CAP and the 2012 Federal Budget

Started by Turk, September 15, 2011, 02:11:51 AM

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Al Sayre

Incorrect.  CAP has MOU's with the States, but it's for when The State is footing the bill for the activity, SAR/DR or something else directly.  If The State requests USAF assistance and an "A" or "M" mission number is issued, we are acting as a "Big A" Auxiliary and an instrumentality of the Federal Govt via USAF.  Then the funding agreement is between the State and Federal Gov'ts, and no MOU is required.  Many states (but not all) have told the USAF to just call CAP directly if there is a missing aircraft or beacon going off, and handle it via State-Federal channels, and that may be written into the MOU. Others get the first call and then decide if they want CAP involved.  I know that in MS for example, CAP get's called first, but MEMA also gets notified as their duty officer frequently calls me about 20 minutes after AFRCC does...
Lt Col Al Sayre
MS Wing Staff Dude
Admiral, Great Navy of the State of Nebraska
GRW #2787

RiverAux

AFRCC has a MOU with each state which is what allows CAP to be there representing the AF. 
CAP has a separate MOU with each state that governs missions CAP does for the state. 

lordmonar

Quote from: RiverAux on September 16, 2011, 07:52:30 PM
AFRCC has a MOU with each state which is what allows CAP to be there representing the AF. 
CAP has a separate MOU with each state that governs missions CAP does for the state.

So like I said....if the USAF did not fund CAP then they would be on the stick to provide the service that CAP provides now.

Like I said....the can't just palm it off.

As soon as the USAF started to fail to meet their end of the MOU the states will begin to cry "unfunded mandate" and that won't be pretty.
PATRICK M. HARRIS, SMSgt, CAP

RiverAux

#23
Nope.  AFRCC's only obligation is to coordinate federal assistance from all federal agencies.  They aren't mandated to do more than that. 

For example, here is a copy of the Oregon-AFRCC MOU -- note that there is no requirement that the Air Force provide any specific assets, just that the AFRCC will coordinate use of federal assets in general.
http://www.oregon.gov/OMD/OEM/tech_resp/sar_docs/afrcc-mou.pdf?ga=t

I found virtually identical agreements for ND and IL.

N Harmon

Quote from: RiverAux on September 16, 2011, 08:39:24 PM
Nope.  AFRCC's only obligation is to coordinate federal assistance from all federal agencies.  They aren't mandated to do more than that.

I think you are mistaken on what it means to be a "SAR Coordinator". According to the National Search and Rescue Plan (emphasis mine):

QuoteSAR RESPONSIBILITIES

United States SAR Coordinators

21. The SAR Coordinators, designated below, have overall responsibility for establishing RCCs as necessary, and for providing or arranging for SAR services within United States SRRs. Only RCCs properly established by the4se SAR Coordinators should carry out domestic and international coordination of civil SAR operations.

22. United States SAR Coordinators are listed below:

a.  United States Air Force:  Recognized SAR Coordinator for the United States aeronautical SRR corresponding to the continental United States other than Alaska;
b.  United States Pacific Command:  Recognized SAR Coordinator for the United States aeronautical SRR corresponding to Alaska; and
c.  United States Coast Guard:  Recognized SAR Coordinator for all other United States aeronautical and maritime SRRs.  This includes the State of Hawaii as well as waters over which the United States has jurisdiction, such as navigable waters of the United States.

So when it comes to aeronautical SAR in the contiguous United States, the U.S. Air Force is responsible for the whole thing and not just coordinating.
NATHAN A. HARMON, Capt, CAP
Monroe Composite Squadron

RiverAux

Folks, you are forgetting that the states and local agencies are primarily responsible for SAR in the US.  If they need help, they ask the feds (in the form of AFRCC) and the AFRCC calls who they think will get the job done best.  Sometimes its the AF sometimes it is not.  If CAP was no longer around, the AF would be under no obligation to purchase 500 light airplanes man them to provide the exact same level of service that CAP now provides.  Heck, the AFRCC calls out the Coast Guard more than the AF to respond to such requests. 

