discuss lease issues in issues d government politics and public policy. from washington d.c. and across the country. coming up thursday morning we will discuss the implications of section iii of the 14th amendment of the constitution as the u.s. supreme court reviews former president trump's appeal against the colorado court's decision barring him from the gop primary ballot for legal scholars. see spans "washington journal" join in the conversation life at 7:00 a.m. eastern thursday morning on c-span, c-span now or online at c-span.org. last december the colorado supreme court ruled f president donald trump and el to appear in the states presidential ballot for violation of the u.s. constitution insurrection clause under the 14th amendment. hears oral arguments donaldcourt trump's appeal of that decision. we'll have it live starting a 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. c-span now and

online@c-span.org. ♪ c-span enter unfiltered view of government. we are funded by these television companies and more including comcast. >> are you thinking this is just a committee center? it is way more than that. comcast is part of 1000 committee centers the students are monk and families can get the tools they need to be ready for anything. comcast support c-span as a publicervice along with these other television providers. giving you a front row seat to democracy. now assistant defense secretary for energy installations and environment from army navy and air force to testify on for living conditions. before house armed services subcommittee they share examples of mold and sewage problems and how unsafe living conditions can

impact quality of life. retention and recruitment of service members. >> okay. the subcommittee will come to order i ask unanimous consent i think i will get it. i hope. [laughter] that our chair will be authorized to declare a racist at any time. without objection so ordered. okay we went right down the toilet bowl. [laughter] okay. i think that sets the tone for what we want to talk about. so, welcome everyone without to our first readiness subcommittee hearing of 2024.

hopefully he will be able to join us. we have a new member joining the subcommittee. i look forward to working with him when they free it from their obligations we get everybody over here. if we go forward through this next fiscal year. unfortunately as you can see from these photos today's topic is not a new issue infrastructure across the department and the services continues to age. and the deteriorate conditions at military facilities obviously have brought effects as you all know. the neglect, the disrepair, the

underfunding of our military facilities does not just harm our operational readiness capability. it does have six impacts onsi everything. from a quality of life for our service members to sustainment to their ability to innovate. their ability to do their jobs. i am going to spend another couple of sentencesnc here to underscore the most recent and glaring example of the problem with her aging infrastructure. this report is where we are showing these photos on the conditions of the barracks across the military departments i hope it's been a real wake-up call for our leadership. we just had reports yesterday of aycock gross infestation where we had to move marines out of those barracks and just had breakfast with the assistant

comrade this morning part i can tell you this committee takes these issues incredibly seriously. it is something we should talk about today for the public to hear the leadership takes this seriously and what dhec were going to do about it. i note ranking member and i sent a letter to secretary austin last year stating our bipartisan commitment to conducting oversight and finding solutions to these problems because poorly maintained and neglected barracks -- met common sense would say it aggravates the recruitment and retention crisis that we arere currently experiencing. disrepair at barracks facilities however is only one of the symptoms of the underlying o chronic problem. the facility restatement, modernization budget line, vines

are routinely underfunded in the budget request every year. these budget lines are routinely used as payes force. at budget reprogramming requests. via fy 2024 this subcommittee authorized amounts f srm about the president's request to help mitigate this issue. underfunding for repair and modernization only causes conditions to deteriorate faster causes these conditions to accumulate to where i think we are today. the consequences of that scenario are bleak enough infrastructure issues are prevalent at innovation and testing facilities. we rely on the infrastructure to advance the concepts and capabilities wee need to be able to compete with our adversaries. and we have to be prepared for

these conflicts and national thl facilities are critical to that effort and frankly are often overlooked by the military departments. so thank you for coming today. i think this is a calm conversation or soldiers, or guardians deserve it. in the public deserves to hear. and i hope each of you would be able to speak to how we can work together on solutions for transparency in the use of funds as well as other opportunities to address the aging infrastructure. without i will not recognize first opening remarks. >> mr. chairman, thank you very much. it's exceedingly important i am pleased made this first hearing of this year. well, here we are. here we go again. everything is important except the maintenance of our

facilities. we have been up banging this drum for a long time and will have to continue to do so we have made some progress definitely not where we need to be. we have increased these facilities sustainment, modernization we go about reducing the money throughout the course of the year it subverted to other tasks. i mustth say the problem is not only the department of defense sitting here in congress specifically last year about $13 billion 13 new after 35 wer funded from sf rm funds. we did that. so we set our priorities. the photos we put up on the screen and we could probably fill several books as we look

across the entire military at the barracks and the quality therein. unfortunately barracks is just one part of the problem. so we have kept safe and adequateaf housing we will continue to bang away it's a definite problem. to show a young man or woman we've got wonderful places for you to live. take a look at this. come join the military. not likely to do it. so we have the leverage is mr. chairman he spoke to the laboratory issues and that certainly a major part of the problem. we will not know if the equipment works with the newest idea has merit if we don't have lab is capable of handling and managing the necessary testing

of those ideas and facilities. sofa what are we going to do abt it? well, we did something about it with family housing. we voted to the nda the law of the land the base commanders fitness report will in part be baseded on his or her attentiono family housing. so it is on the checklist. we want to move up the ranks then you are going to have to take care of family housing. it appears maybe this is a lesson some of us learned and our childhood from our parents. you are going to be held responsible for making the bed and if you don't you're going to get in trouble. in this case we ought to add to that the requirement the base commander be held accountable iband responsible for barracks d

if there are testing facilities and other facilities on the base ndin other words the base commander be held responsible for the quality of the maintenance and the efficiency of the facilities themselves. i don't know if it another way to get we could pass laws and do anything. but if you want to move up in the ranks then this is something you have to pay attention to if you are a base commander. or any other specific role type of base. i will let it go at that and ask my statement be entered into the record because it's a wonderfully written by a terrific staff and i have just skimmed over it. without objection. i yield back. >> thank you. i would like to welcome and introduce today's witnesses. each of our witnesses or their

respective departments assistant secretary of defense for energy installation and environments. environment. we have with us again the honorable rachel jacobson the honorable meredith berger and the. mr. owens, let's start with you went over to you if your testimony.y. >> thank you very much chairman. i echo ranking member and pleases the first hearing this subcommittee is having. chairman waltz, ranking member, distinguished norms of the subcommittee, for the opportunity to discuss the defense infrastructure. particularly government owned housing. the investments we are making to improve these critical mission enablers. our installations are the foundation of our national security posture and i look forward to working with this committee in the coming months

