Federal Real Property: Progress Made on Planning and Data, but Unneeded Owned and Leased Facilities Remain
Published: 2011-04-06T00:00:00

Fast Facts:

Highlights:
section_title: Why GAO Did This Study
paragraphs: The federal government holds more than 45,000 underutilized properties that cost nearly $1.7 billion annually to operate, yet significant obstacles impede efforts to close, consolidate, or find other uses for them. In January 2003, GAO designated federal real property management as a high-risk area, in part because of the number and cost of these properties. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is responsible for reviewing federal agencies' progress in real property management. In 2007, GAO recommended that OMB assist agencies by developing an action plan to address key obstacles associated with decisions related to unneeded real property, including stakeholder influence. The President's fiscal year 2012 budget proposed establishing a legislative framework for disposing of and consolidating civilian real property, referred to as a Civilian Property Realignment Act (CPRA), which may be designed to address stakeholder influences in real property decision making. This testimony identifies (1) obstacles to effectively managing federal real property, (2) actions designed to overcome those obstacles, including government actions and CPRA, and (3) key elements of the Department of Defense's (DOD) base realignment and closure (BRAC) process that are designed to help DOD close or realign installations and may be relevant for CPRA. To do this work, GAO reviewed GAO reports, other reports, and CPRA.
section_title: What GAO Found
paragraphs: In designating federal real property management as a high-risk issue in 2003, GAO found that the federal government faced a number of obstacles to effectively managing its real property. These included its lack of strategic focus on real property issues, a lack of reliable real property data, legal limitations, and stakeholder influence. That year, GAO reported that despite the magnitude and complexity of real-property-related problems, there was no governmentwide strategic focus on real property issues and that governmentwide data were unreliable and outdated. GAO also reported then that before disposing of excess property, the General Services Administration is legally required to follow a lengthy screening process, which includes offering the property to other federal agencies and other entities for public uses. Furthermore, stakeholders--including local governments, private real estate interests, and advocacy groups--may have different interests that do not always align with the most efficient use of government resources. Since 2003, the federal government has taken steps to address some of these obstacles and improve its real property management. For instance, the administration and real-property-holding agencies have improved their strategic management of real property by establishing an interagency Federal Real Property Council designed to enhance real property planning processes. The government has also implemented controls to improve the reliability of federal real property data. However, many problems related to unneeded property and leasing have persisted because legal limitations and stakeholder influences remain. GAO's 2007 recommendation that OMB develop an action plan is designed to address these problems. In addition, CPRA proposes an independent board to identify facilities for disposal and consolidation, which could streamline legal requirements and mitigate stakeholder influences. Congress authorized DOD to undergo five BRAC rounds to reduce excess property and realign DOD's workload to achieve efficiencies and savings in property management. The BRAC process, much like CPRA, was designed to address obstacles to closures or realignments, thus permitting DOD to close installations or realign its missions to better use its facilities and generate savings. GAO's prior work on the BRAC process identified certain key elements that may be applicable to managing civilian real property, such as establishing goals and an organizational structure, developing criteria and an analytical framework, using a model to estimate costs and savings, and involving the audit community to better ensure data accuracy. A key similarity between BRAC and CPRA is that both establish an independent board that reviews agency recommendations; a key difference is that the BRAC process created criteria for selecting installations for realignment while CPRA does not include specific criteria to be used to select properties for disposal or consolidation.

