Pentagon says it's developing 'matrix' with status of NDAA provisions

The Defense Department says it will develop and make public a "matrix" to track the implementation status of acquisition-related provisions from the National Defense Authorization Act.

In a June 18 letter, Kim Herrington, acting principal director of defense pricing and contracting, writes that the matrix will particularly focus on "provisions that direct a change or consideration of a change to the [Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement]."

"The matrix will be posted and updated regularly on the Defense Pricing and Contracting public website," adds the letter, which was sent to the Government Accountability Office. GAO today issued a report calling on the Pentagon to improve how it communicates the status of regulation changes.

GAO's report was mandated by the House Armed Services Committee's report accompanying the Fiscal Year 2019 National Defense Authorization Act.

GAO found that DOD has moved to address 180 acquisition-related provisions since 2010.

"On average, implementation was completed within one year from enactment," GAO found. "Some complicated provisions took more than two years to implement. For example, a fiscal year 2016 NDAA provision, directing a regulatory change for commercial item procurements, took more than two years to implement because DOD was reconciling a prior year's related but different NDAA commercial item provision into one DFARS change."