity enhancements with higher savings would be recommended for the Secretary of the Army's approval and funding. The DM will track the ideas approved for funding to assess the accuracy and speed of forecasted savings and recommend for appropriate recognition those that exceed expectations.
To request additional information, send email to: leadingchange@hqda.army.mil
Secretary of the Army Recognizes 2000 AIEP Suggesters of the Year (2 Nov 00)
Two individuals were recognized by the Honorable Louis Caldera at the annual Secretary of the Army Awards Ceremony conducted at the Pentagon. Each year the suggestions received through the Army Ideas for Excellence Program (AIEP) are reviewed and the best military and civilian ideas are selected for this special recognition.Suggester of the Year (Civilian)
Mr. Michael J. Wright, CH-47 Systems Engineer, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Research, Development and Engineering Center, Redstone Arsenal, Alabama proposed procuring a piece of equipment to hook up directly to the Aviation Ground Power Unit in order to recycle water and purify the hydraulic fluid. The new system increased reliability and decreased response time of flight controls and extended the life of the hydraulic components.
Suggester of the Year (Military)
Chief Warrant Officer 2 David R. Cassity, Battery Motor Officer/Missile Technician, Army Materiel Command, 2-44th Air Defense, Air Defense Artillery, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) and Fort Campbell, Kentucky recognized an improved procedure impacting today's modern battlefield by utilizing a solid state 12 VDC TO 110 VAC inverter for programming the Stinger Missile IFF codes and charging IFF batteries. The inverter allows the IFF programmer/charger to remain on constantly while the Platoon Sergeant is in motion across the battlefield, significantly improving this war-fighting capability.
Two USACE District Teams Win Vice President's Hammer Award (19 Oct 99)
The National Partnership for Reinventing Government (NPR) has announced the selection of two U.S. Army Corps of Engineer teams as the newest recipients of the Vice President's Hammer Award for Reinvention.
The New England District partnered with state agencies and commercial enterprises to streamline the contracting process and combine two projects in a manner that saved taxpayers $1.5 million.
The Army Corps of Engineers, New England District awarded a dredging contract for deepening Boston Harbor in May 1998 to Great Likes Dredge and Dock Company for a cost of $31.9 million. The contract and the project's permits required that all dredged material unsuitable for offshore disposal in Massachusetts Bay be disposed in cells (rectangular pits) excavated within the harbor. After disposal these cells had to be capped with at least three feet of sand meeting the state's physical and chemical requirements. The total amount of required cap material is about 200,0001 cubic yards. The original plan envisioned that this sand would be purchased and transported from gravel pits through the city to the harbor. Had all the required quantity been obtained in this manner, up to 10,000 trips through the city by dump trucks would have been necessary.
At the same time that the Boston Harbor contract was awarded, another project was already planned by the Corps for dredging various shoaled arm of the Cape Cod Canal. The sand dredged from the Canal was to be disposed of at sea.
Knowledge of this project prompted the idea of combining both projects, in that Great Lakes Dredge and Dock would dredge the Cape Cod Canal at no cost to the Government and use this dredged material as the capping material for the cells at Boston Harbor. This would allow Great Lakes to fulfill the requirements of the Boston Harbor project, while at the same time allowing the Corps of Engineers to save the taxpayers money by not issuing the contract to dredge the Cape Cod Canal with its estimated cost of approximately $1.5 minion.
Sediment samples taken from the Cape Cod Canal confirmed that the material would meet the State's requirements for cap material. However, canceling the plan to contract the Canal dredging, as well as coming up with adequate controls to protect the Government while Great Lakes performed the Canal work required innovative contracting and procedural actions. The Boston Harbor Project Team, consisting of Federal employees, contractor representatives, and state employees, accepted the challenge. Through their persistence, a contractual and procedural process to accomplish the idea was achieved.
All parties involved, including the Massachusetts Port Authority, also worked closely with the Massachusetts (MA) Department of Environmental Protection and the MA Office of Coastal Zone Management, who played key roles in resolving and expediting the permit amendments that were also needed for these changes. Together, the five organizations were able to conduct all the necessary testing and provide the required safeguards that assured the success of this innovative solution to the capping requirement.