section_title: Letter
paragraphs: Thank you for the opportunity to testify today on our work related to  excess and underutilized federal real property held by the General  Services Administration (GSA) and other agencies, as well as our work on  the military Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process. As we have  previously testified before this Subcommittee, the federal government  occupies more owned and leased buildings than it needs. In fiscal year  2009, 24 landholding agencies, including the Department of Defense  (DOD), reported 45,190 underutilized buildings with a total of 341 million  square feet, or 1,830 more such buildings than they reported the previous  fiscal year. These underutilized buildings cost $1.66 billion annually to  operate and are potentially valuable. The federal government also leases  more property than is cost-efficient, resulting in millions of dollars of  additional costs to the federal government. Since 2008, GSA has leased  more property than it owns—more than 8,000 buildings—even though  owning a federal building is often a more cost-effective way of meeting an  agency’s long-term space needs. Because of these and other issues, we  designated the management of federal real property as a high-risk area in  January 2003 and retained that designation in our February 2011 high-risk  update. Similarly, DOD has faced long-term challenges in managing its  portfolio of facilities, halting degradation of facilities, and reducing  unneeded infrastructure to free up funds to better maintain the facilities  that it still uses and meet other needs. DOD’s management of its support  infrastructure is also on our high-risk list, in part because of challenges  DOD faces in reducing excess and obsolete infrastructure.
As you know, DOD has been working through the BRAC process to reduce  the amount of unneeded property that it owns and leases. This process,  which is designed to address the obstacles to rightsizing domestic military  installations, may also be applicable to civilian real property management.
Our testimony today will identify (1) obstacles to effectively managing  federal real property, (2) actions designed to overcome those obstacles  such as actions the government has taken and the legislative framework  for disposing of and consolidating civilian real property proposed in the  President’s fiscal year 2012 budget, referred to as the Civilian Property  Realignment Act (CPRA), and (3) key elements of the BRAC process that  are designed to help DOD close or realign installations and may be  relevant for CPRA.
To address these objectives, we reviewed previous GAO reports, reports  by the interagency Federal Real Property Council (FRPC), and CPRA. We  performed this work from March 2011 to April 2011 in accordance with  generally accepted government auditing standards. Those standards  require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate  evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions  based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained  provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our  audit objectives.
subsections: section_title: Background
paragraphs: The federal real property portfolio is vast and diverse—totaling over  900,000 buildings and structures—including office buildings, warehouses,  laboratories, hospitals, and family housing—worth hundreds of billions of  dollars. The six largest federal property holders—DOD, GSA, the U.S.  Postal Service, and the Departments of Veterans Affairs (VA), Energy, and  the Interior—occupy 87.6 percent of the total square footage in federal  buildings. Over all, the federal government owns approximately 83 percent  of this space and leases or otherwise manages the rest; however, these  proportions vary by agency. For example GSA, the central leasing agent  for most agencies, now leases more space than it owns. After we  designated federal real property as a high-risk area in 2003, the President  signed Executive Order 13327 in February 2004, which established new  federal property guidelines for 24 executive branch departments and  agencies. Among other things, the executive order called for creating the  interagency FRPC to develop guidance, collect best practices, and help  agencies improve the management of their real property assets.
DOD has undergone four BRAC rounds since 1988 and is currently  implementing its fifth round. Generally, the purpose of prior BRAC  rounds was to generate savings to apply to other priorities, reduce  property deemed excess to needs, and realign DOD’s workload and  workforce to achieve efficiencies in property management. As a result of  the prior BRAC rounds in 1988, 1991, 1993, and 1995, DOD reported th had reduced its domestic infrastructure, transferred hundreds of  thousands of acres of unneeded property to other federal and nonfederal  entities, and saved billions of dollars annually that could be applied to  other higher priority defense needs. The 2005 BRAC round affected  hundreds of locations across the country through 24 major closures, 24  major realignments, and 765 lesser actions, which also included  terminating leases and consolidating various activities. Legislation  authorizing the 2005 BRAC round maintained requirements establishe the three previous BRAC rounds that GAO provide a detailed analysis of  DOD’s recommendations and of the BRAC selection process. We  submitted our report to Congress in July 2005 and testified before the  BRAC Commission soon thereafter. Since that time, GAO has published  annual reports on the progress, challenges, and costs and savings of the  2005 round, in addition to numerous reports on other aspects of  implementing the 2005 BRAC round.
