Congress to commissary customers: We have your back

Whether it’s monitoring the new process for supplying fruits and vegetables to the Far East or keeping tabs on a new system for pricing groceries, members of Congress are fully engaged in “robust oversight” to make sure the efforts to reform the commissary system don’t hurt the benefit, according to congressional aides.

Legislation is making its way through Congress that would dramatically change the way groceries are sold in military commissaries. Currently, groceries are sold at cost from the vendor, plus a 5 percent surcharge added at the cash register. The reforms would allow the Defense Commissary Agency to start a “variable pricing” system, selling each grocery item at a lower or higher cost.

But lawmakers have also included safeguards in the proposed legislation and will be monitoring the reforms, if they become law, to ensure the benefit is not degraded, the aides said.

Some changes have already been authorized and are underway — and lawmakers are already monitoring these changes. The commissary agency will begin testing its own private label products later this year. Meanwhile DoD officials are developing a "baseline" of commissary savings to use as a benchmark for future comparisons.

“Saving money is not driving the reform. Saving the system is driving the reform,” said Alison Lynn, spokeswoman for the House Armed Services Committee. “Saving money should always be a priority, but this is really about acknowledging that this is a key benefit. … The starting point is preserving the benefit.”
A few years ago, the Defense Department proposed drastically cutting the commissary budget, which is about $1.4 billion a year. Congress required DoD to hire an independent third party to study possible changes to the system.

The proposed changes would come gradually and could take anywhere from three to eight or more years. And members of Congress won't rush the changes, because they want DoD to get it done correctly. “It’s a sea change in how DeCA does business. They’re going to have to basically relearn how to do business and to operate more like a commercial grocery chain,” according to one aide interviewed.

There will be rigorous oversight for each step and each part of the reform, he said.

DeCA officials have already briefed congressional aides about their approach for introducing private label brands and how they will roll out the products to shelves later this year. Officials have put out a notice asking interested companies for proposals. Once a selection is made, Congress will be informed of the specifics.

There's no intent to drastically cut taxpayer dollars to the commissary system, and there's no marker for how much of that yearly $1.4 billion in taxpayer dollars needs to be saved. But members of Congress are hopeful it will be reduced to some degree with the more commercial-like approach.

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, and military personnel subcommittee chairman Rep. Joe Heck, R-Nevada, “are committed to preserving this benefit for our service members and their families. Their number one priority is to maintain the benefit as it is, not to lessen it or necessarily have a big increase,” Lynn said.

“That is the number one marching order we have.”

Lawmakers also have been monitoring DeCA’s new system of providing fruits and vegetables to commissaries in the Far East. In early June, aides visited commissaries in Japan, South Korea and Guam.

This new system has had “hiccups and challenges” as customers have complained about quality and cost of the produce, but it’s probably a better process, the aides said.

“There were no funky-looking carrots or celery. ... Prices and quality are certainly getting better. It’s starting to equalize,” Lynn said. “But there’s still room for improvement.”
Under the new system, when possible, the contractors buy fresh fruits and vegetables locally. DeCA no longer pays to ship fruits and vegetables to those commissaries.

The aides met with about 40 spouses in Osan, South Korea, and talked with customers elsewhere. They heard some complaints, not about cost, but about freshness. The DoD Inspector General will look into those complaints as part of the IG's new congressionally-mandated requirement to evaluate the effectiveness of this new produce-purchasing process in the Far East.

Service members or families who have concerns about their commissary benefit can contact their member of Congress; if it appears to be a systemic concern, the member of Congress will steer the complaint to the appropriate committee where it can be addressed.