Interview transcript:

Terry Gerton: You’ve recently laid out a mix of reforms and warnings and priorities for the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, which is still moving through Congress. What’s the overall message before we dig into the specifics that POGO wants to send about this year’s recommendations?

Greg Williams: Sure. I think we all welcome all of the extraordinary work that Congress has done this year to produce two different versions of NDAA bills that work very hard to overhaul military acquisition. Now that said, they place an enormous emphasis on deregulating military acquisition, with the Senate’s version repealing no fewer than 86 distinct statutes that govern military acquisition. Now, Congress has its own research arm to help inform for these decisions, and that’s the Government Accountability Office. Now the Government Accountability Office maintains a database of suggestions. And last I checked, there were 750 recommendations they had for how the Defense Department is run and exactly none of them recommend repealing any statutes having to do with military acquisition. Now I think the unavoidable question is if Congress doesn’t seem to be listening to the GAO, its own investigative body, well, who is it listening to? I think it’s only logical to wonder to what extent these changes are being pushed by the defense industry, perhaps at the expense of the interests of the taxpayer.

Terry Gerton: Are you seeing any specifics in the NDAA that relate back to those 750 GAO suggestions?

Greg Williams: Frustratingly few. Two that I’ll call out that I think are really important are passages in both the House and Senate versions that secure greater right to repair the military’s own equipment. Just imagine you’re far from home, you have a piece of equipment that you rely on, perhaps for your safety or in order to be able to complete your mission, and it breaks. Right now, there are rules, laws, contracts that often get in the way of military personnel fixing those things. This year’s NDAA, whether the Senate or the House versions prevail in this context, will dramatically increase the military’s right to repair its own equipment. And I think it’s really important that those passages survive conference. The other one that I think is particularly important in terms of acquisition law are some reforms to what’s called the Nunn-McCurdy Act, which stipulates that Congress needs to be informed if weapons development or procurement programs breach certain cost thresholds and requires that the Secretary of Defense or Secretary of War recertify those programs and provide updated timetables and budgets for their completion. So the passages that amend that provide Congress more say in the recertification of those programs and they make it easier to call out cost overages, especially in the case of large programs like naval shipbuilding, where if you look at the overall program, you may not have breached overall cost thresholds. But you’ve already built two or three ships and you can tell that they’re way over budget. What this passage allows you to do is to treat them as distinct subprograms and apply those thresholds to them individually.

Terry Gerton: Well, you’re right. There’s certainly a lot of coverage in the NDAA, both versions, around acquisition reform. One of the other pieces that POGO has really called out is the use of military force. First, you recommend that the authorizations for the use of military force from 1991 and 2002 tied to operations in Iraq be repealed. Why is it so important to take those off the books now?

Greg Williams: Well, those AUMFs have been used very pervasively to authorize all kinds of use of violence around the world that seem to have very little to do with the original intentions of those two AUMFs. And one of the ways Congress can clarify the use of its power to decide when and where we go to war is by not leaving things like that lying around to be potentially misinterpreted or reinterpreted by the executive branch.

Terry Gerton: I’m speaking with Greg Williams. He’s the director of the Center for Defense Information at the Project on Government Oversight. Greg, let’s follow up on this a little bit because there are conversations happening between the president and his team and Congress right now about operations in Venezuela. So how do those AUMFs relate to those kinds of current conversations?

Greg Williams: Well, I’m going to emphasize that there are operations against Venezuelan nationals and Venezuelan boats, and they’re being treated by the administration as being very distinct from potential operations that might take place in Venezuela. And in fact, the administration is arguing that they don’t need to comply with the War Powers Act in the context of the Venezuelan boats because we’re not deploying troops in harm’s way. As you may know, these boat strikes are believed to be largely conducted by unmanned aerial vehicles and so arguably, American troops are never in any danger as we execute these strikes. Now if we were to invade Venezuela or if we were to fly crewed aircraft over Venezuela or even close to Venezuela and engage in a shooting war with them, that would more clearly trigger the requirements of the War Powers Act, or at least that would not be subject to the exclusion that the Trump administration has called out in the context of those boats.

Terry Gerton: One of the other concerns that you raise about military deployments is border enforcement and the use of military forces in that function. What’s the concern there?

Greg Williams: Well, the overall concern is that what we’re seeing is a steady erosion of what we thought were bright lines, protecting both American citizens and others against being arbitrarily seized or killed. And whether we see those lines blurred outside our borders, as in the context of these boats or inside of our borders, it just makes us all a lot less safe. It’s much harder to count on not being swept up in some raid and potentially deported to a foreign country without any meaningful opportunity to defend our rights.

Terry Gerton: Well, military deployments and acquisition reform are really big topics. I want to pull you down to something a little more wonky and talk cost accounting standards because you’ve got a recommendation in here and there’s been a lot of conversation about moving DoD from cost accounting standards to GAAP, Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. Why was that important enough to raise in your memo?