section_title: Underlying Obstacles Have Impeded the Government’s Ability to Dispose of Unneeded Property and Reduce Overreliance on Costly Leasing
paragraphs: When we designated federal real property management as high risk, we  reported that the federal government faced a number of obstacles to  effectively managing its real property. These included a lack of strategic  focus on real property issues, a lack of reliable real property data, legal  limitations, and stakeholder influences in real property decision making.
subsections: section_title: Lack of Strategic Focus on Real Property Issues
paragraphs: In 2003, we reported that despite the magnitude and complexity of real- property-related problems, there had been no governmentwide strategic  focus on real property issues. Not having a strategic focus can lead to  ineffective decision making, such as choosing to rely too much on leasing  for long-term government property needs. In 2008, we found that decisions  to lease selected federal properties were not always driven by cost- effectiveness considerations. For example, we estimated that the decision  to lease the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s field office in Chicago,  Illinois, instead of constructing a building the government would own, cost  about $40 million more over 30 years. GSA officials noted that limited  availability of upfront capital was one of the reasons that prevented  ownership at that time. Federal budget scorekeeping rules require the full  cost of construction to be recorded up front in the budget, whereas only  the annual lease payments plus cancellation costs need to be recorded for  operating leases. In April 2007 and January 2008, we recommended that  the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) develop a strategy to reduce  agencies’ reliance on costly leasing where ownership would result in long- term savings. We noted that such a strategy could identify the conditions  under which leasing is an acceptable alternative, include an analysis of  real property budget scoring issues, and provide an assessment of viable  alternatives. OMB concurred with this recommendation but has not yet  developed a strategy to reduce agencies’ reliance on leasing.
section_title: Lack of Reliable Real Property Data
paragraphs: In 2003, we found that a lack of reliable real property data compounded  real property management problems. The governmentwide data  maintained at that time were unreliable, out of date, and of limited value.  In addition, certain key data that would be useful for budgeting and  strategic management were not being maintained, such as data on space  utilization, facility condition, historical significance, security, and age. We  also found that some of the major real-property-holding agencies faced  challenges developing reliable data on their real property assets. We noted  that reliable governmentwide and agency-specific real property data are  critical for addressing real property management challenges. For example,  better data would help the government determine whether assets are being  used efficiently, make investment decisions, and identify unneeded  properties.
section_title: Legal Limitations
paragraphs: In our February 2011 high-risk update, we noted that a third obstacle to  consolidating federal properties is the legal requirements agencies must  adhere to before disposing of a property, such as requirements for  screening and environmental cleanup. Currently, before GSA can dispose  of a property that a federal agency no longer needs, it is required to offer  the property to other federal agencies. If other federal agencies do not  have a need for the property, GSA must then make the property available  to state and local governments and certain nonprofit organizations and  institutions for public benefit uses such as homeless shelters, educational  facilities, or fire or police training centers. As a result of this lengthy  process, GSA’s underutilized or excess properties may remain in an  agency’s possession for years and continue to accumulate maintenance  and operations costs. Further complicating this issue is that different  agencies have different authorities to enter into leases with public and  private entities for the use of federal property, to sell real property, and to  retain the proceeds from these transactions. For example, DOD has the  authority to both enter into these leases and retain proceeds for the sale of  properties, but the Department of Justice does not have the authority to do  either. In addition, federal agencies are required by law to assess and pay  for any environmental cleanup that may be needed before disposing of a  property—a process that may require years of study and result in  significant costs. In some cases, the cost of the environmental cleanup  may exceed the costs of continuing to maintain the excess property in a  shut-down status. We have also noted that the National Historic  Preservation Act, as amended, requires agencies to manage historic  properties under their control and jurisdiction and to consider the effects  of their actions on historic preservation. Since properties more than 50  years old are eligible for historic designation and the average age of  properties in GSA’s portfolio is 46 years, this issue will soon become  critically important to GSA.