to continue realigning our policies and resources to support the national defense and the safety, productivity and quality of life of our personnel. more than 2 million military personnel live, work, train, raise her children, spend time with their families on a 538 installation supported by an extensive bill and natural infrastructure. these places are central to our service members military experience. affecting the physical health, mental health, ability to carry out their mission the overall recruitment and retention of the force. it is therefore both the national security imperative in our moral obligation to ensure our insulations are healthy, functional and resilient. i will the infrastructure we provide our service members housing has a greatest impact on the quality of life. dod has in too many instances failed to live up to our role making sure the housing we provide honors the commitment of the service members and their

families. and enable them to bring the best versions of themselves to their critical missions. these issues were highlighted in the gao report in september 2023 document import living conditions and some of the unaccompanied housing. we appreciate gal's work achieving greater focus on these issues facing our portfolio and acknowledge we have a lot of work to do. we anticipate influencing 28 of the 31 recommendations this year. fy 24 provisions and recommendations in the gao report have been instrumental in shaping the priorities of a tiger team we stood up earlier month for the tiger team will focus on determining new configuration andnd habitability standards improving accessibility, availability, reliability of metrics, developing standardized preventive maintenance plans and schedule and identify opportunities to improve quality of life and resilience. the department also recognizes our service members are impacted by far more than just housing. our entire infrastructure

portfoliort workspaces, schools, commissaries, hospitals, parks, child of omen centers and more should be configured and maintained with an intent to improve quality of life and help our people thrived. over the past five years the department has invested an f average $14.6 billion a year to build new facilities, $15.3 billion to maintain and repair buildings infrastructure and $2 billion a year on environmental restoration conservation efforts. despite this investment a significant gap persists between installation conditions today and the quality standards that are expected, deserve, best support work fighter readiness. not only do it face a growing $134 billion backlog many of our facilities need significant upgrades or outright replacement to meett revolving requirements and preferences this is especially true in areas prone to extreme weather and other hazards. aging and failing facilities are far in a more vulnerable to these threats. we can and must do better.

continued infrastructure failuress or negatively impact the quality of service life of service members. this will in turn affect their ability to carry out their mission and exacerbate recruiting retention readiness challenges the department faces. therefore we must accelerate our investments while ensuring they are properly prioritized to the greatest impact. too that end but working with the military department on three lines of effort to guide our infrastructure. investment. first adopting human requirements that will great environments not just meet sheep military needs and compliant standards but promote purpose, productivity, health, and camaraderie. second optimizing our footprint to ensure the scale and scope of her infrastructure is aligned with the needs of our people and their mission. and third transforming how we manage our portfolio by abducting a management strategy ultimately target investments and have the greatest return ont investment. your continued support and partnership will be critical for our efforts to improve quality of life for our service members, their families and the sibling

workforce we look forward to working with you as we transform the department approach chart infrastructure investment, thank you and other torture questions. >> ms. jacobson for your testimony. >> thank you chairman walt, ranking member and distinguished members of the subcommittee for inviting me here today to talk with you about the army's housing and aging infrastructure. i first want to say our hearts go out to the families of osoldiers who died in jordan. it is a sad and important reminder of why we do what we do. the need for all soldiers to look athe a safe and healthy environment remains of the veryi top of our new senior leader priorities. we recognize the linkage quality of our facilities and the ability to retain a ready force.

with respect to family housing the army has made real progress. tour oversight of housing providers have increased significantly. we are now preparing to institute a standardized quality assurance quality control maintenance program that will be applicable at all insulations. and we are making sure tenants fully understand and takes full advantage of the right congress is givens them. with respect to barracks, armyce shares the concern of congress as reflected in the 2024 and daa that immediate and concrete measures must be taken to address our feeling barracks especially in the wake of the gao report. we welcome the codification of these measures into law and look forward to working with congress and with the office of the secretary of defense to make sure they are meaningfully executable within a realistic timeframe.

in some of the army will make it work. our commitment is evidenced by proposed investment and permanent party barracks which now exceed $1.5 billion per year across the future years defense program. and when adding all barrack types across all components active, guard, reserve at helpers at approximately $2.1 billion a year across the same time frame. the number of factors have contributed to the current situation namely the sheer size of our inventory for growing a backlog of deferred maintenance, the larger deficit and permanent partyer spaces at an effective management practices. we are applying a multipronged strategy to solve this problem. first we will maximize every dollar we spent on barracks. our funding must be focused on bringing as many barracks as possible out of poor and failing

category. we will take full advantage of the new authority that were replaced barracks beyond repair using restoration and odmodernization funding. this approach to inventory capitalization will save time andon money so you can thank congress for that authority. not only the army has already committed to increasing our investment in sustainment. large-scale projects the goal is to bring as many barracks as possible into good condition and keep them there. second, we will build a robust workforce of trained civilian barracks managers. we will no longer ask soldiers to perform these functions as collateral duty. third, we are taking a hard look at changing the way we do business. this includes how we design our barracks, g based on better livg

experiences. to determine whether more soldiers should live off base. it think it's a robust business case analysis of barracks privatization. the army is ready to move forward with the privatized junior enlisted barracks project at fort irwin. that project will go a long way in helping us understand how and wheren privatization danica. current real world conditions as accurately as possible. need to have good visibility with our resources. obviously much work is needed to improve barracks the army has made great strides in understanding the scale of our problem. as well as resourcing needs no sick time to roll up sleeves and fix the problem we look forward to working with congress to make

improve barracks reality. i look forward to your ququestions. >> thank you ms. jacobson. and think if your testimony. >> chairman, ranking member and distinguished members of the subcommittee. thank you for inviting me too come and talk today about her ourhousing and aging infrastructure. the majority of ouror infrastructure whether it barracks,utilities, public shipe not in the shape it should be. as anon institution we have allowed these assets to degrade over time. we have identified and deferred risk and allowed that risk to ao accumulate and compound. we have been paying the bill quality of life and readiness. i am grateful to the sailors and marines who have raise these issuesh with me and with department leadership. to the government accountability office for creating formal reports and recommendations. and to congress for your attention and codifying

