Win More Work! Understand How the Air Force Funds Construction Projects

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to GovSpan's educational webinar series. Today's session is win more work, understand how the Air Force funds construction project. My name is Archisha Meehan, and I'm the head of public of federal public sector at GovSpan. For those who might not know us, GovSpan is a leading trusted source of data analytics and insights for organizations, buying and selling into the federal public sector. And I guess I should also sort of make sure I'm showing the right slide. And our federal solution, many of you know it as AI, basically integrates the nineteen various federal datasets into one easy to use platform. And, really, the focus of GovSpend FedMiner is to provide accurate federal data and and transparency into the world of government contracts. AI does it on the federal side. Our government platform basically integrates state, local, and education data into a similar platform. So a couple of housekeeping items before we get started. Links to the slides and the recording will be sent within twenty four hours of the webinar. And, also, if you have any questions, please ask them through the q and a side, you know, q and a, chat, and we will get to them towards the end of the webinar. I am personally super excited about to the today's presentation, and I really, really, I'm looking forward to the wealth of information that we are gonna get from today. Scott Hastings is, our CEO, one of the presenters and CEO of s two h AI. He has had a very distinguished career of more than thirty five years, both within private utility and federal civil services. S t s two h Enterprises was founded in twenty twenty three by Scott Hastings after he retired as the director of the seventy eight civil engineer group at Robins Air Force Base in Georgia. During his time with the air force, Scott also held leadership positions at installation levels, two major command headquarters, and the Pentagon. Mister Hastings is a registered professional engineer in the state of Georgia and holds a bachelor of electrical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology, a master of public administration from Georgia College, and is a graduate of the Air Force's Air War College. In his spare time, he actually enjoys competitive tennis and golf. Our second presenter today is Pat McMillan, who who I have had the pleasure of knowing for almost five years now, and I always, always, always learn so much from Pat. He is a senior executive with forty years of federal experience in the construction, environmental, and AE markets. He is a retired US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel, a business owner, and a business development consultant with significant success in strategic planning, proposal writing, and new client development. In addition to delivering multiple webinars for AI over the past five years, he has also presented numerous seminars to national and regional federal conferences. Our contact information is on the slide. If anyone of you wants to get in touch with that, do reach out to me, and I'll get you both connected. To kick off our presentation, I thought it would be interesting to spend a couple of seconds just to tell you about the spending within air force. And I've sort of instead of using NAICS codes, I'm showing them by categories. Year over year, you can see that, you know, air force spent about eighty odd billion dollars in twenty twenty two. It went up by almost twenty percent to ninety five billion dollars in, twenty three. And you could actually see that there was a pretty large increase within r and d, aircraft ships, submarines as also IT. So it's always interesting for me to see, you know, what's where that increase has happened. But within the construction facilities and construction, categories, you could see that in f y twenty three, air force actually spent about six point six billion dollars, with construction and facilities. You know, that's your breakup. But what is also interesting, at least, when I look at data, I find it pretty interesting to see that the breakup between small business and other than small business is almost at fifty fifty, which is always interesting. So that's just a little bit of data for, just to sort of give you the perspective of the spend within air force, especially in construction and related, AI and categories. Having said that, I am gonna start off start us off with the first part of our webinar, which is gonna be, Scott, I think this is all you. So welcome, and super excited about today's presentation. Thanks, AI. Yeah. Thanks, everyone for coming in today. Today's presentation is really gonna be focused on giving you all an inside peek into how the air force funds construction projects. I'll begin by defining some of the acronyms the air force uses, then I'll walk you through the steps involved in getting a project to execution. So let's get started. On this AI, you know, maybe you're new to air force construction or maybe you get a little confused when government employees use a bunch of acronyms. So So on the next two slides, I'm gonna quickly go over some of the main ones used by the air force in construction. Because the more you understand both the concepts and the terminology, the more you can interact with key decision makers to position for work. SRM or sustainment restoration and modernization is the most commonly used form of funding by the Air Force for construction. As its name implies, it's used to sustain, restore, and and modernize facilities. And