section_title: Stakeholder Influences
paragraphs: Local stakeholders—including local governments, business interests,  private real estate interests, sector construction and leasing firms, historic  preservation organizations, various advocacy groups for citizens that  benefit from federal programs, and the public in general—often view  federal facilities as the physical face of the federal government in their  communities. The interests of these multiple and often competing  stakeholders may not always align with the most efficient use of  government resources and can complicate real property decisions. For  example, as we first reported in 2007, VA officials noted that stakeholders  and constituencies, such as historic building advocates or local  communities that want to maintain their relationship with VA, often  prevent the agency from disposing of properties. In 2003, we indicated  that an independent commission or governmentwide task force might be  necessary to help overcome stakeholder influences in real property  decision making.
section_title: The Government Has Adopted a More Strategic Focus to Improve Real Property Management and Has Taken Steps to Increase Data Reliability, but Other Obstacles Remain
paragraphs: The administration and real-property-holding agencies have made progress  in a number of areas since we designated federal real property as high risk  in 2003. Specifically, the federal government has taken steps toward  strategically managing its real property and improving the reliability of its  real property data. However, many problems related to unneeded property  and leasing persist because the government has not addressed the  underlying legal limitations and stakeholder influences which we  identified.
As part of the government’s efforts to strategically manage its real  property, the administration established FRPC—a group composed of the  OMB Controller and the senior real property officers of landholding  agencies—to support real property reform efforts. Through FRPC, the  landholding agencies have also established asset management plans,  standardized real property data reporting, and adopted various  performance measures to track progress. The asset management plans are  updated annually and help agencies take a more strategic approach to real  property management by indicating how real property moves the agency’s  mission forward, outlining the agency’s capital management plans, and  describing how the agency plans to operate its facilities and dispose of  unneeded real property, including listing current and future disposal plans.  Although several FRPC member agencies said that the body no longer  meets regularly, it remains a forum for agency coordination on real  property issues and could serve a larger role in future real property  management.
In our February 2011 high-risk update, we reported that the federal  government has also taken numerous steps since 2003 to improve the  completeness and reliability of its real property data. FRPC, in conjunction  with GSA, established the Federal Real Property Profile (FRPP) to meet a  requirement in Executive Order 13327 for a single real property database  that includes all real property under the control of executive branch  agencies. FRPP contains asset-level information submitted annually by  agencies on 25 high-level data elements, including four performance  measures that enable agencies to track progress in achieving property  management objectives. In response to our 2007 recommendation to  improve the reliability of FRPP data, OMB required, and agencies  implemented, data validation plans that include procedures to verify that  the data are accurate and complete. Furthermore, GSA’s Office of  Governmentwide Policy (OGP), which administers the FRPP database,  instituted a data validation process that precludes FRPP from accepting an  agency’s data until the data pass all established business rules and data  checks. In our most recent analysis of the reliability of FRPP data, we  found none of the basic problems we have previously found, such as  missing data or inexplicably large changes between years. In addition,  agencies continue to improve their real property data for their own  purposes. From a governmentwide perspective, OGP has sufficient  standards and processes in place for us to consider the 25 elements in  FRPP as a database that is sufficiently reliable to describe the real  property holdings of the federal government. Consequently, we removed  the data element of real property management from the high-risk list this  year.
In 2007, we recommended that OMB, which is responsible for reviewing  agencies’ progress on federal real property management, assist agencies  by developing an action plan to address the key problems associated with  decisions related to unneeded real property, including stakeholder  influences. OMB agreed with the recommendation but has yet to  implement it. However, the administration’s recently proposed legislative  framework, CPRA, is somewhat responsive to this recommendation in that  it addresses both legal limitations and stakeholder influences in real  property decision making. According to the proposal, the purpose of  CPRA would be, in part, to “streamline the current legal framework” and  “facilitate the disposal of those unneeded civilian real properties that are  currently subject to legal restrictions that prevent their disposal.” The  proposal itself, however, does not describe how this streamlining would  be accomplished. To address stakeholder influences, CPRA would create  an independent board to recommend federal properties for disposal or  consolidation after receiving recommendations from civilian landholding  agencies. Grouping all disposal and consolidation decisions into one list  that Congress would vote on in its entirety could help to blunt local  stakeholder influences at any individual site. In addition, CPRA could help  to reduce the government’s overreliance on leasing by recommending that  the government consolidate operations from leased space to owned space  where efficient.
