Building a U.S. Coast Guard for the 21st Century - Center for ...

But as the Coast Guard began taking over projects and developing its own cost
baselines, the service concluded that the $24.2 billion baseline was far too low
because some assets would probably cost more than originally anticipated. The
service currently anticipates that the program will grow by another $2.7 billion,
but the GAO asserts that as USCG develops more independent baselines for additional
assets, cost and schedule growth is likely to continue. 61
The Coast Guard’s difficulties assuming ICGS’ responsibilities, however, are not
limited to simply determining the cost and schedule of the various acquisition
projects. Since assuming the wide-ranging responsibilities performed by ICGS,
the service has experienced a number of other difficulties that encompass the
entire program’s construction, testing, and management, including managing
requirements, determining how assets will be acquired, defining how assets will be
employed by the service, and exercising technical authority over all asset design
and configuration. 62
Perhaps the most critical deficiency—as the Coast Guard acknowledges—is that
since the service “still faces challenges in hiring and retaining qualified acquisition
personnel, this situation poses a risk to the successful execution of its acquisition
programs.” 63 The Coast Guard maintains that its Acquisitions Directorate billet
structure has increased to over 900, which is more than double what it was in
2007. As recently as last year, however, the Coast Guard’s Acquisitions Directorate
identified in its Human Capital Strategic Plan that it faces significant acquisitions
challenges in regard to:
• Recruiting, developing, and retaining qualified personnel
• Developing human capital information management
• Developing human capital management policy guidance, procedures,
and practices64 DHS, in its oversight role over Coast Guard acquisitions, has taken steps to mitigate
risks involved in the recapitalization program. GAO notes that “DHS issued a
new interim management directive that, if implemented as intended, should help
ensure that the department’s largest acquisitions, including Deepwater, are more
effectively overseen and managed.” 65
One significant step has been DHS’s requirement that the Coast Guard implement
the Major Systems Acquisitions Manual process, or MSAM. The MSAM process
requires the service to first assess the need for an acquisition, then to select the
supplier and to test and evaluate the initial models more rigorously before approv-
33 Center for American Progress | Building a U.S. Coast Guard for the 21st Century