(Kerrins legislation)

The officer personnel bill was forwarded to Congress on April 5. It was introduced on April 11 as H.R. 5623. Hearings on the bill are expected to commence about June 1.

A brief description of this proposed legislation was contained in the weekly report of March 23, 1962. Since the bill will affect almost every officer in the service a more detailed explanation of it follows:

Preliminary.

It will aid in understanding this legislation if it is remembered that it consists of two major parts.

Part 1 contains permanent law that makes basic changes to the present officer personnel promotion system. This part changes our present system of promotion on a qualified basis to promotion on a "best qualified" basis, institutes forced attrition of those who are not selected for promotion and makes many other changes in the laws relating to officer personnel. "Best qualified" selection for promotion is the heart of the proposal. Its adoption would involve a fundamental change in promotion philosophy in the Coast Guard. Promotion zones would be established and officers within zones would compete on a best qualified basis for the available vacancies in the next higher grade. The amount of attrition involved would be administratively predetermined in such a manner as to provide maximum promotional opportunity consistent with achievement of career promotion objectives. This legislation would eventually achieve an officer career promotion pattern close to the following: Promotion:

The attrition toll resulting from such a system would, it is believed, be much more acceptable to the officer corps than that which any other system would produce. It will be based upon the "up or out" principle-a positive approach. Men of ability, understanding the necessity for it, will take up the challenge and compete for the rewards. A more dynamic officer corps will result.

Part 2 contains temporary provisions of the law to deal with the immediate hump problem. This part contains authority for convening continuation boards on officers in the grades of captain and commander to force attrition in those grades. Interim continuation boards for commanders and captains would provide for an equitable distribution of the initial attrition required to reshape the officer corps. In the sense that they involve additional selection at other than a promotion point, they are undesirable. Unfortunately, they are absolutely necessary. Attempting to excise the present hump in our officer corps by promotion selection alone would involve grave inequities. Officers in the hump would suffer heavy attrition in competing for the few promotion vacancies available. Those above would be left virtually intact. Yet those above are officers who have achieved their higher grades much faster than they normally could have expected to, with little or no attrition. It is both equitable and appropriate, therefore, that the least fitted of those higher ranking officers be attrited in order to provide more reasonable promotion opportunity for those in the hump. The hump necessarily still will suffer the greatest overall attrition. However, the interim continuation boards will make it possible to keep that attrition within reasonable limits. From a rational and objective point of view, it must be manifest that the interests of the service as a whole are better served by spreading necessary initial attrition over two grades than by confining it within one.

PART 1

Part 1 of the legislation institutes the best qualified selection system for promotion of officers. Under this system officers compete for selection for promotions to fill the available and expected vacancies. Those officers who fail twice to be selected for a given grade are separated from the service.

Active duty promotion list

The legislation introduces a new concept called the active duty promotion list. Essentially this is the list of officers who will be subject to and compete under the best qualified selection system. It includes all officers in the Coast Guard except retired officers, officers of the permanent commissioned teaching staff of the Coast Guard Academy, SPARS, and Reserve officers who are not on extended active duty. Retired officers recalled to active duty, members of the permanent commissioned teaching staff and SPARS will be promoted in accordance with regulations to be prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury. Thus these small groups of officers will not be in competition with other officers for promotions. Reserve officers who are not on extended active duty will continue to be promoted under existing laws and regulations. Reserve officers who are on extended active duty will be on the active duty promotion list and compete for promotion along with Regular officers.

The legislation will amend the laws concerning the annual computation so that officers of the permanent commissioned teaching staff, SPARS, and retired officers recalled to active duty will not be included in the computation. Thus, they will not take up any vacancies. The number of such officers that would be authorized in each grade would be prescribed by the Secretary.

