A lead U.S. Army contracting official said Wednesday the branch’s officials are increasingly worried about retaining its contracting workforce due to the possibility of more furloughs under sequestration, Federal Times reported Wednesday.
Jim McElhatton writes the Army’s contracting officers have faced three years of pay freezes, furloughs during this fiscal year and could be subject to more furloughs next fiscal year.
Michael Hutchison, deputy to the contracting general at Army Contracting Command, told a National Contract Management Association conference 20 percent of the branch’s contracting workforce could retire.
The Army reduced its acquisition workforce during the 1990s and Hutchison fears the branch could lose some of its most experienced people, according to Federal Times.
“We look like we are going to stop that growth and are likely to reverse most of that growth that we had in the past seven or eight years,†he said.
