The existing NGA West campus consists of 15 facilities on 27 acres. Some of the buildings’ original construction dates back to the early 1800s, and 22 acres of the site are on the National Register of Historic Places, according to NGA documents. In 2009 through 2010, NGA contracted with an independent firm to assess the condition of the existing NGA West. This assessment gave the facilities an overall condition rating of “poor,” generally because of the insufficiency of the anti-terrorism and force protection measures, the average age of the structures, numerous code and accessibility shortfalls, and lack of seismic protection. Near the end of the completion of the NGA East headquarters consolidation in 2011, NGA focused its attention on the need to improve the operational capacity, security requirements, and modernization of its NGA West facilities. From approximately 2009 through 2012, NGA conducted a series of evaluations to inform its efforts to modernize NGA West. These analyses included a condition assessment of the existing facilities; an economic analysis of alternatives to evaluate the options of building a new facility (“build new”), fully renovating the existing facilities (“modernize”), or remaining in the current facilities with minimum essential repairs (“status quo”); and a qualitative analysis of non-cost considerations for the build new, modernize, and status quo options identified in the economic analysis. In 2012 NGA determined that a new NGA West would best meet the agency’s mission and resource needs. After examining the options of renovating its current facility, leasing, or building a new government- owned facility, NGA determined that building a new, government-owned facility was the preferred option. NGA officials stated that they are in the process of soliciting design-build proposals and that the final design-build contract is planned for award near the end of fiscal year 2018. Construction is expected to begin approximately in the summer of 2019. We identified 22 best practices for an AOA process in October 2015, based on government and private-sector guidance and input from subject-matter experts. Many federal and industry guides have described approaches to analyses of alternatives; however, there was no single set of practices for the AOA process that was broadly recognized by both government and private-sector entities. We developed these best practices by (1) compiling and reviewing commonly mentioned AOA policies and guidance used by different government and private-sector entities and (2) incorporating experts’ comments on a draft set of practices to develop a final set of practices. The 22 best practices are grouped into four characteristics that describe a high-quality, reliable AOA process and can be used to evaluate whether an AOA process meets the characteristics of well-documented, comprehensive, unbiased, and credible. These practices can be applied to AOA processes for a broad range of capability areas, projects, and programs, including military construction projects and decision-making processes, in which an alternative must be selected from a set of possible options. In September 2016, we recommended that DOD develop guidance that requires the use of AOA best practices, including those practices we identified, when conducting AOA processes for certain types of military construction decisions. DOD did not concur with this recommendation and disagreed that these best practices apply to military construction decision-making processes. We continue to believe that this recommendation is valid and that the principles demonstrated by the best practices—and the practices themselves—draw from related DOD and other practices. Our best practices also parallel those found in DOD and Air Force guidance on military construction and analysis for decision making. For example, according to an Air Force instruction governing the planning and programming of military construction projects, one of the required planning actions is to evaluate alternative solutions. According to a DOD directive pertaining to military construction, DOD must monitor the execution of its military construction program to ensure—among other things—that the program is accomplished in the most cost-effective way. This guidance for cost effectiveness aligns with our AOA best practice Develop Life-cycle Cost Estimates, which focuses on providing decision makers with the information they need to assess the cost- effectiveness of alternatives. Further, DOD Instruction 7041.03, on economic analysis for decision making, contains numerous cost estimating principles and procedures that align with those called for in our AOA best practices. As we reported in 2016, these policy documents and instructions align with the general intent of our best practices, and there are many similarities between our best practices and the department’s guidance. Additionally, in our previous work reviewing AOA process for other national security facilities, agencies generally concurred with our recommendations to consider including our best practices in future guidance. For example, in 2014 we assessed three National Nuclear Security Administration construction projects and found each project’s AOA partially met our best practices for conducting an AOA process. The Department of Energy agreed with our recommendation and has begun