section_title: Key Elements That Underpin the Process for Closing or Realigning DOD Installations May Be Applicable to Managing Civilian Real Property
paragraphs: In our prior work on the BRAC process, we identified certain key elements  underpinning the process, which may be applicable to the management of  real property governmentwide. The BRAC process was designed to  address certain challenges to closures or realignments, including  stakeholder interests, thereby permitting DOD to dispose of installations  or realign its missions to better use its facilities and generate savings. The  2005 BRAC round followed a historical analytical framework, carrying  many elements of the process forward or building upon lessons learned  from previous rounds. DOD also established a structured process for  obtaining and analyzing data that provided a consistent basis for  identifying and evaluating closure and realignment recommendations, and  DOD used a logical, reasoned, and well-documented process. In addition,  we have identified lessons learned from DOD’s 1988, 1991, 1993, and 1995  rounds, and we have begun an effort to assess lessons learned from the  2005 BRAC round.
DOD’s 2005 BRAC Process  DOD’s 2005 BRAC process consisted of a series of legislatively-prescribed  steps, as follows:  DOD began to develop options for closure or realignment  recommendations. The military departments developed service-specific  installation closure and realignment options. In addition, the Office of the  Secretary of Defense established seven joint cross-service teams, called  joint cross-service groups, to develop options across common business- oriented functions, such as medical, supply storage, and administrative  activities. These closure and realignment options were reviewed by DOD’s  Infrastructure Executive Council—a senior-level policy-making and  oversight body for the entire process. Options approved by this council  were submitted to the Secretary of Defense for his review and approval.  DOD developed hundreds of closure or realignment options for further  analysis which eventually led to DOD’s submitting over 200  recommendations to the BRAC Commission for analysis and review.
BRAC Commission performed an independent review of DOD’s  recommendations. After DOD selected its base closure and realignment  recommendations, it submitted them to the BRAC Commission, which  performed an independent review and analysis of DOD’s  recommendations. The Commission could approve, modify, reject, or add  closure and realignment recommendations. Also, the BRAC Commission  provided opportunities to interested parties, as well as community and  congressional leaders, to provide testimony and express viewpoints. The  Commission then voted on each individual closure or realignment  recommendation, and those that were approved were included in the  Commission’s report to the President. In 2005, the BRAC Commission  reported that it had rejected or modified about 14 percent of DOD’s  closure and realignment recommendations.
President approved BRAC recommendations. After receiving the  recommendations, the President was to review the recommendations of  the Secretary of Defense and the Commission and prepare a report by  September 23, 2005, containing his approval or disapproval of the  Commission’s recommendations as a whole. Had the President  disapproved of the Commissions’ recommendations, the Commission  would have had until October 20, 2005, to submit a revised list of  recommendations to the President for further consideration. If the  President had not submitted a report to Congress of his approval of the  Commissions recommendations by November 7, 2005, the BRAC process  would have been terminated. The President submitted his report and  approval of the 2005 Commission’s recommendations on September 15,  2005.
Congress allowed the recommendations to become binding. After the  President transmitted his approval of the Commission’s recommendations  to Congress, the Secretary of Defense would have been prohibited from  implementing the recommendations if Congress had passed a joint  resolution of disapproval within 45 days of the date of the President’s  submission or the adjournment of Congress for the session, whichever  was sooner. Since Congress did not pass such a resolution, the  recommendations became binding in November 2005.