by the term facilities, I mean any built infrastructure on an air force installation. Everything from roads to commodes, utilities, buildings, runways. You get the picture. Sustainment refers to keeping good facilities good. Just like you maintain your vehicle, facilities need maintenance as well. Restoration is when a facility or one of the systems in the facility has gone beyond its useful life and needs to be restored back to a good working. Modernization refers to either new construction on a small scale less than a million or changing the purpose of a facility that is from a hangar to an office space, for example. SRM is appropriated by congress on a one year term. MILCON, on the other hand, is a five year appropriate the purpose of large scale new construction, for example, constructing a new aircraft hangar. Era is the common phrase used for environmental restoration account funded. It's also a one year appropriation used for compliance, conservation, and AI quality projects. The DPBS planning, programming, budgeting system. The the air force develops its programs to achieve the defense objectives established by the president and secretary of defense. To develop this program, the air force employs a corporate approach structured to support the total force. The process of air force field commanders translating guidance from the president and the sect def into operational plans designed to safeguard our national security interests. At the same time, these senior officers also identify the resource needed their plans now and for the next five years. Next slide. The base civil engineer or BCE is the individual, usually a senior military officer or civilian, who's responsible for all facilities, including utilities, the natural environment, and fire emergency services on an air force installation. The organization includes four major components, engineering for AI and construction management, operations, those craftsmen who focus on daily maintenance of facilities, installation management focused on housing, dormitories, and environmental concerns, and, of course, fire emergency services. AFKEK is the Air Force's civil engineer center who centrally manages all SRM and IRFA funds. They build the five year budget, provide oversight on environmental projects, and involved in managing the Air Force MILCON program. We'll discuss their role in a little more depth later in the presentation. The Army Corps of Engineers, sometimes just referred to as the corps, are the hands on agents who manage MILCON projects at most air force installations by providing contract acquisition as well as design and construction management. Conn's is the contracting squadron on an air force base who is the signatory authority for all contracting actions. Although the BCE can do market research to see what companies are out there for a requirement, it is the cons who does the official solicitation, makes the contract award, and signs off on all contract modifications. Next slide. So how do we really make it happen on an air space? Let's talk about how it happens. In order to design or build on an air force base, we need a contract. The list below here AI the majority of methods used by BCEs and their contracting squad, and so let's go over them real quick. Individual order is perhaps the simplest form of contract, awarded for a single purpose with either a firm fixed price, cost reimbursable, incentive, or time and material. An IDIQ or indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract is used whenever the air force doesn't know the exact time frame or quantity of materials. A SATO is a competitive or sole source contract to a single contractor who provides services over a period of time, usually one to five years, whenever task orders for a specific purpose are issued by the contracting squad. A multi award task order contract, a METOC, or also known as a award construction contractor, MACC, ISM also a multiple year contract awarded to an entire slate of contractors. This form of contract allows the air force to have competition after the initial award and keeps competitive pressure on the contractors during the life of the contract. Sabre is a simplified IDIQ used by the DCE for small construction efforts. And I'll talk more about acquisition strategy later in the presentation to show how the air force determines which of these types of contract to use. Next slide. Now that we've covered the basics on air force construction lingo, let's get into a specific example to demonstrate how these organizations, processes, and contract mechanisms work. Over the course of the next few slides, I'll discuss actions taken by the players we discussed earlier, that is the BCE, AVCAC, and Conn's. Each plays a specific role in the successful execution of a project. This example is based on a real world SRM project accomplished while I was the BCE at Robins Air Force Base. Although an HVAC project doesn't seem that complicated, let's dig into it a little bit. Obviously, the AC is not working. I'm getting a lot of pressure from my boss, the installation commander. It's too hot in this cold in the winter. Besides the commander's suite, this facility also includes the staff functions, the base library, and a lot of training space used by airmen. The first step the BCE takes is determine what should be done to ensure the AC is restored to a good working so let's talk about the planning phase on the next slide. So the BCE obviously knows the HVAC isn't working properly. He's identified the problem but needs to evaluate alternatives to restore it. As the