On Monday, February 14, 2011, President Barack Obama submitted to Congress his request for military construction appropriations to support federal government operations during FY2012, which will begin on October 1, 2011 (see Table 1 ). The timing of his request was unusual because it overlapped the congressional process of appropriating for government operations during FY2011. Since the beginning of FY2011, federal funding has been provided through a series of six temporary legislative instruments that have continued government spending at the same rate enacted for FY2010. Because the 111 th Congress adjourned sine die without passing any FY2011 regular appropriations bills, the task has fallen to the 112 th Congress. The military construction appropriation, Title I of one of those bills, the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, pays for the building of new military facilities required for new weapons systems, including aircraft and naval vessels; the redeployment of military forces to new locations; the improvement of military living and working conditions; the reduction of facility operating costs; and the improvement of military productivity at both active and reserve components. Military construction funds also pay for construction and movement of organizations mandated in base closure and realignment actions, and for the environmental remediation required for the disposal of defense real property as required by the base closure acts of 1988 and 1990, as amended. Another appropriation within the bill provides funding for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Security Investment Program (NSIP), which constitutes the U.S. contribution to a 28-nation collective account for the acquisition and construction of international collective defense facilities within the North Atlantic Treaty Area. Other subaccounts finance all costs associated with construction, improvement, operation, and leasing of all government-provided military family housing. The Family Housing Improvement Fund (FHIP) finances the DOD portion of the various public-private partnerships resulting from the privatization of much of the inventory of domestic military family housing under the Military Housing Privatization Initiative (MHPI) begun during the late 1990s. The Homeowners Assistance Fund (HAF) was created during the mid-1960s to assist DOD family homeowners who are forced to sell their houses in markets depressed by base closures, but eligibility to apply for such assistance was temporarily expanded to include military members who purchased homes during the so-called "housing bubble" and who were ordered to change duty stations during the subsequent "housing crisis." The Secretary of Defense terminated this temporary eligibility late in 2010, as permitted under the enabling statute. A final subaccount funds the construction of facilities at several chemical munitions depots. These munitions, such as nerve gases, have been banned from use in warfare by international treaty, and highly sophisticated industrial plants at select depots have been constructed to demilitarize (render non-lethal) and safely dispose of U.S. chemical munitions stockpiles. Construction for this program is nearing completion. Titles II and III of the bill fund the benefits programs and operations of the Department of Veterans Affairs and several federal agencies, including the American Battle Monuments Commission, the Armed Forces Retirement Home, the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims, and Arlington National Cemetery. These titles are not addressed in this report. Title IV is a new appropriation provision dedicated to military construction supporting "overseas contingency operations" (OCO), such as the ongoing ground force deployments to U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM). During the first years of active military engagement in CENTCOM, such construction was paid for through a series of emergency supplemental appropriations. In recent years, the Obama Administration has moved this funding into the regular appropriations process, yet highlighted it through the designation of "Title IV (OCO)" military construction. FY2011 military construction is being funded under a series of continuing appropriations rather than a year-long appropriations act. A continuing appropriation does not specify a set amount of budget authority available for each account, but rather allows DOD and the various military departments, in general, to obligate (spend) funds at the same rate as last enacted in a regular appropriation bill. At the present time, P.L. 111-117 , the Continuing Appropriations Act, 2010, included the most recent four-year military construction appropriation. Both House and Senate drafted military construction legislation for FY2011, but neither bill was enacted before adjournment of the 111 th Congress. In the 112 th Congress, the House passed H.R. 1 , a full-year continuing appropriation, on February 19, 2011, but the bill failed in the Senate by a Yea-Nay vote of 44-56 on March 9 (Record Vote No. 36). A new full-year continuing appropriations bill was introduced as Division B of H.R. 1473 (the Department of Defense and Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, 2011) was introduced to the House on April 11, and was passed by the House on April 14, 2011. Finally, as noted earlier, the President has requested appropriations for FY2012. Funding for the FY2010 act, the President's FY2011 appropriation request, H.R. 1 (as introduced to the House), H.R. 1473 (as introduced in the House) and the President's FY2012 request are laid out in Table 2 . A more detailed comparison, including the regular FY2011 House and Senate military construction appropriations bills, may be found in the Appendix in Table A-1 and Table A-2 . President Obama has requested a total of $14.8 billion in military construction and family housing new budget authority for FY2012. This is a reduction of $9.9 billion from the amount enacted for FY2010, representing a drop of 40.2%. The falloff in BRAC costs due to the completion of construction and organization movement is responsible for $7.4 billion, or 75%, of the difference between the two years. That reduction of the FY2012 request below the funding levels of FY2010 extends across most of the military construction and family housing subaccounts. The President is asking for $1.3 billion (9.8%) less for active and reserve component construction than was appropriated in FY2010. For the various family housing accounts (construction, operation, FHIP, and HAF), he is requesting $564 million less (25%) than given for FY2010. His chemical demilitarization construction request has been cut in half relative to FY2010, and his BRAC needs have virtually disappeared. Finally, the President is asking for virtually no OCO military construction funding. Of the funding requested by the President for FY2012, $9.3 billion is dedicated for expenditure within the United States, $1.8 billion for projects outside of the United States, and the remainder ($3.7 billion) for uses where either the location is unspecified or currently unknown (e.g., for future planning and design of various construction projects). The principal purposes for which the requested funding is to be used include major construction projects ($11.1 billion), planning and design ($972.7 million), operating expenses (primarily for military family housing, $602.8 million), BRAC ($511.6 million), and property leases ($411.8 million). The geographic land area comprising U.S. Northern Command includes the contiguous United States, Alaska, Canada, and Mexico. The principal military construction issues within Northern Command center on the relocation of personnel and organizations within the continental United States and the redeployment of troops from garrisons overseas to domestic duty stations. The largest portion of domestic relocation was brought on by the implementation of the recommendations of the 2005 Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission (also known as the BRAC Commission). Over the past six years, the defense agencies and military departments have carried out a highly complex—and often contentious—program of construction and movement that required the appropriation of approximately $35 billion. The 2005 BRAC round, save for environmental cleanup and disposal of surplus property, is scheduled to be completed not later than September 15, 2011. Associated with the domestic BRAC, and funded through the BRAC appropriation, is the construction needed to house units repositioned to the United States as part of the parallel Integrated Global Presence and Basing Strategy (IGPBS), later referred to as Global Defense Posture Realignment (GDPR). Separate from the 2005 BRAC round, DOD announced plans to permanently move one of the Navy's aircraft carriers from its home port of Norfolk, VA, to a new duty station in Mayport, FL. The announced reasoning for the move is strategic. Currently, the naval station at Norfolk is the sole Navy facility along the nation's eastern or southern coasts with the needed facilities and capacity to service a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. The Navy became concerned that stationing all Atlantic Fleet carriers at a single port facility could offer a vulnerability to potential adversaries and decided to build a second facility at Mayport, estimating the cost of the project at $580 million. Thus far, Congress has not appropriated the necessary construction funds. The FY2012 request does not include funding to build the needed facilities. Other issues potentially involving military construction funding include the recently announced disestablishment of Joint Forces Command (JFCOM) and the Navy's Second Fleet (2FLT) Headquarters. Most of the personnel attached to both organizations are located in the Tidewater Virginia area. Because both closures are focused on organizations, and are characterized as "reductions in force" rather than the closure or realignment of specific installations, neither triggers the actions required by the military base closure law (10 U.S.C. § 2687).