Congress established clear time frames for implementation. The BRAC  legislation required DOD to complete recommendations for closing or  realigning bases made in the BRAC 2005 round within the 6-year time  frame ending on September 15, 2011, 6 years from the date the President  submitted his approval of the recommendations to Congress. In July 2010,  in our most recent report on the implementation of the 2005 BRAC  recommendations, we reported that many DOD locations are scheduled to  complete actions to implement the recommendations within months of the  deadline, leaving little or no margin for slippage to finish constructing  buildings and to move or hire the needed personnel.
subsections: section_title: Key Elements That DOD Used to Develop Its 2005 BRAC Recommendations Could Be Considered in a Civilian Real Property Closure or Realignment Process
paragraphs: In developing its recommendations for the BRAC Commission, DOD relied  on certain elements, as follows:  Establish goals for the BRAC process. Prior to the start of the 2005 BRAC  round, the Secretary of Defense emphasized the importance of  transforming the military to make it more efficient as part of the 2005  BRAC round. Other goals for the 2005 BRAC process included fostering  jointness among the four military services, reducing excess infrastructure,  and producing savings. Prior rounds were more about reducing excess  infrastructure and producing savings.
Develop criteria for evaluating closures and realignments. DOD initially  proposed eight selection criteria, which were made available for public  comments via the Federal Register. Ultimately, Congress enacted the eight  final BRAC selection criteria. In authorizing the 2005 BRAC round,  Congress specified that the following four selection criteria, known as the  “military value criteria,” were to be given priority in developing closure  and realignment recommendations:    current and future mission capabilities and the impact on operational  readiness of the total force,    availability and condition of land, facilities, and associated airspace at  both the existing and the potential receiving locations,    ability to accommodate a surge in the force and future total force  requirements at both the existing and the potential receiving location to  support operations and training, and    costs of operations and personnel implications.
In addition to military value, Congress specified that DOD was to apply the  following “other criteria” in developing its recommendations:    costs and savings associated with a recommendation,    economic impact on local communities near the installations,    ability of infrastructure to support forces, missions, and personnel, and    environmental impact.
Additionally, Congress required that the Secretary of Defense develop and  submit to Congress a force structure plan that laid out the numbers, size,  and composition of the units that comprise U.S. defense forces, for  example, divisions, ships, and air wings, based on the Secretary’s  assessment of the probable national security threats for the 20-year period  beginning in 2005, along with a comprehensive inventory of global military  installations. In authorizing the 2005 BRAC round, Congress specified  that the Secretary of Defense publish a list of recommendations for the  closure and realignment of military installations inside the United States  based on the force-structure plan and infrastructure inventory, and on the  eight final selection criteria.
Estimate costs and savings to implement closure and realignment  recommendations. To address the cost and savings criteria, DOD  developed and used the Cost of Base Realignment Actions model—known  as COBRA—a quantitative tool that DOD has used since the 1988 BRAC  round to provide consistency in potential cost, savings, and return-on- investment estimates for closure and realignment options. We reviewed  the COBRA model as part of our review of the 2005 and prior BRAC  rounds and found it to be a generally reasonable estimator for comparing  potential costs and savings among alternatives. As with any model, the  quality of the output is a direct function of the input data. Also, the  COBRA model relies to a large extent on standard factors and averages  and does not represent budget quality estimates that are developed once  BRAC decisions are made and detailed implementation plans are  developed. Nonetheless, the financial information provides important  input into the selection process as decision makers weigh the financial  implications—along with military value and other factors—in arriving at  final decisions regarding the suitability of various closure and realignment  options. However, based on our assessment of the 2005 BRAC round,  actual costs and savings were different from estimates. As we reported in  November 2009, BRAC one-time implementation costs have risen to  almost $35 billion in fiscal year 2010 compared with DOD’s initial estimate  of $21 billion in 2005. Similarly, net annual recurring savings have dropped  to $3.9 billion in fiscal year 2010 compared with the $4.2 billion DOD  estimated in 2005.
Establish a common analytical framework. To ensure that the selection  criteria were consistently applied, the Office of the Secretary of Defense  required the military services and the seven joint cross-service groups to  first perform a capacity analysis of facilities and functions at specific  locations prior to developing recommendations. The capacity analysis  relied on data calls to hundreds of locations to obtain certified data to  assess such factors as maximum potential capacity, current capacity,  current usage, and excess capacity. Then, the military services and joint  cross-service groups performed a military value analysis for the facilities  and functions that included a facility’s or function’s current and future  mission capabilities, physical condition, ability to accommodate future  needs, and cost of operations.