Greg Williams: I think it represents a fundamental misunderstanding of how accounting in general works. And it undermines a very basic control that any customer organization wants to have over vendors that are submitting things like expense reports. So at a high level, I would describe the generally accepted accounting principles as a set of tools that are created by an industry consortium to protect shareholders in private organizations from misrepresentation of the value of the enterprise. Cost accounting standards are like the expense report guidelines that any consultant or anyone who’s ever worked as a customer for a big business has to comply with. And different customers have different standards. Some say you can’t have any alcohol at all with your dinner, some say you can have one drink. Some say if you’ve traveled less than 50 miles, you can’t submit any meal-related expenses. It represents an agreement between the customer and their vendor about what is and is not an acceptable expense. And it’s a very basic structure that any business person should recognize.

Terry Gerton: How does that relate to DoD’s ability to pass an audit?

Greg Williams: I don’t think it is particularly related. As long as you follow whatever rules are articulated for you, you can pass an audit. I think use of cost accounting standards is more about making sure that the government gets a fair deal from its vendors when those vendors submit cost reports for reimbursement.

Terry Gerton: So POGO’s list is pretty specific in terms of things that you would hope Congress would consider. If they were to take up your list, what kinds of impact would you expect to see in terms of military readiness and operations?

Greg Williams: Well, I think it’s really interesting that over the last several weeks we’ve paid a lot of attention to the USS Gerald Ford Carrier Strike Group. There are two readiness issues that bear on it directly that have received some attention, I think, should probably receive more attention. One is that it was called out as a specific example of how service people are affected by the inability to repair their own equipment. And the example that was used was, I think, more than half of the ovens used to prepare meals for sailors embarked on the Ford were out of commission and had to wait an extended period of time for the vendor to repair them. Now that’s one thing when you know you can’t have muffins with your breakfast. But if similar principles apply to systems that allow the aircraft carrier to launch and recover aircraft or move weapons to the flight deck and things like that, just imagine being 6,000 miles away from the contractor who might repair those things and having one of them break and having to wait or redeploy back to the continental United States to have those things fixed. It’s just, I think, a fundamentally unreasonable expectation and puts our troops needlessly in danger.

The post POGO has new recommendations to improve the 2026 NDAA before it’s finalized first appeared on Federal News Network.

© Federal News Network

Nearly every service member living in privatized military housing has experienced at least one serious issue in their home — and an overwhelming number say their family’s health has been negatively impacted by their housing conditions. Nearly half said a medical provider had confirmed the connection, a new survey found. 

The Change the Air Foundation recently conducted the Safe Military Housing Survey — one of the most comprehensive efforts yet to collect data the Defense Department has never been able to track accurately. The survey  was designed to answer questions previous studies had overlooked and to provide Congress and the Pentagon with better data on what families across all branches and ranks are actually experiencing in military housing. 

“We were hearing a lot of how many indoor air quality hazards and just housing hazards that these families were experiencing. But nobody was really ever asking, how is this affecting your physical health? How is this affecting your cognitive abilities? How is this affecting your mental and emotional health, and your and your personal finances? That’s a huge component of this survey,” Brandon Chappo, co-founder and director of public policy at the Change the Air Foundation, told Federal News Network. 

Erica Thompson, a military spouse and the military families’ liaison for the Change the Air Foundation, lived in military housing for 10 months at Maxwell Air Force Base located in Montgomery, Alabama. Thompson said her family immediately noticed serious issues with the house, including a failing AC system they were told couldn’t be replaced. Once contractors opened the walls without any containment, the entire family — including their dog — began experiencing a cascade of medical issues. Her son started passing out in the house and the dog started having seizures; three of their children were later diagnosed with asthma and one was diagnosed with bilateral pediatric cataracts in both eyes. 

“We saw a huge range of health implications across the board, throughout our whole family. And so I think using part of that, it was able to guide us through this questionnaire, some of those things that I wish offices knew. It was able to really give me insight into making some of these questions, because we would share our story with congressional offices, they would say, ‘How many more kids are there like yours?’ And I said, ‘I don’t know. There’s no data around that right now,’” Thompson told Federal News Network.

For decades, service members and their families living in privatized military housing have been exposed to hazardous conditions, including black mold, contaminated water, asbestos in ceilings and lead in walls. The survey found that mold, mildew or microbial growth were the most common issues, reported by 74% of respondents. More than half of respondents cited significant problems with temperature and humidity, pest infestations, water damage and HVAC failures.

“Mold and water damage can be extraordinarily hazardous to somebody’s health. That’s extremely dismaying,” Chappo said.

Overall, 76% of service members said their health has been negatively affected by housing conditions, and nearly half said a physician had confirmed their homes were making them sick. 

The survey also revealed an alarming statistic — 47% of service members said their housing issues impacted their ability to perform their duties or maintain mission readiness. The problem was particularly prevalent among those stationed in Florida. 

Three in five service members reported experiencing mental health challenges such as anxiety or depression, and roughly two in five service members said those issues affected their ability to attend work or training. One in six service members had to relocate — sometimes temporarily, sometimes permanently — often leaving behind personal items that had been damaged. 