requirements. your intent in the end daa languages loud and clear. your goals for our sailors and marines are the ones the department of the navy shares. we have got some efforts underway. we have made meaningful progress and we have got some significant work left to do. today it marks a big step forward for the marine corps the assistant, not directed marine corps wide inspection of barracks and told them to report back. if you're barracks have issues, get out there and own it he says. they are what we are doing across the department of the navy. we are getting out there and we are owning it. i talk about infrastructure in support of critical missions and chairman i heard this in your opening remarks. eight sailor or marine recruited and maintained, healthy, safe,

supported and trained it with the physical space to do the work w of our national defense. will return infinitely more value than the dollars it will cost. but it will cost a lot to get it right. a good maritime fighting force always keeps their eyes on the horizon. they cannot simply accommodate the circumstances we have always known. we must also anticipate the environment and requirements. the department of the navy has advocated for accelerated opportunities that will yield increase quality of life and competitive a advantage. these include using congressional pilot authority for privatized unaccompanied housing into concentration areas. san diego ands, norfolk. we're also running a pathfinder projects on the free wi-fi and barracks ignore folk as we increasingly hear and believe this resource is a fundamental requirement for quality of life and operational success.

we see resilience and efficiency saves dollars that makes sense. and there is a difference between historic and old. at this critical moment and ranking member i heard this and what you were saying it is action by leadership that is paramount. thank you for yours i remain committed to ensuring wee provie the infrastructure to support our sailors, marines, civilians and all of her critical missions. i look forward to our conversation today. thanko you. >> thank you ms. burger. >> chairman at waltz, ranking member and members of the readiness subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to discuss department of the air force housing and infrastructure program. as a former air force operator and pilot i have lived in

military housing to include raising a family during the transition to privatized housing. my services give me first-hand knowledge of how housing can impact the quality of life for personnel and as a concerned parent of air force office candidate i can tell you no issue is more personal to me than this one. i consider it my sacred obligation to ensure our service norms have safe community to livega in. communities for fitting of their service. that is why i welcome feedback in the recent gao report on unaccompanied housing and i take the findings very seriously. the department has committed children with gao to address the issues identified as to installations they visited. as well as the broader feedback in communities across our installation. upon my confirmation in march my first action was to get to her installations and hear directly from service members and servicd families eye to eye. i visited approximately 25

installations conducted over 40 roundtables with our w personne. i personally inspected their homes and storm rooms together direct feedback from her service members my visits include installations thatt have been recently affected by typhoons like in guam or okinawa. others are just now recovering from hurricanes like tyndall air force base. my next action was to get to work for that start with planning the right investment for the future. i would like to extend my gratitude to the members of the subcommittee for your generous support and guidance on this front. pending passage of an appropriation department ise planning its largest storm investment program in over a decade. an estimated 1.1 billion through fy 22 through fy 26. this is simple funding of the previous five years. if appropriated it intends to ninvest in three new dormitories fy 242 fy 28 to address capacity shortfalls and recapitalize facilities. more broadly where planning renovations and restoration of

proximally 60 installations. twenty-three alone and fy 24. storm master plan is critical to this effort in forming investments in places of greatest need for our service members for the department infrastructure council shared by myself provides general officer oversight on everything from investments to implementation of innovative policy initiatives like our storm leadership programs, community partnerships and new privatization models launches into the future. we are pulling out all the stops to address gao findings. we are also accelerating efforts in privatized housing. i can sum up our efforts in three words. oversight, accountability and where appropriate enforcement with the support of congress who does a tenant bill of rights as well as watchlist and performance penalties for companies that don't meet standards. we have hired 218 civilians to a direct oversight including resident advocates, on-base to

represent service members alongside the chain of command. as an example of how serious we take this approach this year the air force held project owners accountable for 58 million in cost to address mold problems in 560 units. more on the way. in 2023 project owners were held accountable for approximately 600 payments to address help and safety issues totaling 16 million in cost. this more work to be done and we recognize that. in fact infrastructure our adversaries have committed using kinetic and non- kinetic means to cripple critical infrastructure. whether for broad vital infrastructure order installations are resilient, survivable and ready to meet the demands of more sophisticated threats. ifif appropriate it will but fy4

funds to task by employing innovative approaches and technologies to build more resiliency. at installations like patrick and vandenberg space force bases partnerships with state and local entities are improving mission capabilities build the spaceport of the future. we are also focused on resiliency and end up pacific. i would like to highlight the installation of a microgrid codeine air force base. during a recent iphone its capabilities ensureyp the base weathered the storm without a single power outage. these critical investments could prove to be the margin of victory in great power competition. a competition which we dare not come in second place. once again, thank you for your support of our airmen and guardians and i look forward to yournd questions.

go ahead and start with some member questions. i want to go back to this issue. look, i understand mr. owens and all of you for the department. we have, by my count 500 installations. 500,000 buildings 9000 unaccompanied housing facilities. we are trying to fund and manage here. the gao visited just 10. i don't even know what they would have seen if they could onto all of them. i don't think anybody on this committee or any of you are expecting our service members to live in the taj mahal, but this is disgusting. this is unsatisfactory. i don't know about in the of you would w want your children and thesee kind of conditions with mold, withh vcs, with the broken

sewage lines? i wouldn't. do you think anyone who's in these facilities. again thiss is a small, small sample of what we are managing their telling their high school buddy oror their cousin or whomever this is the service you've got to join. i can tell you as a veteran and i could speak for most members in all of us here you are overseas, you are deployed, you come back home you want a wash machine and a dryer that works. you want a decent facility to go back to you. i cannot even imagine what this is doing to unit morale. so this is just a couple of questions. number one and i'll start with you mr. owen just looking across the department, who was fired? who is held accountable. several of you put accountability is a key part of your testimony. whoat was fired to question what basic commander what facility manager, what overseer from oversight?

