FORT BRAGG, North Carolina –
Since May of 2014 the U. S. Army has called upon the Defense Logistics Agency Distribution Expeditionary team to support the Army’s Brigade Combat Team drawdown and reorganization/inactivation and Forces Command Unit Equipment Reuse Work Group Expanded initiative.
Distribution has supported six previous BCT drawdown missions for the Ft Knox 1st Infantry Division, Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson 793rd Military Police and 6th Engineering Battalion, Ft Stewart 2nd BCT 3rd ID and 984th Engineering Battalion, Ft Drum 10th Mountain Division, Ft Carson 2nd BCT 4th ID and Ft Riley 4th IBCT / 1st ID. The seventh, and most recent, successful operation was in support of the XVIII Airborne Corps UERWG-E at Fort Bragg, N.C., from July 13 to 22 2015.
The mission of the DDE team was to assist in bringing equipment from Army property book records to DLA Distribution Standard System records for that materiel with disposition to DLA depots. This relieved the Army Property Book Officers of accountability, allowing the units to meet their inactivation time lines in accordance with HQDA EXORD 119-14 BCT Reorganization/490 Excess Equipment Drawdown.
The Army identified a 61 percent reduction of materiel consisting of more than 10,000 pieces of unit excess equipment for turn-in to the DDE, DLA-Disposition Services or divestiture to the Army Materiel Command Logistics Readiness Center.
Materiel turned-in to the DDE was validated, receipted in DSS, packaged and prepared for shipment to DLA Distribution Susquehanna, Pa., DLA Distribution Tobyhanna, Pa., and DLA Distribution Anniston Ala., to be stored under Army ownership awaiting maintenance repair or reissue to other Army units.
“The depth and breadth of the excess problem continuously changes due to force structure decisions, modernization, obsolescence and changes to divestiture lists,” said Army Col. Kenneth Dyer. “Fort Bragg UERWG-E excess turn-in event was a driver to aggressively address excess divestiture – it succeeded!”
Supporting Fort Bragg was the DDE team led by DLA Distribution San Joaquin Distribution specialist Jason Middleton comprised of eight additional DDE members and two information operation personnel; distribution process supervisor Joseph Ortiz, transportation specialist Burton Norvell, distribution process lead Patrick Kinnear, distribution process workers Philip Rosal and Melonie Hernandez from DLA Distribution San Joaquin; supply technician Melissa Davis and supply systems analyst Shirley Merrill from DLA Distribution Red River Texas DDE. Kevan Kern and Terrance Perry provided IT contingency support throughout the operation.