Army Corps Of Engineers To Reorganize
The Army Corps is set for a major reorganization, which its leaders say will ensure the agency runs more like a business. Starting last month, the Army Corps is dividing into eight regional business centers, each pushing nine lines of services ranging from navigation and flood control to recreation and environmental restoration.
Army Corps officials say the reorganization, entitled “USACE 2012” — signifying that it is supposed to remain in effect for the next nine years — will improve its ability to respond to issues that need resolution and expedite reviews and paperwork through the system.
“This is not so much about the Corps as it is about serving our stakeholders, customers, partners and ultimately the American people better,” said Lt. Gen. Robert Flowers, chief of engineers “We have been working toward a regional business approach for a number of years, and this plan will support the regional centers. We have also been concentrating on process improvements over the past few years, and this reorganization will support the changes.”
But a government watchdog groups says the planned reorganization contradicts Bush administration policies, breaks congressional commitments and violates Army guidance that the Corps not become a project promoter.
“This is a misguided vanity project for General Flowers that does nothing to help the Corps’ professional staff do its job,” said Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).
Ruch says Flower’s tenure of under three years as head of the Army Corps has been plagued by continuing scandals, shrinking budgets and growing calls for “Corps reform.” “In many respects, the Corps already acts like a business – Enron,” Ruch said.
According to PEER, the plan violates rules that the Corps be “an honest broker” of projects and not a project booster.
The group says the reorganization eliminates transparency in Corps planning by giving it control of supposedly “independent” peer review, eliminating line-item funding, and giving the agency sole say in determining which projects it wants to construct.
And the plan contradicts the Bush administration’s policy that calls for a greater financial responsibility for local project sponsors, according to PEER. The Corps plan, for example, calls for eliminating local cost sharing in feasibility studies, a move that means an additional $100 million cost to the federal treasury.
“The Corps is supposed to be a public agency, not a business peddling a line of services to corporate customers,” Ruch said. “Cutting through the gung ho gobbledygook encapsulating this plan, the overall tone that comes through is one of supreme arrogance – that the only problems the Corps faces is not enough funding and insufficient power to spend those funds as it sees fit.”
Provided by theEnvironmental News Service.