was anyone relieved or fired because of this? >> chairman i am not aware of anyone who was. >> do you find that acceptable? a hallmark of military leadership of any leadership is accountability and consequences when you fall short. much less having our soldiers, sailors and service members living in this. >> yes i agree with a that. i think the strategy were putting in place the accountability you placed on us as leaders. >> but no one from the secretary down to your level, down to the services, down to the base commander, nobody has actually been held accountable, correct? no one has actually been relieved? or fired? >> not that i'm aware. >> i would submit to you that

may be a critical part of the problem. that sons assemble and this is unacceptable. we received fy 25 budget request details. or when we received an excuse me i know they are forthcoming. but i think given the situation, you all agree we are in, can we expect to see fsr m budget lines funded to one 100% of the requirement? >> across the department but obviously done the services can we expect to see that or not? a quick yes or no. >> for the army with respect to barracks yes. >> fsr m across. it's one thing if you are in a clean and safee environment we are living but you have to go to work. >> of course, ofwo course. >> across the board fsr m yes or no? one 100%? >> we are still work out the budget for fy 25 and not yet

determined the percentages for all the other facilities. right now barracks are our priority because of the an immediate need. >> i will say we are still in final that making sure everything is executable x absolutely. >> will pull the thread on that in a minute on the executable piece. >> yes as we go to the details but we understand mission requirements is something we are focused on an air force. a special great power competition. so the answer is yes. however tough choices are driving is that in that direction and funding is becoming a critical resource. when we need to stay in touch of so yes. >> this sounds like it feels like groundhog's day. >> we have a lot of members with a lot of questions. so i will not be as my time here. one of the issues highlighted in this report is a lack of

visibility into how funds are allocated once he gets down to the installation. so, just for the sake of time, across the department mr. owens, how are we going to do effect? do you agree it's a concern and how are going to address the issue? >> i do agree it's a concern and thank you for the question predicates of the things we are implementing with fy 24 funding when that is available is the management system which is an asset level rather than a portfolio level evaluation which gives us the ability work with the comptroller to understand the ramifications of decisions that get made when fsr and mones reprogrammed. so right now we have an understanding of that macrolevel problem at the portfolio level. you don't really understand these barracks pictures really highlight the ramifications of

the unknown risk that's taking when you de- prioritize specific investments in specific facilities. the sustainment managementag system or work with military apartments to deploy is going to give us the ability to look at an asset level, understand the long-term prognosis for that is an better account for any risk that we are taking when and if we reprioritize funding away from that. this type of situation you pointed to hear it is easier to see at a more granular level it is much more obscure which is where we are now but we look at replacement value for the entire portfolio. >> okay. i would ask you to seriously think about one concept. i would like to get the department of defense, as we have done with housing, to the extent absently possible out of

the hotel management business. we have private sector entities that do incredibly well at scale all over the world. they would certainly go out of business in the second if any of their facilities look like this. so when i am talking to the assistant commandant of the marine corps and he iss trying o figure how to get his marines betterer trained to oversee hvac systems i want those marines better trained to do bad things to bad people and not managing buildings. we have entities in the united states of america that can do this incredibly well i think we have broken -- i figured a lot of things out on the housing side. and i would ask you to come back and see the ranking member and i on how we are thinking there are pilot programs out there. but enhancing our public-private partnerships in the barracks and other spaces. that makes common sense.

thank you ranking member. >> think you mr. chairman. well said, well put, good questions all the way around. i was sitting here almost laughing out loud when you asked the question will they fully fund? history is usually informative for the future. each of you testified that needs are exceptionally larger than the annual appropriations and request foror appropriations. so you all nicely dance to the question but the reality is no you will not be requesting full funding to meet all of the base requirements.. but you are going to the best you can and we appreciate that. a couple of things very quickly on the housing side of it.

the chairman ended his comments looking at theat privatization f the barracks issue. this is an issue we need to tae up mr. chairman because we can make it happen. right now there's limitations on what each of the departments can do. we need to tell them to get on with it in the next nda. give them the authority to do so. and along the way we should require they pay careful attention to well the i problems created and the family housing over the previous 30 years and to avoid those and hire some really good real estate lawyers were going to be up against some really good real estate lawyers who managed to screw the government in the previous 30 years on t family housing. that something we canhe do here and we can see to that. going to move off in a different direction. let's talk about progress or lack there of.

around maritime facilities. so if you would miss berger? >> wranking member, yes we are undertaking once-in-a-lifetime recapitalization we intend to make not once-in-a-lifetime again. this is a place where some of our most mission-critical infrastructure has hit the nearest century market we are seeing the impact all around is to be reoriented and look forward we are looking towards how we put that dollar down to makeco it count. among the four shipyards we are takingng lessons we learn applyg them forward both through the management of the co bases but lessons going for it also looking at requirements and anticipating the environment we are operating in and aligning so we can be more predictable and

what's a very costly but critical endeavor. >> thank you. bring it to your attention bring it to the committee's attention we have dealt with this over the last decade. we are talking multi billion mun dollars to upgrade the shipyards. labs for each and every one of you let's talk about your laboratories you are operating. why don't you give us the overview on the labs, the test s facilities the fact their antiquated, insufficient and in many cases ill maintained. >> thank you for the question ranking member. i think the lab facilities are a microcosm in many ways with the situation we find ourselves in with barracks. having dilapidated or underfunded facilities makes it difficult to recruit and maintain the best talent to do these missions and conduct theti research. we are committing to work with

ourit team, our partners to help them utilize 2805 authorities that have been given to us by this committee and help them prioritize and see the readiness challenge and the long-term challenge associated with these facilities. >> okay this went down the line. on your labs, under testing facilities. what do you ha need? one of thewh shortfalls? >> thank you. for theor army i'll start labs. we have world-class labs that we need to keep them that way we have to make sure we are always applying cutting edge technology and how our labs are operated and the facilities themselves we appreciate the authorities congress has given us. last of the army invested two and $37 million in labs. in almost half are directed to infrastructure projects because we it's critically important. with respect to organic industrial base as i'm sure you

are interested in knowing about we are undergoing an enterprisewide modernization between all of our sites. it's going in phases this is a very large undertaking. not just modernizing our facilities but our manufacturing processes in our workforce. we are accelerating production of critical ammunition asit wel. >> we could probably will spend several hours appearing going in depth on missions or the lack there of. i will let it go at that. >> were definitely going to have think about that. quickly on the labs all the way down. go ahead. labs, testing facilities for. >> very quickly create grateful and will work with osb to make sure we contribute to that way

forward. specifically cap increased our funding from two -- 4% in and reserves to have more of that to be invested in the infrastructure. and we will take advantage of opportunities but we do suffer and impact of another events suchth as the earthquake to make sure we are strengthening what we are building back up. >> three areas i want to touch upon. one air force base were redoing a tremendous amount of drone work to keep this on the leading edge. i look at those facilities they need updated would they get funded by rdt dollars. we look forward to supporting that with you. the other two points i want to f bring up at edwards air force base siteec where i recently visited their doing innovative things. one on transportable hangers there's a lot of test growth going on coming up over the next 10 years.