BCE, I AI a large contingent of in house HVAC technicians, but they've just been putting Band Aids on it for a couple of years now. Maybe they could just install a new compressor, or maybe I could just let a contract to replace the compressor. But in this case, we decided to replace the entire system by contract, the compressor, all the air handlers, the control systems, and all the ductwork. Once we decided on that, we realized the whole building would be out of commission for at least a year. So we looked at the condition of other building systems and decided to replace the roof and interior lighting at the same time as well. Now that we've identified the scope of the project, we need to prepare the DD thirteen ninety one, which is a Department of Defense form used for project approval. It includes a detailed statement of work and a cost estimate. It also includes which type of SRM funding should be used, whether it's maintenance, repair, or new construction. This is also the time in which the BCE determines whether a design is needed. Should we award the contract as a design build, or should we design one year, construct the next? I'll talk more about this part of the acquisition strategy later. Next slide. Okay. Now we start to to show you how the cheese is really made. I've got a cost estimate. I've got approval to replace the HVAC system in building nine zero five. But how do I get it funded? I've got a long list of other projects that need funding as well. So the BCE at an air force base uses a risk framework to determine project priorities. As shown on the graphic to the right, this risk framework is composed of two components, the probability of failure, PoF, and consequence of failure, COF. Every system within every facility has been evaluated by technicians to determine its current condition based on industry standards. This condition is used to determine the likelihood of when that system will fail. In this example, the POF probability of failure is one hundred, that blue dot in the upper right hand corner. In this example, this means the HVAC has reached the end of its use for life and is in need of replacement. The consequence of failure is ability's importance to the mission at Robins Air Force Base. The consequence of failure is computed based on the facility's mission dependency index and the major command priority. For example, the runway has a mission dependency index of one hundred since the mission of the air force is to fly, fly, and win. But in this example, building nine zero five houses the base commander and training space, so its consequence of failure is calculated to be eighty. The overall project score is the POF, which is one hundred AI the COF, which is eighty point eight, which gives me a project score of eight thousand and eighty. Now that I've got a score for this project, I build a prioritized list of all my unfunded projects. I refer to this list as my one to n list, where n is the number of projects on the list and the priority of the project on its score. The higher the score, the higher the priority. The list also contains a projected fiscal year, f y, of when the BCE anticipates needing to get that project funded. The list from each installation is then sent to APKEC, usually in the December to January time frame. Next slide. So once the VCE submitted their local one to enlist to APKEC, APCAC then has a slew of subject matter experts or SME who review all the details shown on the d d thirteen ninety one for each project submitted. They look at the statement of work, the cost estimate, the type of funds request. The SMEs also ensure the probability of failure and consequence of failure are accurate by comparing them sustainment management system air force data. Is the mission dependency index accurate? Is the asset assets condition accurate? Those are the questions that they they answer when they look at the projects. Once all the project scores for AI air validated, APKEC then builds a five year integrated priority list known as the IPL. And they draw a cut line for each year based on the amount of funding they anticipate for each of the next five years. In addition, AVCAC also allocates a small pot of funds to each installation for smaller projects. Known as decentralized SRM, these funds allow commanders the opportunity to get their priorities funded in the event they don't make the cut on the AFTCE IPL. These be for efforts that don't have a dramatic effect on the overall air force mission, but have a great impact to the overall quality of life for airmen. For example, refinishing the gymnasium floor. Or maybe it's for a Pacific local mission. For example, the distinguished visitors lounge near the air traffic control tower. Next slide. So you probably figured it out just because you probably figured it out by now, just because the BCE has an approved project on the installations one to n list is not it's gonna get funded. Over the course of the next few slides, I'm gonna give you a high level review of how FCEC builds that five year integrated priority list that we've been calling the IPL. It's in the list of projects from each installation. AFCEC ranks them in priority order. And, again, that priority is based on their score, that each individual project score. As you can see on this list to the left, there's five years worth of projects on the list. They're ranked in priority order to start with without regard to the physical year needed. I know what you're thinking. Why AI I put projects in any year besides next year, f y twenty five? Well, it may be that I project until AI already