New director leads center for installation operations, support contracts

By Ryan Mattox, Mission and Installation Contracting Command Public Affairs OfficeNovember 16, 2021

New director leads center for installation operations, support contracts
Mike Vicory is the director of the Mission and Installation Contracting Command Installation Readiness Center at Joint Base San Antonio Fort Sam Houston, Texas. He most recently served as the director of procurement services at the NASA Shared Services Center at the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. (Photo Credit: Ryan Mattox) VIEW ORIGINAL

JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas (Nov. 16, 2021) -- A former director of procurement services at NASA is the director of the Mission and Installation Contracting Command Installation Readiness Center at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston, Texas.

Mike Vicory arrived in late October to lead the command’s newly formed center.

“While I have only been on board for a few weeks, I have been very impressed with the professionalism and dedication of the IRC and Field Directorate Office-Fort Sam Houston team,” Vicory said. “Since the IRC is new, I am excited about the prospect to shape the IRC’s operating posture moving forward and demonstrating our value to the Army.”

Vicory most recently served as the director of procurement services at the NASA Shared Services Center at the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. There he oversaw the execution of the agency’s grants, cooperative agreements and small business innovation research and technology transfer contracts, enterprise software licenses, and contracts that support agency-wide requirements, to include information technology business services. He also oversaw the execution of all agency requirements under the simplified acquisition threshold, which is $250,000.

Prior to his time at NASA, he spent 16 years working for both the Navy and Marine Corps in Washington, D.C., as both a contracting officer and procurement analyst.

Vicory earned a bachelor’s degree in political science and history from Santa Clara University in California and a Master of Business Administration from George Washington University in Washington.

In early fiscal 2021, the MICC began filling vacant positions and seeking a director for the MICC IRC. The MICC IRC team is realigned to report directly to the MICC FDO-Fort Sam Houston.

The IRC serves as the strategic central location to award new and follow-on contracts for installation operations and support in order to strategically align MICC contract execution with its major mission partners’ readiness priorities and lines of effort.

Since the initial operational capability of IRC and move of the command’s full food service center of excellence workload and staff under the IRC earlier this year, five full food services and dining facility attendants contracts have been awarded in excess of $280 million to support requirements at Fort Stewart, Georgia; Fort Drum, New York; Fort Wainwright, Alaska; Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington; and Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. These efforts enabled the Army to provide millions of meals for Soldiers across the nation.

“We were very fortunate to keep the full food services team together and become part of the IRC from the beginning,” said Gary Stevens, who was leading the IRC team until October. “The team was operating on auto-pilot, while others were concentrating on hiring actions, establishing a new Department of Defense activity address code, getting access to all of the systems needed and setting up the new office.”

Stevens added that an integrated process team met weekly following the publishing of the operations order contributing to the initial startup success.

The IRC also supports the base operations contract portfolio, which is in the early stages of the process to award a contract for operation requirements at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah. Once the IRC staff finishes the process and awards the contract, it will be transferred to the MICC-Dugway Proving Ground contracting office for administration.

“The IRC was stood up so the MICC can more effectively promote strategic Army category management objectives that will optimize support for our Soldiers,” Vicory said. “This will be realized in the form of increased savings, reduced procurement actions lead times and standardization of services across the Army for those vital life support functions like food service and base operations.”

The IRC is expected to reach full operational capability by spring 2022.