Imagine CAP is gone.
An airplane goes missing.
State asks AFRCC for help.
AFRCC says that we have f-15s, C-130s and some other planes but none are appropriate to assist in this mission.  We can ask the National Guard to send over some helicopters.  Sorry, can't help you out more.

lordmonar

And that's when the fecal matter hits the fan!
PATRICK M. HARRIS, SMSgt, CAP

N Harmon

Quote from: RiverAux on September 16, 2011, 09:13:44 PMFolks, you are forgetting that the states and local agencies are primarily responsible for SAR in the US.

States are responsible for SAR that is not already the responsibility of certain federal agencies. Aeronautical and maritime SAR are federal responsibilities.

In fact, according to the AFRCC:

"Without Civil Air Patrol's highly dedicated personnel, the United States Air Force would find it very difficult to fulfill it's mission responsibilities in the 48 Continental United States."

So, without CAP, the U.S. Air Force would find it difficult to fulfill it's responsibilities to coordinate SAR?
NATHAN A. HARMON, Capt, CAP
Monroe Composite Squadron

Eclipse

Here's a list of all the MOA's & MOU's, at least as of 2008, from 1AF, which is the most current list I could find.
https://1afnorth.region1.ang.af.mil/JPRC/State%20MOUMOA/Forms/AllItems.aspx

One doc (presumably the AFRCC/state version) is an MOA, signed by the Governor and General Henry Morrow, listed as "Joint Flag Officer Warfighting Course, Maxwell AFB, Ala" at the time of the signing.  It indicates that it is in force until rescinded in writing with 60 day notice.

The other (presumably the corporate version) is an MOU signed by my state's EMA and a Lt. Col. Wash, indicated as the commander of AFRCC, and the last paragraph says it remains in force only by "mutual agreement", and can be modified via phone, with a requirement that it be updated in writing "immediately".  One note of interest is that the procedures outlined by the document are not what we follow in my state on missing aircraft searches and related activations, nor has it ever worked as indicated.  Since my wing got a finding last year on the CI for not having an MOU (with a CAP-USAF note that it is the state who is not interested in the conversation), I have to assume that one or both of these are no longer in force.

I'd be interested in the legal nuance between an MOU and an MOA, and why and how we can in what appears to be a vacuum of a formal agreement.  Knowing how my state tends to do things in general, it could be anything from "a handshake", to "we'd prefer to not be bothered, you guys just figure it out..."

"That Others May Zoom"

Eclipse

Quote from: N Harmon on September 16, 2011, 10:08:52 PM
So, without CAP, the U.S. Air Force would find it difficult to fulfill it's responsibilities to coordinate SAR?

I would say "yes" - coordination requires command and control assest, not to mention resources that care what you say.

USAF fulfills it's mandate by handing off the taskings to another trained and qualified agency in CAP.  Absent CAP, an entire network and
hierarchy of authority would need to be established, at the typical costs for doing these things in government agencies.  The arguments over jurisdiction and funding could go on for years.  I would hazard a lot of agencies would work to disavow the job on principle alone.

Unless of course there was an HLS grant associated with it, in which case you'd have agencies fighting in the streets to be first on the list.

"That Others May Zoom"

RiverAux

Well, you guys can believe what you want, but if CAP were gone the federal government would end up saving money in relation to SAR/DR as there is almost nothing that CAP does that the feds would pick up and do using other resources simply because they are under no obligation to provide any specific level of service. 

States, on the other hand, which do have a duty to do this sort of thing may end up spending more money. 

Keep in mind that I'm certainly not in favor of the feds taking any such action. 



AirDX

This was forwarded by my WG/CC this morning.  It pays to have the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee on your speed dial:

Roger and Stan

Very good news!  We've just learned that the Senate Appropriations Committee has restored funding for CAP Operations and Maintenance and aircraft procurement.  Here are the figures:

O&M +$4.5 million for a total of $27.8 million

Aircraft +$6.8 million for a total of $9.0 million

Both the House and the Senate have increased our O&M so that is a done deal.  As to the aircraft funding the House only gave us $2.2 million so exactly what CAP receives will have to be worked out in the upcoming defense conference committee.

This means a great deal to CAP especially given the current political climate and the fact that 580 line items were cut in the Senate Defense Appropriations bill to reduce it by $26 billion.

Central to this happening is the help that both of you gave CAP in talking with Senator Inouye and his staff about our needs and requirements.