repeating that metric and gettingtransportable hangers usr m. it has been critical to that through dollars and these are classified facilities as well that can meet our needs. we are looking to innovate. these are fantastic facilities the third is a recent update i received the rocket lab. we are going to look at corrosion at high pressure vessels that are at that facility that have integrated over the past years. were looking into public/private partnerships suit we can do the space community. to upgrade those facilities. new ways of solving these problems something will be focused on going forward. >> one final question mr. chairman if irm might. when you arees the critical airbases we have just travis air force base a gateway to the

pacific. it is endangered by aan group of investors that want to build the new city in the open land to the east of the base. if that initiative succeeds the base will be seriously impacted by a former thousand person facility right up to the edge of the base. your attention to that would be appreciated and of the base commander is concerned i am concerned. your attention to it in the air force continued effort to find out where the $800 million came from to buy 50000 acres of land surrounding the base. so if you pay attention to that and with that i yield back. >> thank you. five minutes of questions. >> thank you chairman and ranking member. thank you's welts or witnesses for testifying and being here today.

as we have heard already here today the they're critical to the national security of our great country. the installations of the are the facilities in which we f project power. american strength can reach into all geographic regions in theaters of operations throughout the world. just import the subcommittee must work to ensure our military families have quality homes source service members are free to focus on execution of their lawful duties at mr. chairman to your point maybe not as focused on fixing the hvac systems. with the strategic importance of these issues clearly established i want to assure weth are concerned the whole ofe the military. it appears most of the statements presented are primarily focused on active foce components of our military. as a proud member serving southern minnesota with the strong heritage and folks that have served in our nationall guard it's important to talk about the totality of our

military this ishi important ina significant portion resides in that reserve and national guardp component. too often guard reserve equities are considered after the fact this is a detrimental impact on readiness. it is, straightforward. we'll start with mr. owens in safe and get an answer there. the national guard armory in training installations primarily utilized by the guard and reserve are they being properly considered in infrastructure investments? and if so how? thank you for the question. in terms w of a me by properly considered in relation with the rest of the things rupert already about the housing. just give me a flavor of what's being considered how are we looking at the guard, the reserve and specifically armories in regard to the aging

infrastructure needs that we have up there. >> said be more comfortable with my service member colleagues for. >> congressman the guard and the reserve a huge component of what were doing not just on a barracks and facilities but also on way of life we want to make sure we maintain the incredibly important force. a good portion of our funding will go to garden reserves. i personallyrs engage on projecs as not working very closely with the team in massachusetts. we are keenly aware meet very want much want to make should have the best of the best. >> using the same

infrastructure. as well as considering it's certainly integrated because of how integral it is to our training and all of the other elements we've talked about in regards to readiness for the reserves. >> thank you for that y comment and the question. i am heartened to hear your words on this topic. the international guard based in minneapolis is a place i learned aboutxc airpower it excited me about pursuing my career in the air force. congratulations on receiving the aircraft two. i have been extremely connected to the minnesota guard and all they do for the nation. on your question i just returned from attending northern edge which is a large exercise that is conducting extremely important multi- domain training.

we just broke ground is a common hanger and innovation made by the guard itself understanding of the guard addresses infrastructure is the active duty can learn from. i willct stay engaged on that subject particularly with infrastructure. you have my commitment i will continue in that journey. >> thank you. i will close with this. the piece that resignations with me is accountability. after you have the opportunity to show us a few of these pictures andhe having the honoro travel around the country and see some of these facilities we can do better. we must do better sought a partisan issue it's an american issue. we owe it to our servicemen and

women to do better. >> absolutely and thank you for that. i agree i cannot a man imagine a hotel manager or resort manager who would not have lost her job with osha or anybody elser inspected and found this kind of conditions. so with that let's go to the great state of hawaii. >> thank you mr. chair. two basic questions one local onene global. this is about the navy water system in hawaii and while this is happening inai hawaii given e facilities it's likely happening across the country. this burger i am concerned about renewed complaints and reports of the navy water system on a walkover invisible sheens of odors, chemical taste in the drinking water, their tap waterr corn to the state department of health we receive rest roughly 50 complaints about tapwater air quality from navy water systems users and unfortunately we've

had similar reports of this last fall we tested water samples had a handful of trace amounts of diesel in their drinking water. by the chemical signatures do not correspond of the jet fuel that was stored at red hill where we have 19000 gallons emptied into our drinking water system impacting service members, their families and civilians it is disturbing we are talking about chemical traces in a drinking water. the bigger question comes about where is it possible contamination even comingg from? the public deserves to know part of our service members and their families deserve to know that their water is safe and clean to drink the navy has a public health responsibility to urgently get to the bottom of this and make sure people know the water that they drink, that they get to the families is safe. what is the navy doing to identify the causes behind these alarming, alarming reoccurring water quality issues and to have a timeline for when we can expect some real answers?

more importantly what have we done to inspect and harden our aging infrastructure that likely has led to these leaks? >> congresswoman, we are concerned too. any time that we hear there is a report of something wrong, especially when it comes to water we are taking action and responding. so first i will type out what the navy is doing since we heard these reports the department has identified for everybody we can directly respond to individually we respond to the home or location identified. have gathered information from the reporting into the family. we havewe provided bottled water and we have done testing to ascertain what's in the water. every vacation is a below the

