The White House today announced the nomination of Bill LaPlante, the Air Force's principal deputy acquisition executive, to take over the long-vacant position of service acquisition executive.
LaPlante is fairly new to the deputy post -- he started the job in May after coming over from the MITRE Corporation, and before that the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory -- and his promotion would fill a critical, Senate-confirmed position that has been empty since 2009.
Moving LaPlante into the Air Force's top acquisition job would ease the burden on the service's acting secretary, Eric Fanning, because some acquisition-related activities can only be accomplished by Senate-confirmed appointees. However, senior service officials have long articulated the need for a full complement of acquisition decision-makers -- a civilian acquisition executive, his or her deputy, and a military deputy -- and LaPlante's promotion, if approved by the Senate, would still leave one of those three posts vacant.
Lt. Gen. Charles Davis has been serving in that military deputy position since May 2012, according to his official biography.