Extra number officers, all of whom are now in the grade of captain, will be included on the active duty promotion list. They will thus continue to be eligible for promotion to flag grade on a best qualified basis. As extra numbers they will continue to be excluded from the annual computation. Best qualified selection system

The best qualified selection system will work as follows: The Secretary will annually convene selection boards to select officers for promotion to each grade above lieutenant (junior grade). (Promotions to lieutenant (junior grade) will be made under secretarial regulations. It is expected that this promotion will remain on a fully qualified basis.) There will be a separate selection board for each grade. These boards will consist of at least five officers who are serving in or above the grade to which they may recommend officers for promotion. The Secretary will establish a promotion zone for each grade, and will tell the board how many officers they can select for promotion. This number will be less than the number of officers in the promotion zone. However, the size of the promotion zone will be limited by law so that the number to be selected will be at least 60 percent of the number in the zone. This last provision does not apply to the promotion zone for rear admiral.

The selection board will consider

(a) All officers in the promotion zone.

(b) All officers "above the zone," that is, officers who were considered by the previous board but who were not then selected for promotion.

(c) Officers "below the zone" subject to the limitations discussed below. From these three sources the board will select those officers it considers best qualified for promotion in the number specified.

To be eligible to be considered by a board for selection from below the zone an officer must have completed a certain specified number of years of service in his grade. These are as follows: 2 years as lieutenant (junior grade), 3 years as lieutenant, 4 years as lieutenant commander, 4 years as commander, and 3 years as captain. This provision is so written that an officer becomes eligible for consideration for promotion at the beginning of the fiscal year in which he completes the specified amount of service. The board will be limited in the number of officers it can select from below the zone. In the case of promotions to lieutenant and lieutenant commander the board cannot select from below the promotion zone more than 5 percent of the number which the Secretary has prescribed to be selected. In the case of promotion to commander the figure is 7% percent and for captain it is 10 percent. There is no limitation on the number of captains who can be selected for rear admiral from below the zone. The 3-year time in grade requirement mentioned above does, however. limit how far down a flag selection board could go.

The number which the Secretary authorizes a board to select for promotion is based on the number of vacancies existing in the next higher grade, plus the number of vacancies expected in that grade in the following year, less the number of officers already selected for that grade but not promoted.

The designation of the size of the promotion zone is one of the most important parts of the system. Variations in the size of the promotion

zones will, of course, cause variations in the amount of attrition. By adjusting the size of the promotion zone, rates of promotion can be increased or decreased. It should be noted that while the size of the promotion zone is limited so that the number to be selected will not be less than 60 percent of the number in the zone, the board can pick officers from either above or below the promotion zone. If an officer is picked from above or below the zone, this selection reduces the number that can be picked from within the zone. Therefore, the number of officers in the zone who are not selected could exceed 40 percent depending on how many are picked from above or below the zone.

The selection boards will submit reports in writing in which they certify that the officers they have selected are in their opinion the best qualified of the officers whose names were considered by the board. The board must select for promotion the number of officers authorized by the Secretary. This report will be submitted to the Secretary via the Commandant. After his review the Secretary will transmit it to the President.

Failure of selection

Any officer who is in the promotion zone or above the promotion zone and who is not selected is considered as having failed of selection. An officer who fails of selection twice will no longer be eligible for promotion and will be separated from the service as described below.

The proposed law does away with the "out of line of promotion" concept. It also eliminates the reconsideration board. It also eliminates the dual promotion system whereby an officer is considered by a board for temporary promotion and then later considered by another board for permanent promotion. Under the proposed bill there will be only permanent promotions. Separation provisions

The provisions for separations of officers who twice fail of selection vary by grade. In general the bill adopts the concept that officers of grade below lieutenant commander will be separated with severance pay, lieutenant commander and above will be retired with retired pay.

The proposed bill provides that no officer will be separated less than 6 months after the approval of the board which considered him for selection or continuation but did not select him. Also the bill is so designed that no officer would be forced to separate less than 6 months after the bill is enacted. Ensign: Those who are found not fully qualified for promotion will be separated from the service. The authority to revoke the commission of any officer with less than 3 years of continuous service is retained in the proposed legislation.

