Base Support Services

In response to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Air Force's decision to disestablish the San Antonio Real Property Maintenance Agency (SARPMA) and the San Antonio Contracting Center (SACC), focusing on the: (1) rationale for disestablishment; (2) impact on SARPMA and SACC employees; (3) costs of disestablishing SARPMA and SACC and reestablishing their services at the affected installations; and (4) operational costs of SARPMA compared with decentralized base civil engineering.

GAO found that: (1) Air Force studies showed that customers were not satisfied with SARPMA services, even though SARPMA provided services at performance levels and response times comparable to the traditional base operations; (2) the Air Force found positions for 97 percent of the permanent civilian employees at the newly formed base civil engineering offices; (3) the estimated costs to disestablish and reestablish base civil engineering and base-level contracting units totalled $12.5 million; (4) the costs to provide real property maintenance services after SARPMA disestablishment would depend on the amount of funds available at each base; and (5) the Air Force believed that the important issue was the return of command and control of installation civil engineering and base-level contracting resources to the installation commanders.