260 level of tph which the department of level and epa have identified for safe drinking water standards. but there is something wrong and to report that they're having impact. the navy has put together a team of scientific and communication experts so not only can we get the science research but we also make sure we are sharing the information with people as the department of health and environmental protection agency and navy have set up a team to look at the data gathered and analyzed to make sure we are understanding with the source potentialal impacts over the course of time and it aggregation can mean. we did not have all that information yet but in the interim as we get information share of people what we are doing we are posting on our website. we have phone numbers were wherepeople can call and gain

information if they are interested. >> i appreciate that. unfortunately very little time. but i went to harper what you just said we do not actually know what the impacts are of extended exposure to petroleum in our drinking water and or cooking, water and our bathing water. we do not know whatin exposure o lower levels in our drinking water something we do not expect to find but we pick up our water to drink or give to our child. what that could mean to both service members and their families to civilians being the exposed to the water systems leakages and whatnot so that is a big concern but i want to make sure we are consistent and the treatment of residents we have found publicly it was reported resonance was told was a military was on the navy water light delight denied monitoring by the navy's reverse course a few weeks later. again eroding the trust and confidence at the end of the day the navy hasle people's best interest in mind both service

members and civilians i would actually charge whether the pictures we have seen are the water our constituents are forced to drink, challenge you to live in some of these homes and drink the water, get them to your children and your families and ask yourself, do you feel safe knowing it's below the 266 level. at the end of the death is a sheen on your water and the smell coming from it, would you pick up that glass and drink it? similarly would you live in the housing structures that are service members, their family never summing forced to live in domestically and overseas? mr. chair elect entry to record some questions about or oversee installation on the state of these facilities there but we are doing to make sure we had quality of life, safety and health for service members as well as to be respectful. >> of that objection per. >> thank youit mr. chair. >> thank you. into ms. higgins who has been a real leader in champion with the quality of life both are service

members or. >> thank you mr. chair thank you to everyone who came today to testify before our panel per it's been a great privilege as to the quality of life task force. just to hear time after time about what her service members need and paying compensation housing as number two though, childcare, healthcare this lot of room for improvement. i am just thankful to have your ear into hear your passion i know that you prioritize it just like we do pressure having children who served so just thinking of them at every term and everything we do. i want to speak and take a minute to advocate as well. and i note we would just touch on that. they looked right at us and said in 10 years we can't do the mission we need to do if we don't put some time and money into our infrastructure. i was at that marine air course

and i know what's going on is that staying isn't moving? the marines there are still there there still 67 miles awayy from china we have to continue osto focus on housing info asstructure issues it will have people like us that represent that come here and can speak about what those bases need. be pleased the voices for them. i represent virginia beach. and it is pathetic. i get frustrated, angry every time. i was say i'm their worst secret shopper as that navy shopper i try front of the commissary a look at the housing every time i go at makes me madder every time i go for it there's a lot of room for improvement. and i know youou show this concerns. i want to take a minute and talk about something positive. i know such a burger and i've worked together many times. she has come to my district and thank you so much for your advocacy. one of things i talked about the first time when we had one is

readiness committees paying for wi-fi that connectivity piece is so important as a nurse practitioner and health care healthcareprovider been focus os well. alone, making sure our junior servicemen and women have access to wi-fi. the fact we are charging them and move them to crappy barracks and charge them for wi-fi was up was one of the most frustrating things i think i address or do this job. i wanted to applaud you and say kudos, thank you so much for the pilot program for the navy about giving our servicemen and women access to free wi-fi. could you please speak about how you did that? i know you have come up with some creative ways for funding and really thinking outside the box which is what we need to do right now.

t about the mh ei process over the last five years or certainly a piece of that. it is a critical aspect of these challenges. >> thank. very important. my time has expired. i yield back. >> thank you. ms. escobar from texas. >> thank you, mr. chairman and ranking member ands many thanks to our witnesses. it is wonderful to see you again you have been really wonderful to the military installation that i have the incredible -- the second largest military installation for our nation. it is great to see you.

thank you all very much for your service and what you are working on. sharing all the same concerns that my colleagues deal. this felt like a chronic issue. it obviously did not happen overnight. it has been something that has been chronic for a long time. i have a couple of questions tjust given what i have heard over my years in congress. are there any specific programs or initiatives aimed at feedback and concerns from service members regarding housing conditions. when i have had quality of life roundtables i guess we will

start with you mr. owen. thoughts on how those concerns are fielded and how we act on them. >> thank you for the question. in terms of the way we are trying to get after this, i want to thank the members here and congress in general. it enables us to do more of that in requires us to do more of that. are we sitting in the pentagon spending time on issues that will not resonate or not fix the problems that our service members are having right now. we do have periodic check ins, monthly check ins with my assistant secretary counterparts we have check ins with my counterparts to make sure we are increasing the level in the amount of feedback we are getting geared and we are relying on surveys that are going out periodically.

but i think we can do better. we can utilize the strategies that are not reliant on proactive response tos a series of questions about what matters to you today. the army did a survey and i think a lot of the information -- i don't think it is the most direct way to take the polls of the unemployment right now and we are exploring variousie different technologies and strategies that will be able to help shorten that cycle time and really be on top of these issues tiproactively rather than lettig us come up in assess and be statistically parsed and sliced ande diced and make action that takes longer. we are trying to get after this in multiple different ways. >> thank you. miss jacobson.

>> wonderful to see you again. such a pleasure to work with you on all matters. we did conduct a survey. it was referenced in the report. aside from the multiple-choice questions and so forth, we have the comments and reading those comments was eye-opening. we read them across the board. the other thing we have done is we have recently convened a barracks summit. while it did involve soldiers directly, some of the primary members of the command sergeant major's. we have them to reach in and get input from the soldiers so that we could give the soldiers a better living experience. not just on the surface but what will make the lives better in all of us to a person when we visit any installation. we ask the questions. we look at ascertaining how we can help them.

>> inem addition we include technology so that we can actually register an account for a timestamp affiliated aside from the initiative that i mentioned earlier where there will be a wall-to-wall investigation which will involve conversation with results which will help us to make informed decisions. >> thank you soio much. i am out of time. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> really been a tremendous add to this committee and given his unique and critical needs. >> thank you, mr. chairman. ranking member. thank you for coming to my office the other day. i appreciate our conversation. i appreciate you coming often to guam as well.

