Defense Primer: Military Infrastructure Funding (CRS Report for Congress)
| Release Date |
Sept. 24, 2024 |
| Report Number |
IF12773 |
| Report Type |
In Focus |
| Authors |
Andrew Tilghman |
| Source Agency |
Congressional Research Service |
Summary:
The Department of Defense (DOD) maintains military
infrastructure to support military missions around the world.
This infrastructure includes buildings, roads, airfields, ports,
training ranges, barracks, utilities, piers, pipelines, and other
structures. Congress provides two primary funding sources to
support military infrastructure. Military construction
(MILCON) funding provides for the construction of new
facilities and the expansion of existing facilities. Facilities
Sustainment, Restoration and Modernization (FSRM) funding
provides for the maintenance and renovation of existing
facilities. For FY2025, the Biden Administration requested
$17.5 billion for MILCON and family housing programs; the
request for FSRM funding (sometimes also referred to in
budget documents as “Sustainment, Restoration and
Modernization”) totaled $19.8 billion.
The MILCON and FSRM programs are interdependent; in
budget planning, the tradeoff between maintaining and
adapting existing facilities or building anew is given close
consideration. Both programs aim to ensure the readiness of
military infrastructure worldwide. Nevertheless, the two
programs have several differences (see Table 1), as each
provides funding for different types of projects, is governed
by different statutes and policies, and is funded by distinct
congressional appropriations processes.
Broadly speaking, one key difference between MILCON and
FSRM is that Congress typically exercises comparatively
more oversight and direction over the MILCON budget. For
example, Congress requires DOD to provide budgetjustification documents for individual projects before
authorization and the law generally requires enactment of
line-item level authorization and appropriation for individual
projects. By comparison, Congress typically provides annual
funding for FSRM in a lump sum to the military services and
DOD components, allowing the services and components to
exercise discretion over which specific projects receive
funding from one year to the next. In some instances,
congressional defense committees may allow Members to
submit requests to fund specific MILCON projects in their
communities; such funding requests—formally known in the
House as Community Project Funding and in the Senate as
Congressionally Directed Spending— are rarely an option for
FSRM projects.
