Yesterday, the House of Representatives voted 299-120 to pass the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 (H.R. 4310). The Act defies the President by adding $4 billion to the Administration’s requested budget and reversing…
Category: Budget and Spending
OMB Freezes Inventory Growth
On Friday, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Acting Director, Jeffrey Zients, issued a memorandum effectively freezing the federal inventory of leased space. The memorandum entitled “Promoting Efficient Spending to Support Agency Operations” addressed a wide…
Attack on BRAC
Have we seen the last of BRAC? Although the Defense Department has used the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process five times within the past 15 years, and although President Obama and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta have…
GovSpeak: “Sequestration”
Sequestration—originally a legal term referring to an agent of the court taking valuable property into custody to prevent it from being disposed of or abused before a dispute over its ownership can be resolved—has been adapted…
GovSpeak: “Scoring”
One of the primary issues federal agencies must address when leasing space is budget scoring. “Scoring” (as the term is routinely used in federal leasing) is the process by which the government determines if it is…
DoD is Evaluating Changes to its Facility Security Standards
In written testimony on March 7th before the House, Dr. Dorothy Robyn, Deputy Under Secretary of Defense, Installations and Environment, confirmed that DoD has embarked upon a formal initiative to review the Department’s anti-terrorism/force protection (ATFP)…
Authorization and Appropriation – What’s the Difference?
Each year, the House and Senate authorize each federal agency, department, or program to spend a specific amount of money, and the President signs the bill into law. But this money may not be spent until…
GovSpeak: “Continuing Resolution”
What happens when Congress fails to pass a formal federal appropriations bill, and/or the President fails to sign it into law by October 1st? (We ask “when” rather than “if” because this has happened every year…
Understanding the Federal Budget Process
Surprisingly, the U.S. Constitution makes no provisions for a federal budget and, in fact, the federal government operated without a comprehensive budget process until 1921. The Budget and Accounting Act of 1921, which has been amended…
DCBIA Meeting Review
This morning the District of Columbia Building Industry Association (DCBIA) hosted its seminar entitled “GSA Downsizing – A Perfect Storm Looming”, consisting of a panel of government officials and private sector professionals. We were there and…