Milestone Decision Authority News

Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) announced the establishment of the Acquisition and Commonality directorate April 14. The new directorate, led by Rear Adm. Thomas Kearney, focuses on lowering acquisition costs and reducing the number of unique components such as valves in the Navy's ships and systems. It also increases the sea service's ability to incorporate and update new capabilities when considered as part of an item's lifecycle strategy. "This directorate brings together billets and personnel dedicated to moving forward commonality of people, parts and processes through promoting and enabling exchange within government and between government and industry," said Kearney.

On Nov. 6, 2008, Rear Admiral Gary T. Blore, Assistant Commandant for Acquisition & Chief Acquisition Officer, commented on the status of U.S. “On October 28 we posted a fact sheet (updated on November 4) that explained that DHS had rescinded acquisition [milestone] decision authority from the Coast Guard as recommended by the GAO and required in a recent legislation. I want to further explain this issue, as it may not be clear that this basically codified existing acquisition management practices. We are exercising our major* acquisition processes -- appropriately -- the same way we did before, and after, this law. However, since we had previously adopted the guidance as a ‘best practice…