it is really well received. i know we have a critical mission for the united states to move forward. in our indo pay common area. voting is going well. of course there is a critical for housing already. and our concern of course is relying heavily on the housing market to satisfy what we need to get going to provide for our families, military families as well. ultimately, a big surprise for our community. so, give us your perspective on the h portion of how things that will be needed outside as well veand what is the consideration that you are looking out for the local residents on the housing market for the residents of guam

we have a chance to visit guam. really the ultimate defense in a lot of ways there is such interdependence on the ecosystem. the marine corps, as they are moving forward, are not taking that lightly. moving along, but there is also the community element. the marine corps and navy is going through and making sure we do a housing assessment out on the market that will be complet. the work is ongoing as we speak. i will be able to give you what that impactnt looks like. we are taking into account what that looks like in terms of requirements in terms of being

able to build if there is a need to build the environmental considerations as we think about any sort of permitting or other places. really, that holistic look at what the impact is. i will come back to you when it is complete this spring and we are doing it with the cognizance of the perspective that you have provided. thankk you, sir. >> thank you very much. mr. owens. of course we are faced with many storms. we recentlyy had that typhoon. we are still recovering from that as well. it had an impact on the construction that we desperately need to get going. the housing that we need there as well. we have written to secretary austin requesting the clear constructionub strategy to be developed and submitted to congress. we have not heard feedback from that yet. it is concerning for us and especially now with the 25

budget. when will the department be providing a response on how well the budget request accounts for typhoon damage. >> thank you for the question, representative. i appreciate these folks. i wantal to start by saying thak you to all the work that went into to make sure the extension was in fy 24 nda. we understand that before we can program all of that, the workforce has to be available. we have to be putting that to good use. i will have to get back to you on the schedule. over the course of the last several months, we have stood up a series of governance structures puttingep the navy as this whole point of accountability for all the issues that are being dealt with to make sure that we are prioritizing, first of all, cataloging, prioritizing and

sequencing the work that needs to happen. in terms of the work that our team has been doing, our infrastructure counsel under our office currently at the tail end of filling out the entirety of what the full need of all of the different initiatives that need to happen there look like weird we are feeding that up strategic oversight council for digestion and prioritization outva of that comes a plan. >> the critical timing. just one final question for you. just a few seconds. it is so important for us. the cost of living is extremely high. everything is shipped in. how it was measured. we really need that back. can you bring it back for us? >> i would be happy to work with our partners too work on that issue. >> thank you very much.

thank you to the panel. >> thank you mr. marlin. over to mr. davis from the great state of north carolina, the state that i feel like i have literally walked with a very heavy rock sack in training. over to you, mr. davis. >> thank you. to the ranking member. to all the guests who have witnesses here today. thank you for taking the time to join us and provide us these important updates as it pertains to the state of our installation infrastructure. i want to travel back to north carolina, if i may to seymour johnson air force base. on the terms of basis in terms of health risk, one of the things that stood out to me when i visited the air force base was a deteriorating and particularly

physical fitness center. for the fitness center itself to pose a risk, potentially to members, what steps are we finding to try to address, and particularly, unhygienic and aging physical fitness and equipment infrastructure that puts military personnel families at risk. >> representative, i understand that that question is for me. >> yes.es yes. >> absolutely. thank you for the question. safety is a number one priority for men and women in uniform. addressing safety concerns on

the spot is the responsibility of the installation commander. i will take a note of that. i am not aware of a safety issue i will make sure that i take that baton and look into it for you. if it's okay, i will get back to you on the details on that. if it is an infrastructure issue itself, we will take a look at it as a facility. we have a number of models just get it available. in our portfolio, we have opportunities to realize the savings and give those savings back toni the unit itself. this could be a candidate for that opportunity, but if you

what i'd like to take that back and focus on the fitness center at seymour johnson and give you well-groomed land to move forward with it. >> absolutely. one more follow-up here in particular. going to the child development center because part of the roof was falling apart. while i was there, i know this could not have been planned well nda 4-year-old child comes up to the window and waved at me with the biggest smile. when i think about child development centers, how are we prioritizing them tried to get through this process. realizing challenges thatt are pose so many military families. >> thank you for that,

representative davis. it needs to be addressed that day. we cannot wrestle with any sort of ambiguity with that issue. i will check back with the cdc has well and make sure that we are addressing it. embarking to the 1.1 billion dormitory investments. another 600,000 in 19 cdc. if appropriated to move forward with a large program to upgrade our cdc's. anything from renovation to building all new ones. we will aggressively get up this particular problem. i can get back to you on what the plansdc are and i will take that back, if that is okay with you. the department is committed to

broadening our investment going forward. >> i do understand the challenges and look to connecting again. thank you for your continued service. >> thank you, mr. davis. yoi will thank each of you for your service. i have a special appreciation. to me, military service is very uplifting. we out for sunset served in iraq and afghanistan. over and over again we see the positive side. in particular my navy doctor son served in naples, italy. we now have three grandchildren that speak italian. i just want to again say thank you for what is being done. we still have some trails that we need to come and bring his --

representingng nearby the proverbial question is always a delay in having. what isan a department doing to ensure the maintenance request or responded to mr. secretary owens in regards to timing. >> thank you for the question. i think i will start by pointing to the work that we are eager to get out there. it gives us the ability to have asset level assessments so that we can understand the ramificationsel of delay better than we can right now. at a portfolio level, like i said earlier, we understand the macrolevel challenge and the money problem, but, to the specific example that the

representative gave about a failing roof in the cdc, i agree it is not a thing that we can let sit for even a couple of hours. the asset management approach will give us the ability to rack and stack these issues in a more deliberate and responsive way. >> the health and safety. we really i appreciate expeditig in every way. additionally, secretary jacobson , reliable energy is a critical asset. in your statement, you mentioned the armyiv is working to increae housing sustainability and reduce energy consumption. what has a department done to consider other energy sources, i am particularly interested in these actors. you would have energy security. you would have reliability. i would g list 100 things.

a great thing i can see it. it is so helpful in the territory of guam. when i think about how beautiful that territory is we have discussed this indeed. the beautiful beaches of guam hawaii and we need to have energy security. security for military installation. it is previously representing parris island. what are the efforts being made to multiple energy sources. >> congressman, thank you very much for that question. it is an important one. exploring nuclear energy. i have stood up a multidisciplinary working group so that we can be prepared. leadership approval to move forward with exploring a request

forpr proposal. i know that they are little bit ahead of us to have a small module reactor. we are not quite there yet. looking at every single issue. what are the needs. what are the state and local politics surrounding it. we, too agree that our energy future must include nuclear energy. >> i was really grateful last night to meet with -- they are taking a lead. the country of romania. such an opportunity. it could be so beneficial for military installations for energy and independence and security. having to be secure, too. all of that is in place. the small actors, to me, would be an ideal way of addressing

because i am very, very concerned. with the number of terrorist that come into our country across the border. so that as the fbi has said an attack isk imminent, we would have energy security. with that, i yield back. >> thank you, mr. wilson. for five minutes, questions. >> thank you,, mr. chairman. i want to thank the panel for being here today to answer questions. in 2021, it was after covid and one of the things that we looked at when we were at fort hood was the livingti conditions. we had some good off the record conversations and one of the areas that they pointed out was how challenging it can be.