implementation. NGA launched its search for a new NGA West site in 2012 with a site location study conducted by an outside real estate firm, and it concluded the search with the issuance of a record of decision in June 2016. The site location study included a check for existing federal sites that could accommodate NGA West’s workforce and mission. This search resulted in a total of 186 sites being identified initially as possible options; the list was narrowed to 6 sites in the St. Louis metropolitan area for further study. During preliminary master planning, 4 of the 6 sites identified by the site location studies were determined to be suitable for further analysis to select the agency’s preferred alternative. Three of these sites are in the Missouri cities of Fenton, Mehlville, and St. Louis, and one is in St. Clair County, Illinois, near Scott Air Force Base. See figure 1 for the geographic distribution of the 4 sites. The subsequent site selection process included an environmental impact statement as required by the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, analysis of NGA and the Corps of Engineers’ compliance with related DOD policies and other federal laws and requirements, preliminary master planning conducted by the Corps of Engineers, and a site evaluation process initiated by the NGA West Program Management Office (PMO), which is responsible for managing the NGA West project. To select the final site from the four alternatives, NGA initiated a site evaluation process in August 2015 that was led by the NGA West PMO. This process involved various teams of experts analyzing the sites and evaluating them against defined criteria to identify the advantages and disadvantages of each site. Figure 2 provides an overview of the key elements and milestones of NGA’s site selection process, beginning with its earlier decision to build and concluding with its 2016 selection of the new site and issuance of its record of decision. According to NGA officials, there was no NGA or DOD policy or set of practices to comprehensively guide NGA’s site selection and AOA process. As a result, NGA relied on various DOD policies and instructions, other federal guidance, and industry standards. It incorporated these practices into the site selection process to ensure that it complied with federal requirements and industry practice to develop its AOA process, according to NGA and Corps of Engineers officials. Additionally, NGA officials stated that our AOA best practices would have been helpful in planning the site selection process for NGA West, but the process began in 2012, and our 22 best practices were not published until October 2015. At the outset of the site evaluation process in August 2015, the PMO set forth broad sets of criteria to use in analyzing the four alternatives. These broad sets of criteria, referred to as “evaluation factors,” were mission, security, development and sustainability, schedule, cost, and environment. In addition, each site was assessed to ensure that it complied with key laws, regulations, and directives. The PMO divided the analysis of the evaluation factors among NGA and Corps of Engineers teams. The mission, security, and development and sustainability factors were assigned to two NGA evaluation teams of subject-matter experts—the “mission evaluation team” and “security, infrastructure and schedule evaluation team” (referred to here as security evaluation team). Each of these teams used its expertise to develop “sub-factors” to assess the advantages and disadvantages of each site. For example: The mission evaluation team developed 10 mission-related sub- factors based on the PMO guidance, NGA’s mission, and the strategic goals outlined in the 2015 NGA Strategy. The mission-related sub- factors focused largely on elements pertaining to NGA’s workforce and partnerships, such as the sites’ proximity to the existing workforce, their distance from NGA’s Arnold facility, and the likelihood that the sites would attract mission partners to create a “GEOINT Valley.” The security evaluation team developed 13 sub-factors related to security and infrastructure based on PMO guidance, DOD and other federal security and energy requirements, threat analysis, and other subject-matter expertise. Examples of the sub-factors include a 500- foot setback, perimeter security elements, sustainable characteristics, and infrastructure resilience. Separate evaluations of cost, schedule, and environmental considerations were conducted by the Corps of Engineers in its role as construction agent as part of the environmental impact analysis. In addition, NGA and the Corps of Engineers conducted an assessment of relevant laws and regulations. The PMO integrated these analyses and provided an additional layer of review to each of the evaluation factors, in some cases adjusting them. For instance, the PMO reorganized the 10 mission-related sub-factors for its review. Specifically, while the mission evaluation team focused the sub-factors largely on NGA’s strategic goals related to workforce and partnerships, the PMO’s analysis reorganized those same mission-related sub-factors by how they supported all four of the 2015 strategic goals. The PMO listed under three “strategic effects”—“Create GEOINT Valley,” “Enhance Operations,” and “Attract and Sustain the Workforce”—all of the sub-factors related to that strategic effect.