Lieutenant (junior grade): Will be separated with severance pay at the end of the fiscal year in which his second failure of selection occurs. If on the date he would otherwise be separated a lieutenant (junior grade) has enough service for voluntary retirement--20 years he could retire instead.

Lieutenant: Will be separated with severance pay at the end of the fiscal year in which his second failure of selection occurs. If on the date he would otherwise be separated a lieutenant has enough service for voluntary retirement-20 years-he could retire instead. Another section of the law would provide for the retention on active duty of any lieutenant who had at least 18 years of active service on the date he would otherwise be separated for having twice failed of selection. Such a lieutenant would be retired on completion of 20 years of active service.

The proposed law contains a further provision regarding lieutenants. It gives the Secretary authority to convene boards to consider lieutenants who have twice failed of selection for continuation on active duty. The Secretary can authorize these boards to recommend a specified number of the lieutenants for retention on active duty for specified terms of not less than 2 nor more than 4 years. Thus if there were for instance 20 lieutenants who had twice failed of selection the board could be directed to pick 5 for retention for 2 years and 5 more for retention for 3 years. Any officer continued under this provision would be separated at the completion of the term of continuation unless he was selected for a further term. Any officer who was continued under this provision and whose term ran beyond the date on which he completes 20 years of active service would be retired on completion of 20 years of active service. Lieutenant commander: Those who fail twice of selection for lieutenant commander will be retired. If on June 30 of the fiscal year in which his second failure of selection occurs a lieutenant commander has less than 20 years of

active service he will be retired upon completion of 20 years of active duty. If he has over 20 years of active service he will be retired on June 30 of the fiscal year in which his second failure of selection occurs. Thus lieutenant commanders, no matter how much service they have when they fail of selection for the second time, will be retained on active duty until they complete 20 years and then retired.

Commander: Subject to the same provisions as lieutenant commander. Captain: The proposed bill eliminates the annual 30 and 8 board. Instead, all captains will be required to retire on June 30 of the fiscal year in which they complete 30 years of active commissioned service in the Coast Guard. There is a further provision in the law which would apply to officers who entered the service at an advanced grade and who did not therefore have as much service as their contemporaries on the precedence list. The proposed law in effect requires that when any captain who has not lost numbers or precedence completes 30 years of active commissioned service in the Coast Guard, he and all captains senior to him must retire. (This latter provision would not apply to BMIN extra number officers unless such officers had completed 30 years of service including that which is presently creditable for them. Only nine BMIN officers can possibly come under this savings provision in that all others will be retired under other laws, particularly the age 62 law.)

The mandatory retirement provisions for captains do not apply to officers who have been selected for promotion to rear admiral.

The bill contains an additional provision for captains which would authorize the Secretary to convene a continuation board on captains. This board could consider any captain with over 3 years service in grade who was in a continuation zone to be designated by the Secretary. This board would select such number of captains for continuation on active duty as designated by the Secretary. The number selected for continuation would have to be at least 75 percent of those being considered. Any captain not selected for continuation under this provision would be retired at the end of the fiscal year in which the board's report was approved, or if such captain did not have 20 years of active service, upon completion of such service. It is contemplated that this board would be used infrequently to smooth out promotion flow in those years in which an abnormally small number of captains would be retired under the 30-year retirement provision. This provision would not become effective until 3 years after enactment of the law.

Rear admiral: The existing provisions of law for retirement of rear admirals on completion of 35 years active commissioned service or 7 years in grade are unchanged.

The laws relating to voluntary retirement on 20 or 30 years service remain unchanged. No change is made in the law relating to compulsory retirement at age 62.

It should be noted that the mandatory separation provisions described above only apply to Regular officers. They do not apply to Reserve officers. However, it is planned that Reserve officers on extended active duty will be released to inactive duty if they twice fail of selection at the same time as their Regular officer contemporaries, subject to any existing contracts they may have.

