Progress Report on Other Procurement Reform Initiatives

We've been discussing the Section 809 Panel and everyone's hope that it brings significant reforms to the acquisition process. Ultimately, many of the recommended reforms are going to require legislative action to implement so this isn't something that will happen overnight. Also, we don't know how many sacred cows that might be sacrificed bringing real reform into the process so we'll just have to wait and see how it all develops.

The Section 809 Panel is not the only organization looking at simplifying the acquisition process however. The Department of Defense (DoD) has begun a review of 716 regulations including 350 acquisition-related rules in compliance with a White House executive order from last February that seeks to reduce the regulatory burden on citizens and businesses (see Executive Order on Enforcing Regulatory Reform).

Concerning the 350 acquisition-related regulations, DoD is implementing a multi-step process to assess the procurement rules and make its recommendations. It is being led by the Defense Federal Acquisition Regulations personnel and includes

1. Historical research an all 350 procurement-related regulations (presumably this is completed).
2. Determining the intended outcome of the regulations - the reasons for issuing them in the first place. The committee might discover that many of these regulations address problems that no longer exist.
3. Consulting with subject matter experts to assess whether a regulation offers benefits to the Department or to the acquisition process. This is intended to answer the question as to whether the regulation is still needed.

The Department expects that any changes will occur in fiscal year 2019 and 2020 since the rule-making process to alter or remove existing rules could take 18 to 24 months. That's a long time. Maybe the committee should recommend, as a first step in the reform process, ways to speed up the rule-making process.