JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas (June 28, 2019) -- My tenure as your commanding general ends soon, and the past 24 months have been the highlight of my Army career. The Mission and Installation Contracting Command is the Army's standard for contracting because of the extraordinary efforts of every Soldier and Army civilian in our organization toward operationalizing contracting support. Providing world-class acquisition support for our Soldiers directly affects Army readiness. I salute you all for your selfless efforts to our mission.
In the past two years, we completed 62,000 contracting actions valued at more than $9.2 billion, but that does not measure what the MICC does for our Army. We delivered materiel readiness to ensure every Soldier is ready to fight tonight. I applaud you, the MICC workforce, for building solid working relationships with leaders of Training and Doctrine Command, Futures Command, Installation Management Command, Army Forces Command, Army South, Army North, Medical Command and the other commands and Army activities we support. It took consistent dialogue and collaboration with all of our customers to provide contracting support and materiel readiness when they needed it and how they needed it.
We developed the MICC Readiness Initiative that aimed to give our contracting offices the authority, skillset and ability to perform up to 90% of the contract work at their installations. This helped build our offices and gave our customers the exact support they requested. With MRI, we built our corps of contracting professionals and made great strides to rebuild the 1102 career field by bringing back 40 GS-11 positions, 44 GS-12 positions and 22 GS-13 positions. We added industrial property management positions, quality assurance members and cost-price analysts who are critical to our contracting mission. While we have less than 100 of our 1,500-person workforce in non-acquisition careers, we have worked hard to fill all positions throughout the command as every career and position is vital to the success of our mission. Moreover, the MICC's success with advancing contracts to small businesses across the nation has been a key factor in the Army meeting its small business goals.
With our offices aligned properly and able to do the vast majority of their installation's work, we allow our centers of excellence to concentrate their efforts on the complex contracts to support the Army's category management initiative. We had great success standardizing our food services and base operations contracts, and now we are developing construction and facility management contracts.
I have had the wonderful opportunity during my battlefield circulation to visit all of our contracting offices, and I routinely witnessed the incredible efforts by our outstanding Soldiers and Army civilian workforce across two brigades, two field directorate offices, nine battalions and 30 contracting offices throughout the continental United States and Puerto Rico. Together we provided invaluable acquisition support to all of our customers that ensured the Army is ready to fight and win tonight.
I'd also like to extend my deep gratitude to all the MICC Soldiers and Army civilians who deployed around the world the past two years to provide operational contracting support. You are living proof of the importance of contracting to the Army with every contracting action that provides critical support to combatant commanders. From supporting hurricane relief efforts and acquiring goods and services in the war zone, to ensuring Soldiers have what they need to accomplish the border support mission, your outstanding contracting support has been agile, adaptable, and essential to the warfighters' needs.
I trust you will give Brig. Gen. Christine Beeler the same level of professionalism and support that you gave me while I was your commanding general. As I transition to Army Contracting Command as the deputy commanding general for operations outside the continental United States know that your efforts for our Soldiers has shown me that Army contracting is destined for greater days ahead.
Accomplishing our mission takes a lot of effort, and requires a work-life balance. As Gen. Gus Perna, the commanding general of Army Materiel Command, says, we need 100% effort from 100% of the workforce. At the end of the day, we should all have a good balance of fitness, family time and activities to recharge ourselves. Always remember, as former Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno stated, "The Strength of our Nation is our Army. The Strength of our Army is our Soldiers. The Strength of our Soldiers is our Families. This is what makes us Army Strong!"
Thank you for all you do for the Soldiers, the Army and the nation.
Contracting for Soldiers! With honor!
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