been completed. Specifically, for in in the case of Robins, I I can't completely replace the entire electrical system AI Robins Air Force Base in one year, so I spaced the projects out over eighty AI. Also, both the contracting squadron and the DCE have, manning constraints that'll limit how many construction projects they can do in a single year. It's at this point, AFTCAC is ready to the project list for f y twenty five. So let's go to the next slide. So the first step is to pull all those f y twenty five projects out of the overall list and stack them in priority order. As you can see here, the second priority in f y twenty the second overall priority in the overall list is actually the number. I'm sorry. Like, as you can see here, the second priority in f y twenty five is actually the number four overall priority. The overall seven priority is number three in f y twenty five, and the overall number fifteen priority is number four. Thanks, Ortiz. Once AvCat knows how much funding they'll receive in f y twenty five, they draw a cut line on the list represented here by that dash line. What happens to those projects below the cut line in f y twenty five, you ask? Well, they move to the f y twenty six. Let's see what that looks like on the next slide. Projects below the f y twenty five cut line go into the f y twenty six IPL based on their score. They don't automatically go to the top of the list. AFKEK builds the f y twenty six IPL in the same manner as they did f y twenty five. They take the unfunded f y twenty five projects and all the f y twenty six projects from that overall list and sort them by score. So in this example, the first two priorities in f y twenty six are number two and number five from the original overall list. But now the number three priority is one of the unfunded projects from f y twenty five. Then that f y twenty six symbol gets cut based on projected funding for f y twenty six, and the projects below the cut line moved at the f y twenty seventh. And that process continues for the f y twenty seventh through twenty AI list as you can see on the next slide. In the f y twenty seven list, unfunded projects in the f y twenty six list get prioritized with the twenty seven projects. Then once again, the anticipated funding line is drawn, and then the process repeats itself for twenty eight and twenty nine. Built building this five year integrated party list or IPL is one of the activities that make APKEC the key organization with determining which projects get funded. They're the overall arbiter, I would say, of the IPL in an equitable distribution of funds throughout all installations based on project scoring and priority. So once Afteq has ensured the integrity of this twenty five to twenty nine list and got approval from higher headquarters, they published that five year list of prioritized projects to the BCE sometime this summer in f y twenty four. If the project requires design, the AI funds in f y twenty five and construction funds in f y twenty six. I know this process sounds overly simplified, but but trust me, it's not. It takes a full year to do this. BCEs across the air force right now are already starting work on the f y twenty six to thirty integrated party list. Each year in April, APC publishes a list of business rules highlighting any changes to how project scoring will be accomplished. Then each BCE sends his programming staff to a week long training seminar in the May, June AI frame, and then those guys come home and get to work doing submittals for each of their projects from July to October, kicking off the AVTECH project process I just described. The big news here for you is is having that IPL sent to the BCE and the contracting squadron. The summer before f y twenty five allows them to to determine their acquisition strategy. So let's take a look at that right now. Next slide. Alright. So let's go back now to our original project example, replace the HVAC in building nine zero five. We're now in the summer of the year before the BCE wants to execute the HVAC project in building nine zero five. I've got the list provided by APEC, and I know the project will be funded in a but since I've got a number of other projects to do in f y twenty five, I know I can't afford them all right on October first. As I said before, the BCE and the cons are are constrained by staff, so we've gotta space them out throughout the year. So the BCE and the cons partner together, decide how they're gonna make it happen. They determine method of execution. For example, they're gonna do it IDIQ, MATOC, Sabre, as we discussed earlier, and the AI needed for each of those. For example, I may need a longer time frame if we choose a full and open single order contract. Further, the contracting squadron also has to meet certain federal goals for contracts, you know, small business, women owned companies, etcetera. So by mutual agreement, after this meeting, GovSpend the BCE, they develop a plan to be ready to execute as soon as f y twenty five starts. That's why it's important, I think Pat's gonna do this later, that you that you get with your BCE contacts the summer before work begins to AI out what they plan to do the next year or the next four years with their SRM dollars. Next slide. So today's presentation focused primarily on SRM projects instead of the bulk of what, you know, BCE is doing day to day, on an air force base. But there's also requirements too large to fund with SRM, and that's where MILCON comes in. The this military construction appropriation are projects for new construction that are AI up and