By Cliff Montgomery – May 20th, 2009
A May Government Accountability Office report on Afghanistan reveals that the U.S. emergency responseprogram intended to rebuild the war-torn nation is in trouble, and that urgent action is needed to improve itsbasic oversight and coordination.
The American Spark quotes from the report’s highlights:
“U.S. government agencies, including the Department of Defense (DOD) and the United States Agency forInternational Development (USAID) have spent billions of dollars to develop Afghanistan. From fiscal years 2004to 2008, DOD has reported obligations of about $1 billion for its Commander’s Emergency Response Program(CERP), which enables commanders to respond to urgent humanitarian and reconstruction needs. As trooplevels increase, DOD officials expect the program to expand.
“Although DOD has used CERP to fund projects that it believes significantly benefit the Afghan people, it facessignificant challenges in providing adequate management and oversight because of an insufficient number oftrained personnel. GAO has frequently reported that inadequate numbers of management and oversightpersonnel hinders DOD’s use of contractors in contingency operations.
“GAO’s work also shows that high-performing organizations use data to make informed decisions about currentand future workforce needs. DOD has not conducted an overall workforce assessment to identify how manypersonnel are needed to effectively execute CERP.
“Rather, individual commanders determine how many personnel will manage and execute CERP. Personnel atall levels, including headquarters and unit personnel that GAO interviewed after they returned from Afghanistan orwho were in Afghanistan in November 2008, expressed a need for more personnel to perform CERP programmanagement and oversight functions.
“Due to a lack of personnel, key duties such as performing headquarters staff assistance visits to help unitsimprove contracting procedures and visiting sites to monitor project status and contractor performance wereeither not performed or inconsistently performed. Per DOD policy, DOD personnel should receive timely andeffective training to enable performance to standard during operations.
“However, key CERP personnel at headquarters, units, and provincial reconstruction teams received little or notraining prior to deployment which commanders believed made it more difficult to properly execute and overseethe program.
“Also, most personnel responsible for awarding and overseeing CERP contracts valued at $500,000 or lessreceived little or no training prior to deployment and, once deployed, received a 1-hour briefing, which did notprovide detailed information on the individual’s duties.
“As a result, frequent mistakes occurred, such as the omission of key clauses from contracts, which slowed theproject approval process. As GAO has reported in the past, poorly written contracts and statements of work canincrease DOD’s cost risk and could result in payment for projects that do not meet project goals or objectives.
“While mechanisms exist to facilitate coordination, DOD and USAID lack information that would provide greatervisibility on all U.S. government development projects. DOD and USAID generally coordinate projects at theheadquarters and unit level as well as through military-led provincial reconstruction teams which include USAIDrepresentatives.
“In addition, in November 2008, USAID, DOD and the Department of State began participating in an interagencygroup composed of senior U.S. government civilians and DOD personnel in Afghanistan to enhance planningand coordination of development plans and related projects.
“However, complete project information is lacking, because DOD and USAID use different databases. USAIDhas been tasked to develop a common database and is coordinating with DOD to do so, but development is inthe early stages and goals and milestones have not been established. Without clear goals and milestones, it isunclear how progress will be measured or when it will be completed.
“GAO recommends that DOD evaluate workforce needs, ensure adequate staffing, and establish CERP trainingrequirements, and that DOD and USAID collaborate to create a centralized database of project data, includingmilestones for completion. DOD concurred or partially concurred with GAO’s recommendations, citing recentactions taken. GAO believes its recommendations remain valid.”
