Inaugural forum promotes reimbursable program awareness

Inaugural forum promotes reimbursable program awareness

By DCMA FBR

The Defense Contract Management Agency's Foreign Military Sales and Department of Defense Reimbursable Program Management Division, or FBR, held its first Security Cooperation Informational Forum here July 24.

Susan Allen, FBR's director, led the event, creating a milestone in the division's ongoing efforts to increase awareness and create a collaborative environment to facilitate open dialogue among personnel working on security cooperation programs like Foreign Military Sales, or FMS; Building Partner Capacity; and Direct Commercial Sales.

Security Cooperation is defined as all interactions between DOD and foreign security establishments aimed at building defense relationships that promote specific U.S. security interests. This includes developing allied and partner military capabilities for self-defense and multinational operations, as well as providing U.S. forces with access to host nations during peacetime and contingencies.

This inaugural forum introduced the FBR team and provided an overview of Security Cooperation programs. Dina Pinkston, DCMA's FMS program manager, concluded the forum with a question-and-answer session, giving various FBR subject matter experts the opportunity to respond. These included Jenkins Sotheavy, FMS program manager, Robert Ketchum, DOD Central Control Point team lead, Michael Corrigan, FMS Strategic Engagement, and Jon Fish, FMS program analyst.

DCMA actively engages with the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense Acquisition and Sustainment, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency and the Security Cooperation Enterprise as a member of the Foreign Military Sales Tiger Team and Continuous Process Improvement Board to improve acquisition and contracting support to FMS.

The president recently issued an executive order for Reforming Foreign Defense Sales to Improve Speed and Accountability where the DOD was tasked to refine areas throughout the FMS case lifecycle.

The next forum, which will cover Security Cooperation Workload Identification and Reciprocal Defense Procurement Agreements is scheduled for Sept. 4, from 1 to 2 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Users may register and view previous recordings by using the link on the Learning and Resource page (CAC login required) located on the DCMA FBR site (CAC login required).

Questions may be emailed to [email protected].