approved by congress. And as you can see by the graphic here, Milcon projects typically take four or more years of planning before they're ever approved and funded. So follow along as we move from left to right on the timeline. The process starts four years before f y minus four, four years be before they want that construction to start. The planning phase is where the AI identified, alternatives are evaluated, and the d d thirteen ninety one is prepared. The base civil engineer evaluates the proposed need for new or improved facilities such as training classrooms, fire and arranges, barracks, family housing, and they compare them to the facilities that already exist. The BCE then weighs the cost and time required to rehabilitate or alter existing structures against the cost and time required to replace them. Engineers and other members of the installation's planning team then make a preliminary determination of whether or not renovation of existing facility, new construction, or leasing is more appropriate to satisfy the proposed need. Project AI is also conducted during this phase. The base civil engineer ensures that the facility is in the installation development plan or IDP. The IDP is a summary document at every air force base that provides information at an appropriate level of detail for the installation, the command, and other decision makers to understand the character and structure of the installation and its development potential. Once AI alternatives are sufficiently developed, project siding will occur in coordination with the environmental planning function to ensure that project siting is consistent with the National Environmental Policy Act, NEPA, requirements. At this initial stage, an environmental assessment may also be needed to include coordination of all environmental permits and certifications with environmental depending upon the complexity of the project or its location on an installation, an environmental assessment can sometimes take several years to accomplish. At f y minus three, AVCEC is also involved to oversee a planning charrette where the that requirement is distilled to give it more fidelity. A charrette or a AI of a predesign also assists with the cost estimating. Once the charrette is complete, the VCE sends the DD thirteen ninety one, that programming document, to the Air Force Installation Management Command, IMSC, who is the higher headquarters of AFKET. The programming phase starts in f y minus two, and it's done at the Pentagon level where they prioritize the projects in the MILCON working group. They determine funding levels for each f y to get the secretary to defense to sign off. They send that request to the by project, they send that request to the office of management and budget, OMB, and include the project in the president's budget or PB. At this stage, the program amount or PA is finalized. Now once that project is approved and authorized into law by the president via the National Defense Authorization Act, the NDAA, funding is made available for design and construction. Now design may be funded up to two years before construction begins. But in the event of a compelling urgent need, MILCON projects may also be execute be a design build. Once funding is approved, the air force sends the design and construction funds to the US Army Corps of Engineers for execution. Remember that MILCON is a five year appropriation, so construction must be completed before the end of the fifth year after the funds you AI into law. Now I've talked about SRM and MILCON mostly today, but I also wanna tell you that that overall Air Force SRM list is about roughly six to seven hundred million dollars per year for all of the air force installations. But there's another pot of funds out there, commodity sustained activity group. It's a working capital fund used at Tinker, Hill, and Roberts for construction on facilities that go towards repairing aircraft. And if you'd like more information, that that that CSAG money is about three at those three bases. So a hundred million for each of those bases. If you'd like more information on that working capital fund known as CSAG at Tinker Hill and Robins, reach out to me using the, email and phone number you saw in this presentation. So that's it for me at this time. I'd like to turn it over to my associate, mister Pat McMullen. Hey. Thanks. Good morning. Well, I guess it's actually afternoon in one time zone. And for the sake of time, I think Scott's covered this, so you could just go to the next AI, And I do wanna say one thing, because he, I don't know if it was, for everybody who's on the webinar, but Scott broke up for just a second. And what he was saying is that there's about six hundred to seven hundred million SRM, and then the other CSAG, CSAG, is about three hundred million. And that's the one where it's just too much information to cover in a one hour webinar. And, I had the benefit of having being on the receiving end of a webinar, presentation Scott did for one of my clients a year ago. And, so the three bases are, Hill in Utah, Tinker in Oklahoma, and Warner Robins in, Georgia. Anyway, let me jump to my stuff. The, I understand how it comes to pass that, small business especially get the impression the government gives work to any firm that really has, good qualifications. And one of the main reasons is the air force is always doing such a wide range of outreach seminars and webinars and industry days and conferences, and they really and truly are looking for, good firms. But the focus is always on what your your ability to make the civil engineering