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News | March 5, 2021

Closing contracts, returning dollars

By DCMA Contract Lifecycle Management Center

There are approximately 579,000 overaged contracts across the Department of Defense, and while typically benign, they carry potential unnecessary or preventable government risks.

The potential solutions represent millions of dollars that can be returned to the military services. Closing these contracts is a priority for the Defense Contract Management Agency, which administers tens-of-thousands of the overaged contracts on behalf of DoD customers.

Army Col. Keith Harley, program manager at the agency’s new Contract Lifecycle Management Center, said the results of DCMA’s closeout efforts are clear.

“Prior to the formation of CLMC, the agency’s Contracts Directorate, in conjunction with our regional commands, orchestrated the reduction of the agency’s 70,000 overaged contracts to under 40,000 over a five-year period, returning $9 million back to the services and Treasury in fiscal year 2020,” said Harley.

Harley and his CLMC team are now pursuing greater efficiency and return. Established in December 2020, the center is using business judgment, comprehensive knowledge and streamlined processes to become what Harley envisions as “DoD’s center of excellence for closing and terminating contracts.” The center will find and share innovative techniques across DoD and other inter-governmental agencies, potentially returning billions of dollars to the services and Treasury.  

The CLMC merged the agency’s Contract Closeout Center and Terminations Group, and is composed of subject matter experts with extensive knowledge of complex flexibly priced and firm-fixed-price contracts. Team members include administrative contracting officers, administrative grant officers and termination contract officers holding Defense Acquisition Workforce Improvement Act, or DAWIA, level II and III certifications.

Work is performed at contract closeout locations in Houston, led by Johanna Akinfenwa, and near DCMA’s Fort Lee, Virginia, headquarters, led by Frederick Roitz. The CLMC Terminations Group is located in Atlanta, led by Pamela Mitchell.

Harley said his team is also looking at other innovations that will drive efficiency and return, including developing a closeout packet to assist small contractors with the final closeout process, collaborating with contractors on the use of initiatives that could further streamline closeouts, and the use of low-risk, quick closeout initiatives when appropriate.

Click here to learn more about the DCMA CLMC.