I can't thank you enough for your help!  When you next talk to the Senator and/or his staff please let them know how much we appreciate their help.

Aloha,

John

John Swain
Washington Representative
Civil Air Patrol - United States Air Force Auxiliary

Believe in fate, but lean forward where fate can see you.

FW

^That's what I call good news.... :clap:

Persona non grata

Turn the fleet over to the National Guard , problem solved......Guard does search and find and turns technical rescue over to local agencies. 
Rock, Flag & Eagle.........

lordmonar

Quote from: eaker.cadet on September 17, 2011, 02:40:57 AM
Turn the fleet over to the National Guard , problem solved......Guard does search and find and turns technical rescue over to local agencies.
There are seveal problems with that from a budget stand point.

The military maintaining the 500+/- aircraft would cost MORE then the CAP maintaining those same planes.
Also operations costs climbe as all those aircrews are paid for their flight time.  You also have to add in the costs of their housing, education, medical, retirement, and other benifits.

So handing the mission and the assets to someone else and axing $22M from the budget is not really a cost savings.

Also you have the figure the service GAP.  Say 1 Oct our funding goes away and everything is handed over to the National Guard.
What base gets the planes?
Who maintains them?
Is the AVGAS available on that base?
Where is the envionmental impact study?
Where is the logistics train? (where you buy parts from)
Who is the lead command?
Who is the SPOO?
Where is the training facility?
Does ACC set up a Weapons School for this/these platform(s)?
Who developes the TTL's?

The USAF does not do anything "simple".  It is not like they are just going to tell their local NG pilots to "learn how to fly SAR and get back to me".
Like I said before.......the USAF cannot afford to take on the inland SAR mission.
PATRICK M. HARRIS, SMSgt, CAP

Persona non grata

Maintenance is done at local FBO(CONTRACT), Most Air Guard bases are co located at local Air Ports.  The guard would not need the entire fleet maybe three or four.  I t can be done and there would be more considerably savings by doing these.  The USAF could use our vans for sure.......Worst case.  We better start looking for more missions to justify are existence. Some wings have a pretty good grasps on this and some dont.  Many people are joining  CAP these days to find out that they train and when the button is pushed only a few actually particpate in the real world mission.   Also, many obstacles are in peoples way when it comes to get training.  I have heard comments through out the country that people feel that they are playing dress up and whn they are asked to do something its like parking cars at the air show.  I remeber a CAP commercial and in the run up it says something like "when disaters strike we are there" from what I have experinced recently it is more like when disaster strikes we will try and get permission to be there but funding is low so we cant make any promises.  I have even heard from elected officials that they would not support CAP because of the difficulties they have had to go through to get CAP to respond.  I guess CAP made an attempt to get a new mission(VSAF) what happened?.  We should look at the MARS program to see if we can contribute there. 
Rock, Flag & Eagle.........

lordmonar

That's not how the USAF works.

FBO's are NOT.....I SAY AGAIN.....NOT going to cut it with USAF maintenance policies and directives....take a look at AFI 21-101 and you will know what I mean.

Second.....operations.

CAP
a) does not pay it's pilots...that's millions of dollars in pay, benifits, retirment, education and housing that does not have to be factored into the "cost per hour" calculations.
b) duel utiliese its pilots, that is they have other jobs to keep the busy...the USAF would have to dedicate squadrons and personnel to doing this mission.  It is not like they can just tack this onto a C-130 squadron's mission or an A-10 squadron's mission.  Standing up new squadrons take a lot of overhead.....even it is just a bunch of detachments run out of a central squadron.
c) does not have to pay for thing like currencies or initial training.  Once the squadrons or detachments were established then the USAF rules of currencies would be in effect.  That would mean that once IQT and MQT traing was completed then they would have to do CT storties every 30-60days just to keep current ON TOP of any actual missions they fly as they would have CT for each major task.