Establish an organizational structure. As previously mentioned, the  Office of the Secretary of Defense emphasized the need for joint cross- service groups to analyze common business-oriented functions. For the  2005 round, as for the 1993 and 1995 rounds, these joint cross-service  groups performed analyses and developed closure and realignment  options in addition to those developed by the military departments. In  contrast, our evaluation of DOD’s 1995 round indicated that few cross- service recommendations were made, in part because of the lack of high- level leadership to encourage consolidations across the services’  functions. In the 1995 round, the joint cross-service groups submitted  options through the military departments for approval, resulting in few  being approved. The number of approved recommendations that the joint  cross-service groups developed significantly increased in the 2005 round.  This was due, in part, to high-level leadership’s ensuring that the options  were approved not by the military services but rather by a DOD senior- level group. Also, one of these joint cross-service groups developed a  number of recommendations to realign administrative-type functions out  of leased space into DOD-owned facilities.
Involve the audit community to better ensure data accuracy. The DOD  Inspector General and military service audit agencies played key roles in  identifying data limitations, fostering corrections, and improving the  accuracy of the data used in the process. The oversight roles of the audit  organizations, given their access to relevant information and officials as  the process evolved, helped to improve the accuracy of the data used in  the BRAC process and added an important aspect to the quality and  integrity of the data used to develop closure and realignment  recommendations.
There are a number of important similarities and differences between  BRAC and a civilian process as proposed in CPRA. As a similarity, both  BRAC and CPRA employ the all-or-nothing approach to disposals and  consolidations, meaning that once the final list is approved, it must be  approved or rejected as a whole. This approach can help overcome  stakeholders’ interests. Another similarity may be the need for a phased  approach. Through the five prior BRAC rounds, DOD has reduced its  domestic infrastructure, transferred hundreds of thousands of acres of  unneeded property to other federal and nonfederal entities, and saved  funds for application to higher priority defense needs. Similarly, it may  take several BRAC-like rounds to complete the disposals and  consolidations of civilian real property owned and leased by many  disparate agencies including GSA, VA, Interior, and the Department of  Energy. On the other hand, an important difference in the two processes  may be the role of the independent board. DOD has participated in the  BRAC process by generating lists of bases to close and realign that the last  four BRAC Commissions have then reviewed. On the civilian side,  however, agencies would provide recommendations to the proposed  civilian board, but the board would ultimately be responsible for  developing the lists of disposals and consolidations.
In closing, the government has made strides toward strategically managing  its real property and improving its real property planning and data over the  last 10 years, but those efforts have not yet led to sufficient reductions in  excess property and overreliance on leasing. DOD’s experiences with  BRAC, including establishing criteria and a common analytical framework  up front, could help this effort move forward.
Chairman Denham, Ranking Member Norton, and Members of the  Subcommittee, this concludes our prepared statement. We will be pleased  to answer any questions that you may have at this time.
For further information on this testimony, please contact David Wise at  (202) 512-2834 or wised@gao.gov regarding federal real property, or Brian  Lepore at (202) 512-4523 or leporeb@gao.gov regarding the Base  Realignment and Closure process. Contact points for our Congressional  Relations and Public Affairs offices may be found on the last page of this  statement. In addition to the contacts named above, Keith Cunningham,  Assistant Director; Laura Talbott, Assistant Director; Vijay Barnabas;  Hilary Benedict; Jessica Bryant-Bertail; Elizabeth Eisenstadt; Sarah  Farkas; Susan Michal-Smith; and Michael Willems made important  contributions to this statement.
This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright protection in the  United States. The published product may be reproduced and distributed in its entirety  without further permission from GAO. However, because this work may contain  copyrighted images or other material, permission from the copyright holder may be  necessary if you wish to reproduce this material separately.