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Questions about agencies' participation.

Any agency listed in section 901(b) of Title 31, United States Code except for the Department of Defense. This includes:

  • The Department of Agriculture.
  • The Department of Commerce.
  • The Department of Education.
  • The Department of Energy.
  • The Department of Health and Human Services.
  • The Department of Homeland Security.
  • The Department of Housing and Urban Development.
  • The Department of the Interior.
  • The Department of Justice.
  • The Department of Labor.
  • The Department of State.
  • The Department of Transportation.
  • The Department of the Treasury.
  • The Department of Veterans Affairs.
  • The Environmental Protection Agency.
  • The National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
  • The Agency for International Development.
  • The General Services Administration.
  • The National Science Foundation.
  • The Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
  • The Office of Personnel Management.
  • The Small Business Administration.
  • The Social Security Administration.

Two reasons. First, DOD already has a robust multi-year capital planning process. Second, DOD falls under the defense discretionary cap, while the projects targeted by the proposed legislation are funded under the non-defense discretionary cap.

Section 3(g) of the proposed legislation sets a $250 million minimum project cost, which likely is far in excess of the cost of the needs of smaller agencies. Also, smaller agencies probably rent from GSA, so their needs could be met by approval of a GSA project.

Yes, section 4(i) of the proposed legislation defines “purchasing agency” broadly to mean any agency that is approved by an appropriations Act to receive a purchase transfer from the Fund to pay for a project. Normally agencies that rent from GSA would expect GSA to get the funding for such projects. GSA is funded in the annual FSGG appropriations bill, and if the FSGG bill were to approve a GSA project, then FSGG would be responsible for funding the annual repayments. The legislation anticipates that there may be times when an Appropriations Subcommittee other than FSGG is willing to sign up for the annual repayments. If so, that Subcommittee can approve the project. In such cases, section 9 of the proposed legislation requires the asset to go into GSA’s inventory. The legislation does not create new landholding authority for agencies that currently do not have it. Section 9 provides that the purchase transfer would go from the revolving fund to the approved purchase agency, that agency in turn would transfer the money to GSA, and GSA would then pay for the construction, own the property, and rent it back to the purchasing agency. Since the purchasing agency would be repaying the revolving fund and paying rent to GSA at the same time, section 9(a) of the proposed legislation requires GSA to give the purchasing agency a rent credit to prevent the agency from paying twice for the asset.

No. Section 9 of the proposed legislation states that it neither provides new real property landholding or landmanaging authority to any agency nor otherwise affects any agency’s existing real property landholding or landmanaging authority. The proposed legislation does allow for a different funding path for GSA-owned properties, which is discussed in Q4 under this section.

Section 4(a) of the proposed legislation assigns GSA the task of supervising the revolving fund. GSA would handle all payments to and from the revolving fund, calculate repayment amounts, and otherwise perform the accounting functions for the revolving fund. GSA’s would not have a role in selecting proposed projects, however, GSA obviously would be able to submit its own project proposals for consideration by the President through OMB’s annual budget preparation process and by Congress through action on appropriations Acts.