Third....manning.
The USAF would have to find enough pilots to do the mission.  (you got 200+ pilots sitting around not doing anything?  If so I think you should tell the USAF they are having a problem getting butts into their existing seats).
they would have to establish a training squadron somewhere to conduct inital platform training and inital qualification training.
They would have to stand up a logistics train.....that is depot personnel ready to help maintain the aircraft, procure and manage the spare parts, maintain the technical orders, flight manuals, etc.
You would have to find the guys to do the training and currencies paperwork (called ARMS in the USAF).
You would have to stand up operational support squadrons and MAJCOM staffs to manage this new weapons system.

Fourth real estate.
You will have to find the hangar space for these planes, office space for the pilots, maintainers, planners, ect.  Getting hanger space at local airport is not an easy or cheap thing to do.  Building new on military bases takes 5+ years from "hey we need to a hanger" to "Put the plane in the corner".....and that is if there is no political, operational or fincial hold up that slips the project to the right.

Once and for all......loud and clear.....it is impossible for the USAF to do this mission at the same cost that CAP does it.  PERIOD.
The only way to "save" money would be to completely drop it.....tell the states and counties that they are on their own and then live with the political fall out from that........Bottom line to that is that the USAF would only be forceing an even BIGGER cost onto the states (already cash strapped) because each state would have to recreate the wheel on a local level.

CAP is not in any danger of becomming ill relevent.  We lost a lot of BS missions when they stopped monitoring 121.5.....but when a plane is actually mission or an ELT is detected (121.5 or 435) we get the call and do the mission.....for way, way, way, way, way less then the USAF or any other government agency or civilian contractor could do it.

Palming it off onto the states or counties.....is only shifting and increasing the bill.
PATRICK M. HARRIS, SMSgt, CAP

Eclipse

#37
VSAF was not a CAP mission, it was tangential at best, and challenged from the start when they began "adjusting" our uniform and added all the asterisks its execution. 

The total operational budget for CAP wings, on top of the appropriate funds, is less than $2M, and probably nearer to $1.5M.  Everything else is member-funded and operates at or near cost.

So saying CAP "costs" about $25M a year is good enough for the discussion, and you'd never get near replacing it through professional channels like the military or the guard, and that assumes either is interested in the conversation.

We already know you can't do MX at the local FBO and hold down costs - that's why we have the highly successful consolidated MX system.

Most states have only one or two guard bases, and few, if any, have anyone on "alert" in the same way that CAP members are - you'd need at least the same number of planes distributed in basically the same way, in order to be able to launch anything close to a real alert SAR sortie.  That or you'd need the aircrews sleeping on alert like they do for the HLS combat stuff, and that ain't free.

Put all the planes in one place with alert crews, and you could be talking about 3-4 hour flight times just to get to the AO, let alone the mission itself.
Missions, no matter who runs them, require IC personnel, support and logistics.  And bear in mind the military and the guard aren't going to put up with the nonsense CAP members do about "pay your own way", "bring your own lunch", and "buy your own gear".

Additional sorties means more risk for the actuaries to calc as well - more medicals, more flight physicals, blah, blah.

Not to mention who's going to train these crews and provide retrain, proficiency, etc?  Again, unlike CAP, these guys won't get into a cockpit or sit in a class for free.  You also have to ramp up a whole new set of specialties, with all the ancillary costs associated with creating a new military program and training-up.

Almost everything on the above list, and the 1000 other little details we are not mentioning are done by CAP members for free.  You can't replace "free" with "government" and expect to save money.

My guess would be that the ramp up / down would be a 3-5 year process, at which time AOPA or other organizations start complaining about the lack of response and increased costs and the feds start looking to re-animate CAP in some form or another to "save money". 

$25M just to have 60,000 Americans show up to a meeting every week and not be a PITA to their neighbors for a few hours would be a good bargain, let alone what the good taxpayers of this country are getting for their buck.


"That Others May Zoom"

Persona non grata

Thanks for clearing up the VSAf thing, I was some what confused about the details of it execution.
Rock, Flag & Eagle.........

RiverAux

Quote from: lordmonar on September 17, 2011, 04:36:17 PM
Once and for all......loud and clear.....it is impossible for the USAF to do this mission at the same cost that CAP does it.  PERIOD.
Agreed

Quote from: lordmonar on September 17, 2011, 04:36:17 PMThe only way to "save" money would be to completely drop it.....tell the states and counties that they are on their own and then live with the political fall out from that........
This is pretty much what I was predicting would be the outcome.