ROCK ISLAND ARSENAL, Illinois - An Army Contracting Command-Rock Island employee was presented the 2021 Louis Dellamonica Award for Outstanding Army Material Command (AMC) Personnel of the Year during a ceremony at the U.S. Army Contracting Command’s Senior Leader Forum, at Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, Oct. 25.
Brent DePauw, a contracting officer supporting ACC-RI’s Logistics Civil Augmentation Program (LOGCAP) Contracting Division, is the second ACC-RI employee to be recognized with this notable award.
The Dellamonica Award recognizes outstanding accomplishments that significantly contributed to the AMC mission. Nominations must highlight how the employee motivates and inspires fellow employees to improve the quality of their own work, and how well they work with peers, subordinates, and supervisors.
“The selection was completely unexpected,” said DePauw. “It was a true honor to find out I was even nominated, and even more humbling to find out I was selected for this distinguished award.”
DePauw, who has worked at ACC-RI for more than 13 years, was assigned to LOGCAP in December 2020. In his role as a LOGCAP contracting officer, he supports U.S. NORTHERN Command, U.S. INDO-PACOM, and U.S. SPACE Command. LOGCAP provides contracted capabilities to plan for, and when directed, rapidly provide sustainment capabilities necessary to set theaters and enable Army and Joint, Interagency, Intergovernmental and Multinational operations.
“Knowing that what I do on a daily basis provides an unprecedented historical impact to the U.S. Army and their allies gives me the greatest sense of job satisfaction and purpose,” said DePauw.
DePauw was nominated for his work on several notable, high profile contingency contracting actions:
- Task orders in support of the Countermeasures Acceleration Group (CAG), supporting the vaccine trials in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Task orders supporting the Operation Allies Refuge (OAR)/Operation Allies Welcome (OAW), a $4.6 billion mission providing critical base life support services at five sites in support of the Afghan Special Immigrant Visa applicants, their families, and other at-risk Afghan civilians.
- Several last-minute urgent requirements, including providing Dining Facility (DFAC) operations at Fort Knox, Kentucky, for summer cadets when the previous contractor failed; and providing basic life support and sustainment services at four sites in Guam in support of the Defender Pacific (DP21)/Forager 21 Soldier training exercise.
All of these missions required constant communication with multiple partners to address their urgent natures and up-to hourly changes.
His unprecedented support to the OAR/OAW missions is of particular merit: Upon receiving funding and the first draft of the technical data package, he immediately issued the notice to proceed, as there was no time for a traditional contracting approach because flights were already scheduled to begin arriving from Afghanistan. Any delay would have resulted in mission failure and potential Afghan lives lost.
Further, Mr. DePauw supports the National Training Center (NTC), Fort Irwin, California, improving readiness for operational units preparing to deploy, and providing maintenance support to military vehicles. In addition, he supported an immediate requirement for a DFAC at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, due to the condemnation of the existing DFAC. Lastly, he supported an exercise at Joint Base Charleston and Warfighter 21 Exercise at Fort Hood, Texas, partnering with our British and French allies to provide them with the knowledge and experience with using LOGCAP and the capabilities it provides.
Despite the voluminous, ever-changing, complex workload he has been assigned, DePauw consistently delivers critical services at the right price and the right time. He attributes this to one thing: “It all comes down to the fact that I am surrounded by a great team,” said DePauw. “While this is an individual award, I am surrounded by brilliant people and their expertise is what drives mission success, and ultimately my success.”
Mark Mower, acting executive director of ACC-RI, said he was thrilled that DePauw was recognized with this award, as he himself has a lengthy background in LOGCAP contracting and is familiar with the program’s daily demands and mission impact across the globe.
“I was so happy when I heard Brent had been selected for the Louis Dellamonica Award,” said Mower. “He’s truly making a difference in peoples’ lives through his ability to think creatively, work decisively and soldier on until the mission is complete.”
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