By MOAA Staff

MOAA has pushed for a timely, complete federal budget for years, but the need to break this cycle comes into greater focus amid concerns over government waste. Instead, the administration may not submit its budget to Congress for another two months, compressing a schedule lawmakers consistently struggle to meet.

Both the legislative and executive branches, and both sides of the aisle, must work to end this string of wasteful funding patches. Doing so would allow DoD and VA officials to make meaningful long-term plans to ensure the present and future readiness of the all-volunteer force … and would lift an ever-present uncertainty faced by those in uniform and their families, wondering if each resolution’s expiration could lead to a period of unpaid service.

[ADVOCACY IN ACTION: All the Details on MOAA’s Spring Campaign]

The stopgap budgetary measure keeping the federal government running will expire March 14 without congressional intervention. And while another continuing resolution likely will ensure the doors remain open – and those who serve and have served, and their families and survivors, continue to receive their promised benefits – such temporary measures continue to weaken the all-volunteer force.

While senators consider the House-passed version of the fiscal year’s third continuing resolution -- this one set to last the rest of the fiscal year -- and DoD staffers navigate major upheaval, the Pentagon also will need to spend its time, money, and energy on:

• Preparing for a possible federal shutdown, which would include providing essential services with fewer available personnel.
• Coping with delayed projects, misaligned funds, and other budgetary problems caused by a reliance on continuing resolutions. One estimate put the cost of a similar stopgap measure in 2019 at $19 billion.
• Rescheduling or canceling training and maintenance projects – while servicemembers will work without pay during a shutdown, much of the support needed for such projects won’t be available.

An Unwelcome Cycle

The government has required at least one continuing resolution every year since FY 1997, according to the Congressional Research Service, and has enacted one such resolution in all but three years since FY 1977, when the start of the fiscal year moved to Oct. 1. Continuing resolutions funded the government for at least 80 days every fiscal year since 2011, with an average of 44% of the fiscal year covered by stopgap funding from 2012 through this year.

Pentagon officials outlined the costs and concerns attached to these ongoing resolutions at the start of the fiscal year, while Office of Management and Budget officials warned such measures could “reduce healthcare services to veterans.” These concerns have been lodged yearly but have fallen on deaf ears in Congress as the appropriations bills continue to languish.

[RELATED: MOAA on the Hill: Key Veterans’ Priorities Outlined During Joint Hearing]

Keep up with the latest on the budget debate by bookmarking MOAA’s Advocacy News page, and if you haven’t done so already, register at MOAA’s Legislative Action Center, where you will be able to send messages to your lawmakers addressing all of MOAA’s key legislative priorities.