particularly raising ail family for child care needs and things like that. they just do not have adequate housing supply that is nearby. that puts a lot of pressure on them to perform where they need to. talking about the aging housing issue and how we can get those. continuing to talkus about the rise in prices for military families. we have a leading -- letter last year. allowing families to buy groceries and other household goods because in addition to housing, those things around food around shelter, around childcare, they all tie into the importance of housing, to. i just really want to urge you to look into those places and how those complement housing.

in light of today's military recruitment challenges, we know all of those things have to be addressed. we have seen the photos where people have depicted subpar living conditions in barracks. they will tell you that a lot of the housing is older. it needsr to be updated. not just because it's old, but because of safety reasons as well. anybody can answer this. has your organization taken any steps toub proactively manage ad mitigate the public perception around these challenges, particularly when a lot of the recruits, potential recruits have heard a lot of the stories. >> i will takes a first step and ask my counterparts to jump in. i want to thank them for the work they have been doing on the

quality of life and all. in response to a lot of the concerns that i think you just expressed. that has created a companion effort within dod. it is being led by our legislative affairs team and it includes personal readiness. acquisitions and sustainment. we have a regular set of meetings where we are focused at looking at the total quality of service that we are providing across all of our departments. we are incorporating any of those things that we learned as part of that quality of life engagement that we have had with the subcommittee into the tiger team that we stand it up with. getting after those issues, addressing them head on is something that i think we can do better at. when we are fixing the problem we are highlighting the places where quality of service is something we can be proud of. i think the navy is prioritized

in san diego being a great example. holding up and saying this is where i think we are headed. >> with respect to family housing, the army has been very much outfront and letting those companies know that if they are not fulfilling their obligation, we will help them in default of their leases. we hold their incentive payments until we get there. issuing notices where circumstances require the conditions being unacceptable. with respect to barracks unfolding a huge program to get our barracks, as many as possible into good quality to take them out of the so-called bad quality scale into good quality and keep them there. we will make sure that our dollars are invested wisely so

our soldiers have good living experiences. >> let me just sayat this in closing. in addition to the housing, the aging infrastructure as it relates to housing and i've talked about some of the other as well, please look at gas prices, particularly for military personnel on the west coast. even if you receive a bump, once you get there, five, $6 a gallon like it was in some circumstances, it just eats it up. i have a family that lives in my district that was stationed out at edwards air force base. talking about how people had to live in rvs. they still could not afford to have housinger around there. thank you. >> thank you. we are about to have boats.

they follow along question and then a request. we had conversations last year and also with the service secretaries about if we look at resiliency'sook at on our bases, getting chinese made infrastructure out of our supply chain. i know that that is a complicatedd issue. i fully recognize that. we cannot have year after year administration after s administration citing our number one adversary which is openly talking about replacing the united states and the decline as a global hedge a decline of democracy, the decline of western values, the rhetoric that we are seeing coming from the chairman, the ccp and create dependency in our infrastructure on the chinese communist party.

can you each talk to me about what you are doing? i asked for specifics.an last year it was we understand it's an issue. we are looking at the issue. i get it. what are we doing? in line with the language and if you disagree with the need to have domestically produced energy supplies, even if they are backup supplies, let me know we can have that conversation off-line. i will just start from a departmentwide, mr. owens. >> thank you, chairman. i wish we had more than five minutes toit talk about this ise you are right how critical it is to our security. from the standpoint of the way that we are partnering we have partnerships with ouric industrl base policy counterparts that are focused on battery supply chains looking at part of their

industrial base strategy that they just released earlier. they were focused on that. the work that the rest of government is doing on the federal consortium and on shoring capacities for those batteriesuc is something that we are very engaged in. i would say the reason we are so directly engaged, this is not a problem for tomorrow as we build out the new energy infrastructure. it is a problem today for hundreds if not thousands of systems that rely on batteries that have secure supply chains. one specific example i can give you is the enforcement of buy american provisions and a purchase agreement that we just concluded with duke energy, that type of thing that we can be able to guide dod dollars in the direction of u.s. manufacturing

and something that increases the demand signal for the market. but also make sure that we are, you know, sending the larger the rest of the nation that we are driving these issues forward. >> thank you for that, mr. owens i think that that is heading in the right direction. we will continue to push for this in terms of accelerating helping you. you are absolutely right. the department can create a demand signal that they can fill from the services perspectives, anything to add to that? i welcome specifics. >> here is a specific. if you go for a particular contract in my particular portfolio you will be down selected. that is it. >> now we are talking. that is. great. i just have a request for both

you. forgive me if i miss pronounce your name earlier. and miss jacobson and mr. owens. hiprobably the most high-profile child development center at eglin air force base. frankly, i do not think this committee, the senate, conference should really be referencing over a cdc either. it is safe to be and to operate and to be on campus given the proximity to arrange or it is not. but, parsing, we have a church there, we have a playground there, but we cannot have a child development center there. i think that they are just all kinds of bizarre distinctions. i ask you guys to resolve this issue. either it is safe to be there are speciale operators need a place, their families don't have to drive hours to drop off their

kids. they will be prioritized which they would not be in town so to speak or s they are not. if we could get that resolved this year that would be my request. that would be fantastic. >> thank you for bringing up the energy issue. to the by america requirements. there is a huge loophole in the department of defense that can waive the requirements. needing to close that. if we are able to enforce then the chairman's concern about chinese batteries and the like, we will move past that. they haveca to be made in ameri. or friendly countries nearby. thank you for bringing that up.

we can go on for several hours. we may have even a few seconds. i have asked each of you to share with me, and i would also request that youhe share with te chair and the staff, specific requests of what you need in this coming nda to carry out the task that you have described to us that you want to do. housing, energy, installations, on and on, all of those things. we need to know what you need to carry out your task. hearing adjourned.

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