folks' life easier with services that are tailored to their needs. Nothing makes the CE folks' eyes glaze over faster than when you go in there and ask how you can get work at their base. That's not how it works. And now with that said, we'll transition into how it does work. Next slide, please. There's a lot of really good business development folks working for, air force contractors and engineering firms right now, and there are a number of good consultants. All I'm able to provide to you right now is thoughts on how I learned to be successful in winning a lot of work from the Air Force for AE firms, for subcontractors, and for AI. It's a way it's not the only way. Next slide. What did Scott cover that's relevant to this half? Well, talked about SRM money. He spent a lot more time on that than Milcon, and you'll understand why in a few minutes. Civil engineering, I'll talk about one particular flight within the civil engineering squadron, and, I will talk about NILCON also. Contracting, I'm just gonna mention, if you, Archie said, if anybody has questions, on the contract vehicles, and I have the list there, they can send you an well, if they have it to Scott, they can contact him directly. They have it from me. I'll just have them send an email to you, and and we'll get back to them on on all of that stuff. Next slide. It's a bit of a paradox that it's really not that hard to break into doing either AE or construction work or the air force or for that matter, any DOD agency, the challenge is not losing money and losing your reputation. These are the questions that I typically ask, in a first meeting. And, Archisa, I don't know if this is on my screen, but I think we're clipping. I think the sides needs to be adjusted. I don't know if that's on everybody. But, anyway, really straightforward. And regarding that fourth bullet, on data mining, we do these webinars pro bono for Archesa because I really believe that strongly in this product. And I also know firsthand, you can't be doing business development work today, well, not effectively, for the DOD without a quality data mining tool. Next slide. If you're if you're not ready, and I'm not again, I'm not gonna go through details on this slide. I wanted to put it up as a reference. If anybody in the audience has questions, they can, again, send the question to Archisa. If she can't answer, she'll send it to me. The one I've used the most is Sammy. I haven't used what used to be called PTAC, now called Apex. AI haven't I never used it much. I know it's a great resource. Consultants are a great resource. I I'm a huge fan of the Amenta Protege program. My only comment on that sub bullet is, I I wouldn't if you're if you're wanting to break into work, don't go that route. That's not a good way to start. The other ways are better. There are a lot of other ways that are better. I think the Mena Protege AI is used by somebody who's already working for the DOD as a subprime or on the engineering AI, doesn't matter, and is looking to, improve the volume of their work. So that's my comment on that. Next slide, please. The the slides that follow really dovetail directly into what, Scott covered. For for small businesses who've never worked for the air force before, and we always have some folks on these webinars who really are brand new, you really and truly need to go to contracting. He talks about cons, contracting. You need to go to the small business office first. Everybody else who's already on this webinar and doing work has probably already done that. For those of you who are already, working for the air force, it's it's not enough to have a point of contact in civil engineering that you know. You really need to learn about the whole organization, especially everyone in the engineering flight, which is always has the office symbol, c e n. C e s is the squadron. C e n is the flight. Scott talked about the IPL. It's a downloadable file on AFKEC. If you're going to be pursuing engineering or construction work with the air force, you're gonna have to go into the engineering flight and, and do your introductions there. And you do and you have to have done your data mining homework to learn what contracts are used at the target base that you're looking at. So next slide. And you know what? I'm sorry. I missed a key point, if you will. Yeah. Thank you. It's April, so it's time is ticking. Those visits, to civil engineering and specifically I can't say this enough. Getting into people who are in the engineering flight in civil engineering, there's, depending upon the installation, there are as many as seven different flights. The one you care about is CEN. May to July is a window when you can still do that. Obviously, next year, you wanna start that in October. But right now, there's still time. So the window for doing that is May to July. And, next slide, please. Now in forty two years of working for and with Air Force civil engineering staff, I never once had a contractor or, an engineer, somebody from an AE firm, who sat down with a civil engineer, was well prepared, had relevant intelligent questions, and who then walked out with anything less than a truly great meeting. So these are the types of questions that are going to get you into a dialogue with somebody from civil engineer. The engineer's responsible so much for having a cell phone on when you're giving a webinar. The engineers responsible for the most important contracting decisions are AI nature the busiest people in that squadron. They really appreciate well prepared, relevant, intelligent questions. Do your homework. Use