Army Corps of Engineers Announces Reforms to Balance Critical Infrastructure Workload

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced a series of reforms on Feb. 23 in the hopes of more efficiently delivering on its portfolio of critical infrastructure projects.

With roots stretching back to the Continental Army and the American Revolution, the Army Corps of Engineers oversees a mix of military construction and construction of domestic critical infrastructure and other civil works projects. The Army’s construction agency is also responsible for ensuring the navigability of U.S. waterways and oversees about a quarter of the hydropower generation capacity of the United States.

Dubbed the “Building Infrastructure, Not Paperwork” initiative, the update covers five main areas of reform efforts for the Army agency.

Speaking with The Epoch Times ahead of the initiative’s rollout, Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works Adam Telle said the plan “will enable the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to deliver critical projects and programs for the nation more efficiently, sooner, and at less cost than the current ways of doing business.”

The first area of effort entails maximizing the Corps of Engineers’ capacity to complete national infrastructure projects. The Army agency is set to adopt a new framework for contracting as part of this specific line of effort.

One area of civil works the Army Corps of Engineers is responsible for is dredging waterways, but Telle said that rising dredging costs and a current highly localized contracting model have made this section of the project portfolio difficult to manage.

Telle said the push for smarter contracting on this particular issue will include elevating dredging to a national level of visibility so the Army Corps of Engineers can better assess what factors are affecting the contracting market and more effectively assign projects.

“The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will accelerate project delivery with smarter contracting, higher design standards, and a reformed partnership pipeline to build the infrastructure America needs faster,” Telle said.

A second area of effort entails streamlining permitting processes for Army Corps of Engineers projects.

Telle said there are uncertainties about the geographic scope of the Clean Water Act, which refers to “the waters of the United States” as features to be protected from pollutants.

Among its permitting fixes, the Army Corps of Engineers intends to develop geospatial assessment tools to remove ambiguity about which areas fall under the federal jurisdiction described in the Clean Water Act.

“This will eliminate bureaucratic delays and provide fast, clear decisions needed to save lives and empower our economy,” Telle told The Epoch Times.

The third area of effort focuses on optimizing the usage of Army Corps of Engineers resources and enforcing discipline in how Corps of Engineers leaders communicate with states and localities about the feasibility of delivering on certain infrastructure projects.

Currently, the Army Corps of Engineers allocates funding to its 44 geographic districts based on their project workload. Telle said this model can create an incentive for district leaders to advocate open-ended projects that can fall outside the scope of available funding. Failure to deliver on these projects can then damage relationships with localities.

The reform plan calls for the various Army Corps of Engineers districts to focus on projects and functions that are core to the agency’s mission.

In the fourth line of effort, the Army Corps of Engineers will seek to apply transparency measures to instill a culture of fiscal discipline across the agency and cut back on wasteful or inefficient practices.

Telle’s office said the inclusion of salaries within project line-item costs can mask how federal funding is being spent. As a proposed fix, the Corps of Engineers will separate these employee salary cost lines from other project line items to more closely monitor both personnel and overhead costs.

The fifth and final effort area focuses on how the Corps of Engineers prioritizes its various projects. Telle’s office said the Army’s civil works program will focus on projects that primarily serve national interests.

Telle’s office said that to address this effort area, the Army Corps of Engineers will assign key projects to districts that are available to complete the tasks, regardless of their geographic location. His office said the Army agency would also reach out, when possible, to non-federal experts and authorities to help deliver on lower-priority projects.