“That is absolutely stunning. And so, if anything, it underscores the importance of trying to get these issues dealt with. It’s the fact that not only are our service members’ health and wellness being affected, it’s mission readiness. This is a national security issue, and we need to start talking about it in that light, and start really framing it in that way,” Chappo said. 

While anxiety, depression, mood changes, cognitive issues, insomnia, headaches, migraines, brain fog and skin, eye and respiratory irritation top the list of reported health problems, the survey found the health impacts to be far more extensive than that.

“This is extraordinary. These [medical conditions] weren’t just in the low percentages. We’re talking in the 20, 30, 40 percentages for some of these. Even those alone, being as high as they are, really should catch the attention of, hopefully, the country, and of course, those in Congress,” Chappo said. 

The survey found that Florida, Hawaii and Texas experienced housing-related issues at far greater rates and saw significantly higher rates of both health impacts and readiness concerns. Nearly 60% of service members stationed in Florida said housing issues impacted their ability to perform their duties. Health impacts were also higher than average — 84% of Florida service members said their families’ health had been impacted by house-related issues, compared with 83% in Hawaii and North Carolina. 

“I think it’s got to do with lots of these states are on federal land, and they don’t have to follow the state regulations for building and code, and so that’s something that needs to be looked at. But Florida, Hawaii and Texas were exponentially higher on those stats for both readiness and really across the board. And those have some really big commands in those states as well that need to have some attention drawn to it,” Thompson said. 

Marines reported the highest rates across all branches, with 85% saying their families were affected.

“We were displaced multiple times, with one displacement over 30 days. Relocation to a new home was requested, but we were denied a new home. We ultimately moved into a hotel on our dime after getting rid of everything we owned,” an active Marine service member in North Carolina told the Change the Air Foundation. 

Gaps in current dispute resolution process

Whenever a housing-related issue arises, service members are supposed to follow a three-step tenant resolution process that includes built-in escalation steps.

The first step is to file a service call. If the issue isn’t resolved to the service member’s satisfaction, it can be escalated to the Military Housing Office or the government housing office on base, along with the service member’s chain of command to help elevate the issues. Thompson said that’s where most families drop out of the process.

The survey found that nine in ten service members always reported the issues they were experiencing, but only 7% made it all the way through the tenant resolution process — and of those, 72% said it still did not resolve their problem.

One in 14 service members were denied the tenant resolution process altogether.

“I want people to try to understand this, nine of 10 service members reported issues as they should to the proper authorities. Nine of 10 had to report the same issue multiple times. 66% of those had their issues marked resolved without a satisfactory result and over 50% of those went unresolved entirely. We have a situation here where the families are asking, calling, screaming for help. They’re upholding their end of the bargain, and the other side isn’t, and it’s failing,” Chappo said.

“Only 7% of service members actually made it through the entire dispute resolution process. That shows us that it’s broken. It’s failing. It’s not working,” he added.

In addition, the survey highlights major gaps in seven-year housing histories, with only 43% of service members receiving one — and most of those were incomplete.

“You’re able to turn down a house if you recognize or see something you’re not comfortable with. But if their service calls aren’t accurate, or it’s not reporting accurately, I think that screams to a bigger issue of what is going on? What’s the further issue? It’s not only for the service members, but it’s for DoD accountability,” Thompson said. 

Out-of-pocket cost of privatized housing

Roughly half of service members reported paying an average of $1,680 out of pocket for costs such as pest control, mold inspections, hotel stays and medical bills .

“If they’re paying for pest control out of pocket, that’s not something that’s reimbursable. Our dehumidifiers and air purifiers are not reimbursable. You just end up paying out of pocket to do what you can, to try and make what you have work. And then same with medical bills, if you’re seeking extra time or care outside of the military, that’s out of pocket as well,” Thompson said. 

Nearly all military family housing in the United States — about 99% — is owned and managed by private companies. These projects are built around 50-year ground leases and legal agreements that private partners use to secure financing and guarantee predictable revenue over decades, which limited the Defense Department’s ability to cancel or renegotiate agreements when housing conditions declined, creating oversight challenges that have persisted for decades.

Thompson, along with other advocates, have been advocating for several amendments to be included in the 2026 defense policy bill, including the proposed Healthy at Home on Base Act, which would require the Defense Department to study mold and its health effects in both military housing and barracks. Another amendment would direct the department to adopt uniform mold remediation standards across all barracks and family housing.

“We’re hearing a lot of congressional offices are starting to read the report, and they’re already asking for meetings to discuss these a little more closely, and then, of course, talk about some of the fixes and solutions. We’re having some feedback and some conversations with folks at the Pentagon who are kind of taking a closer look at this as well, and trying to come up with long term fixes, as opposed to band aid fixes,” Chappo said.

The post Privatized military housing is making service members and their families sick at alarming rates, survey finds first appeared on Federal News Network.

© AP Photo/Mengshin Lin