The mandatory separation provisions for lieutenants (junior grade) and lieutenants who are temporary officers are slightly different from those for permanent officers. Such temporary officers would not come under the provision which retains a lieutenant who has completed 18 years service until he completes 20 years service. But temporary officers, both lieutenants (junior grade) and lietuenants who have twice failed of selection could elect to revert to their permanent grade. While it is not specified in the proposed law it is administratively planned to require temporary officers to integrate and become permanent upon promotion to lieutenant.

The proposed bill would repeal the provisions for the annual personnel board. It would substitute a new method of handling substandard officers which has been in use in the Army and Air Force for several years. It would require a three-board procedure before officers could be separated because their performance of duty had fallen below certain standards or because of moral or professional dereliction or for security reasons.

While the proposed promotion system sounds extremely complicated, it should actually be simpler to operate than the present one. For example it will eliminate a considerable number of boards since there will be no second, or reconsideration boards, and boards will not be required for both temporary

and permanent promotions. Further, the board for selection of officers for promotion to lieutenant would be used as an integration board also, the theory being that if an officer were selected for promotion to lieutenant this would also amount to selection for integration as a permanent officer.

The proposed system will also have considerably greater flexibility than the present system. It should give the service the means for maintaining reasonable promotion flow and adjusting attrition in a way that will be as fair as possible to all officers.

Career pattern

It is hoped that under the proposed system a career plan can eventually be achieved so that officers will be promoted to lieutenant (junior grade) at the completion of 18 months service, to lieutenant upon completion of 4 years service, to lieutenant commander at about 11 years service, to commander at about 17 years service and to captain not later than completion of 24 years service. Due to the present hump problem it will take several years before all grades can meet this pattern, especially the commander and captain grades.

PART 2

The second major part of the bill is directed at the immediate hump problem. It would in effect apply a degree of selection to officers who have reached. the grades of captain and commander under the present system. If this were not done officers in lower grades, particularly lieutenant commander, would have to suffer considerably heavier attrition in order to maintain a reasonable flow of promotion.

All

This part of the bill authorizes the Secretary to convene continuation boards on captains and commanders. As to captains such a board could only consider captains who had not been selected for rear admiral and who were not subject to be retired for completion of 30 years service under part 1 of the bill. commanders could be considered by such a board. The bill provides that any officer who was selected for promotion under the best qualified selection system of part 1 of the bill could not be considered by such a board. Nor could an officer be considered more than one time by such a board.

The authority to convene these boards expires in 3 years. not be convened more than once a year.

Such a board may

When the Secretary convenes a continuation board he designates a zone of officers to be considered by the board. This zone must start with the senior officer of the grade who has not been previously considered by such a board. The zone may consist of all officers in the grade or any lesser number the Secretary designates.

The Secretary also will designate the number of officers that the board may select for continuation on active duty. In the case of captains this number must be at least 90 percent of the number of officers in the designated zone. In the case of commanders this number must be at least 80 percent of the number of commanders in the zone.

These boards, to consist of at least six officers serving in a grade above the grade being considered, would select the best qualified officers for continuation on active duty in the number specified by the Secretary. The report of such a board would go to the Secretary and then to the President.

Any officer who is considered by one of these continuation boards and not selected for continuation on active duty would be retired on June 30 of the fiscal year in which the board's report is approved or upon completion of 20 years of active service, whichever is later.

The bill provides that an officer who is retired under this provision would receive a $2,000 readjustment payment in addition to his retired pay. An officer who is required to retire under this provision could retire earlier than the dates mentioned above and still receive the readjustment payment. The proposed law also provides that no officer would be required to retire under this provision less than 6 months after approval of the board.

SUMMARY

The effect of this bill on the various types of officers is summarized below. 1. Officers of the permanent commissioned teaching staff of the Coast Guard Academy. These officers will not be included on the active duty promotion list. They will not compete under the best qualified selection system. They will not be included in the annual computation. They will be promoted under