The result of their team efforts is a savings to taxpayers of S1.5 million and enhanced environmental benefits though the elimination of trucking of the sand and by using the Canal sand constructively instead of disposing it at sea.
A team of Chicago District engineers solved an environmental impact problem that had halted dredging in the Indiana Harbor and Canal since 1972.
Indiana Harbor and Canal contains about 4.6 million cubic yards of bottom sediments which cause deep draft navigation difficulties and increase the transportation costs of waterborne commerce by about $14.3 million on an average annual basis. In addition, about 200 million pounds of polluted sediments are transported annually by the Canal into Lake Michigan. The harbor has not been dredged since 1972 because the Army Corps of Engineers was unable to find an economically feasible and environmentally acceptable solution to contain the sediments.
The Corps investigated 19 sediment disposal sites, 18 treatment technologies and alternative dredging techniques in an effort to solve the navigation and environmental problems at the harbor. Two recommended plans, one in the mid 1970s and another in the mid 1980s, were dropped from further consideration because of high construction cost, technical and policy issues, or lack of agency and public support.
The current project, approved for construction in February 1999, is the result of a cooperative effort of the Corps Chicago District and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5, to produce an Environmental Impact Statement and Comprehensive Management Plan for dredging and disposal activities at Indiana Harbor and Canal.
The federal team, working with state and local governments and industry, devised a plan for constructing a confined disposal facility on a site with existing contamination in the soil and ground water, the ECI site in East Chicago, Ind., and dredging the entire federal channel to navigation depths. Public and private interests will share the responsibilities for constructing, operating and maintaining the disposal facility, and for dredging the canal.
The environmental advantage of the disposal plan is that it incorporates Resource and Conservation Recovery Act (RCRA) closure and corrective measures for existing contamination at the ECI site into the design of the sediment disposal facility. The economic advantage is that the existing contamination would have to be isolated and contained in compliance with the RCRA at a cost of about $35 million, with or without the disposal facility. Likewise, the cost of using a generic clean upland site for a sediment disposal facility would cost about $66 million, versus the $35 million to construct it at the ECI site.
The environmental advantage of dredging is a reduced amount of polluted sediments, contribution to the improvement of water quality at the south end of Lake Michigan and reducing the stresses on the entire ecosystem. The economic benefits of continued maintenance dredging for commercial navigation exceed $14 million annually.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineer Consolidates Reinvention Activities (1 Oct 99)
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has consolidated four reinvention laboratories. The U.S. Army Engineer Waterways Experiment Station (WES), the U.S. Army Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory (CRREL), the U.S. Army Engineer Construction Engineering Research Laboratory (CERL) and the U.S. Army Engineer Topographic Engineering Center (TEC) became the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC) on 01 October 1999. The new structure will reduce the cost of doing business, improve coordination and teamwork between the technical experts at the four sites and provide easier access and increased responsiveness to customers. The new organization has five major objectives:
- Deliver new technology needed by the Corps to achieve its strategic vision.
- Increase the relevance of the Corps to its customers.
- Increase the focus on priority future operational capabilities of the Army and the nation.
- Comply with the Department of Defense (DoD) and Army Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation (RDTE) Defense Reform Initiatives.
- Sustain world-class research capability in critical mission areas.
The reengineering effort supports current DoD initiatives to reduce costs and increase efficiencies in its research laboratories. These laboratories employ 2,150 people and execute a $450 million annual research and development program that includes combat engineering, infrastructure, and environmental quality under the Corps' military and civil works missions.
In 1998, the Waterways Experiment Station (WES) and Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratories earned the titles of Large and Small Army Research and Development Organizations of the Year respectively. In 1999, the Topographic Engineering Center earned the title Army Research and Development Organization of the Year - Small Category.
The U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center (USAERDC) will develop and implement standard business practices for all of the laboratory sites in 1999. All contracting activities and the personnel who perform them will be reassigned to Vicksburg District by the middle of 1999.
Events from FY
1999
Events from FY 1998
Last revision: 18 Aug 2008