their time wisely. And just I don't know how to say this in a in a more professional way, but just don't go in there and ask a bunch of dumb questions. If you didn't get into oh, next slide. If you didn't get in there by July, don't go in in August and September. They're too busy. You could always tell someone who's never worked for civil engineering. They're the ones who are, showing up wanting to, get an appointment to visit with CE folks in August and September. So don't do that. Next slide. Scott covered all of this in detail. He gave you that AI, and if you didn't understand it, you gotta go back. You gotta go back and look at that slide talking about scoring. It's really simple. I get that when you're seeing it in a webinar and it's passing in twenty seconds, you may not get it. Go back and look at it. What comes out of that? He already talked about this. They build the Ipple. It's a rolling five year program. Where do the numbers that you see on the screen come from? Scott covered that. You have a hundred I think you have a a project that scores a hundred in one area, a hundred in the other area, you multiply that, you get ten thousand. Something that is below twenty five hundred, and I know Scott didn't cover this directly, but he sure he sure suggested it. Something that's really low, it just doesn't take the list. So that's how that works. And, I I don't, I don't know that I really need to beat it to death. The IPL is an AFKEC thing. All of the installations feed into AFKEC, into the organizational unit down there that does this, and then the IPL is, it's downloadable. It's download loadable on Excel. You can filter it by just one base or any bases that you want, and that's how it's organized. But next slide. The other thing that he said is if you're looking at something that's on the twenty five or twenty six or twenty seven, or, AI, they only release it. And and you know what? I I don't know if you said this or not. They don't release the five year IPL. They I think they release it on a two year basis. So right now, we're in the middle of April, and this is embarrassing. I'm not sure if the twenty AI, twenty six IPL is out already. I think it doesn't come out until the end of April, early May, but you'll be able to see that twenty five IPL. Well, what happened to those projects that were, on there in twenty four? Scott covered this. They don't get funded in twenty four for any number of various reasons, like money went to Ukraine. Money went to other programs. Anyway, next slide, Archiso. AI appreciate this as a recap, but I also know it's worth repeating. When you look at the twenty five IPL, that was published, One thing that is going to that makes that, something that is a dynamic document is, well, what happened to the stuff that didn't make it in twenty four? Scott covered this, and I just highlighted in red on the far AI. Some things don't make it. They don't get into the twenty AI. Some get higher scores so that they're sure to get funded in twenty five. Some of the stuff from twenty four that didn't make it doesn't make it for twenty AI, but does make it in the out years. You might be asking AI do you care, and it goes back to something I said at the beginning. If you go out and visit a civil engineering client now, you're gonna go out because you attended this webinar, and you know that you'd be have to be doing data AI, and I gave you some really simple intelligent questions to start asking. But you also understand from what Scott covered that it's just dynamic. It's continually dynamic. So some of the stuff that's in their program now that they're trying to get funded, and some of this stuff is not certain because end of year money, it may make it, it may not. These are all input for you to continue to stay in touch with the client, especially when you go back in October. I don't have anything else on that one. Next slide. Yeah. Come October, you know how to you know that the IPL is downloadable. It's on the AFCEC website. You know to do data mining and not because I'm plugging AI. It's because that's what your competitors are doing. You've got a relationship because you're now visiting civil engineering. So when you roll in there in October, first question is, hey. What about any unfunded projects from twenty four? Is there anything that's high on your list that we can help? And I've told you at the beginning of my presentation, the thing that you can never say is, how can I get work? Please don't say that. What you're saying is, okay. Given your requirements, given what you understand about our capabilities, how can we help you support your mission? Just looking at some notes that I made when Scott yeah. I I thought one of the most I was taking notes about during Scott's presentation. I I I think one of the most important points Scott shared was that civil engineering and contracting do a series of meetings in August and September to determine the contract vehicles. So we're talking to you about going in there, in October, And, they've already done at that point, they've already done the acquisition strategy, so they have a general idea how they're going to execute the program in twenty five. I thought that was very relevant. Milcon, AI what what did he already cover? It's, it's large projects. They start planning five years before it goes into design and construction. It's new work. All air force MILCON work goes through the core. Scott explained that. And there's really only a few other points that I wanna make on Milcon. And if you go to the next slide and or Chisa, if you'll go to the next