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DoD to draft full 2010 budget for new president

Pentagon officials are crafting a full 2010 defense blueprint even though the coming change in administration likely will shift the nation’s defense spending priorities, sources said.

That decision marks the resolution of a debate that began earlier this year among the Bush administration and Pentagon officials about whether to hand the next president a full six-year military spending plan, or do a partial plan that left it to the new administration to fashion its own version.

The situation became more murky and confusing in April, when the White House’s Office of Management and Budget instructed federal departments and agencies to avoid building the standard annual budget requests.

“You are not required to submit a formal budget request in September,” OMB Director Jim Nussle wrote in an April 7 memo. “Most of the policy materials you usually submit in September in support of your budget requests will not be required until after the new administration or transition team is in place.”

Army Times obtained a copy of Nussle’s memo, which told federal entities to prepare 2010 “budget databases” with “current services baselines” and program estimates for the coming fiscal year. Those documents and data will allow the next administration to put its stamp on the 2010 federal budget request to be sent to Congress in February.

The instructions were in line with practices used by the outgoing George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations, but the memo created confusion. Over the spring and summer, U.S. defense community insiders, in private and in public, said things including: “The Pentagon isn’t doing a 2010 POM,” or program objective memorandum.

Now it appears that the Pentagon will comply with Nussle’s instruction — but will not stop there.

“DoD intends to go through its normal internal programming and budget process,” said Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Brian Maka. “The department will provide OMB with whatever data it requires.”

Several sources have said the Defense Department objected to the White House’s transition plan. Under DoD’s two-year budget cycle, major funding and programmatic changes are generally made in the even years, with smaller adjustments in the odd years. Because the last budget submitted to Congress is for 2009, an odd year, the 2010 request would feature bigger changes. Essentially, sources said, the Office of the Secretary of Defense argued the 2010 plan is too important to construct outside of normal practices.

Sources said there is no formal exemption, meaning “you won’t find it on any piece of paper,” as one former federal budgeting official said. OMB and Pentagon officials reached an oral pact that lifted the document’s requirements for the military, sources say.

The Office of the Secretary of Defense sped up the budget-building process, aiming to complete the spending plan around the time of the November presidential election, sources said.

Pentagon officials declined to directly comment on the exemption talk.

Asked why defense leaders pushed back against Nussle’s direction, Maka said: “The department has not opposed OMB’s plan.”

Maka also confirmed that the transition team that will oversee the change of power will be handed a 2010 program objective memorandum soon after the election.

“The goal is to complete the internal programming and budget review by November,” he said. “This information will be available for the next administration.”

Crafting a full POM plan “has to be done,” said Loren Thompson, chief operating officer of the Arlington, Va.-based Lexington Institute, “because the next administration will not be adequately staffed to prepare a fiscal 2010 budget in time for mark-ups by the congressional committees.”