The U.S. Army Mission and Installation Contracting Command held a change of responsibility and assumption of command ceremony Nov. 4 at the Sam Houston Club.
Command Sgt. Maj. Clinton Jackson uncased the colors and the outgoing director, Dr. Carol Lowman, unfurled them.
Once the colors were unfurled, Jackson passed them to Lowman who passed them to Jeffrey Parsons, executive director, Army Contracting Command, who in turn passed them to Col. Stephen Leisenring, charging him with the responsibilities of commander for the MICC.
"Carol, my thanks to you and your team for all you have accomplished in the establishment of your command and setting the foundation for the future," Parsons said.
The mission of MICC is to provide customers with a substantial return on investment by obtaining goods and services in a timely manner at the lowest cost for Soldiers and provide career management for over 1,300 military and civilian contracting personnel, explained Lowman.
"We take care of our Soldiers; we recruit them, house them, train them, mobilize and demobilize them and deploy and redeploy them. We impact their quality of life," she said.
"Today's Army cannot function without contractor support. Not only do contractors deliver the materiel we use to execute our mission such as tanks, helicopters and ammunition, they provide essential installation and mission support services critical to national defense, Soldiers and Families," Parsons said.
The Secretary of the Army formed an independent commission to provide a comprehensive review of the Army's acquisition system two years ago. Known as the Gansler Commission, named for former Under Secretary of Defense Dr. Jack Gansler, the organization was given a broad charter to examine current contracting operations and provide recommendations to get Army contracting back on track, Parsons explained.
One of the key recommendations was to restructure the Army contracting organization under one command, the ACC and establish two subordinate commands, the Expeditionary Contracting Command and the MICC.
"We must build upon our relationships with our customers and redouble our efforts in all that we do to achieve the vision of the Gansler Commission," Lowman said.
In closing Lowman said, "Steve, I entrust you to take good care of the MICC employees. I assure you they will take good care of you."
"We will continue fully integrating the MICC into the Army's generating force and from there into the Army's enterprise system. Most importantly we will dedicate our organization and ourselves to providing the best support to our nation's most precious treasure, Soldiers and their Families. There is no greater honor then to support them," Leisenring said.
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