slide. Yeah. Simple checklist. I'm not gonna walk you through all this. It's driven out of common sense. It's with the core. The core is a more difficult client to learn to work for. You if you're on the construction side, don't even go in there unless you have talked to your bonding agent. Do not assume that your surety will bond you for Milcon just because they're already bonding you for SRM. That's the conversation you have to have with your surety before you start pursuing this work. If you've never done core work before, if you don't have the experience, you at least need to have somebody on staff in the quality control and project management area who have done it. I would never recommend a client pursue milk on work without having experience in those two areas. There's a lot of ways to get it. Again, if you have more questions than what I'm glossing over right now, send an email to our CHISA. Partnering with other firms who can teach you how to do that is a good way to do that. And if you're already working in SRM, I made a comment earlier, I wouldn't use mentor protege to learn how to get into doing DOD slash air force work. I would use I would recommend you use one to learn how to move from SRM to MOCOM. Next slide. But if you're not ready, you're not already doing SRM work, AI I I have a hard time recommending anyone jump into Milcon. I just think AI. I'm too old. I've seen too many people fail AI to do that, so that's a huge bias on my part. That's it. I don't really have anything else on that, Archisah. What is my last slide? Why are we glossing over Milcon so much? Because from a business development perspective, it's so easy to get the information. The hard one is SRM. That's why Scott spent about seventy percent of his time on SRM. The Milcon forecast comes out through industry days with the core. We already said all of the Milcon work for the air force is executed by the core. They anybody who any district who does MILCON work does industry days. I'm giving this to you out of San Antonio, Texas, and the districts here are Tulsa and Fort Worth. Scott's down in Georgia, and it's Savannah and Mobile. Anybody who does MILCON does industry days. All of the information that you need to capture plan and position for MILCON work is given out to you at an industry day several years before the contracts are released for the AE design and even more for construction. So that's why we don't really have a whole lot to say because it's just that easy. AI Archiza, next slide. Yeah. I left that in there. I thought that was a good slide. I didn't prepare it, but it ended up in a slide deck, and I thought I would leave it in, and And they can review it on their own time because everybody gets the slides. And, if you'll just go to my last slide. With knowledge of the IPL and this webinar, you should be able to start moving forward to improve your ability to get SRM work at an air force base. Yeah. I'm really big on meeting face to face, with the civil engineering, the engineering branch people of the civil engineering squadron. They're the ones who ultimately are responsible for managing all the work that goes on contracts. And as I said with regards to Milcon, I wouldn't start there. I know people have done that with success. Far more people have done that with failure. They're larger. They're more difficult to manage. The core is a, has much greater requirements. If you have any questions, I can I'm gonna stay on now. Any other questions you wanna send with more detail, you can send to Archisa, and I will take the time necessary. I do have to say, yeah. I'm still a consultant. I am unless you live in San Antonio and you're a friend of Tim Geppert, I'm I'm not taking any new clients indefinitely. So that's all I have. This has been a very, very, very informative, webinar. Thank you so much, Scott and Pat. But, I mean, it's I learned so much as always. We have one question, which is, do you recommend large businesses that are interested in working with the air force to contact small business also? Yeah. I I I I'll I'll let Scott answer that, and I'll just, AI answer that after I do because he he he and I have such different backgrounds. That's the value of working with him. Yeah. But you gotta be smart about that. Send send me that question, and let me give you a more detailed answer. I don't wanna drone on for five minutes. That's a longer answer, Scott, from my end as, on the contracting side and the consultant side. I'll I'll defer to anything Scott has to say. Yeah. I I would just I would say that it wouldn't hurt, you know, because if you're if you're a large business, you know, you've you've got opportunity with, you know, some of your subs that if you were to go visit with the small business office, you might see a requirement out there that, you know, one of the small businesses you work with, who may not have this informate, be able to to handle. So, you know, you might be able to work an arrangement with with them. That being that would be my answer. Good. Yeah. There's AI I I will share in an email the correct AI send you the question. Would wanna use. So Yeah. That's good. Yeah. Yeah. I don't have any other questions. Okay. Okay. You know, contact information is there, but anyone on the phone and, on the call, feel free to reach out if you have any questions, anything specific. And then, of course, upcoming webinars, feel free to visit our website, and we will go ahead and send everyone out a recording and the slides of this, webinar. Thank you, everyone, and have a wonderful day. Thanks, Scott. Thanks, Archisa. Thank you.