NAVAL RESERVE ASSOCIATION’S
Input to Navy’s National Naval Reserve Policy Board
General Assembly

Suggested issues to be included before the NNRPB, not in order of priority.

Issue #1. Should the current NRQQ be utilized, modified or discontinued?

Discussion.

Annually the Naval Reserve Personnel Center distributes a Naval Reserve Qualification Questionnaire (NRPC 1200/1) to all Selected Reserve and VTU officers for updating and return. Upon receipt NRPC extracts a select few fields required by Reserve Components Common Personnel Data System (RCCPDS) and passes the form to Navy Personnel Command (PERS-313) for inclusion in the officer’s permanent file. Consequently, when the file is forwarded to the officer in the following year for updating most of the information previously provided requires updating once again. Since all the information on the questionnaire is not required by NRPC, they do not enter it into a database, but forward it to PERS-313 to be included in the permanent record for use by promotion selection boards. A lot of personal time is spent each year replicating information, which is not used by NRPC. Expense is expended scanning in reports at PERS-313. The current value of the questionnaire to selection boards is not clear. This information may be available from other sources. Are we maintaining a bureaucratic ritual with individuals providing personal information that is no longer used?

Options:

1. Create software (currently adobe) that can save individual’s data.
2. Create database (like e-apply) to do form on website.
3. Expand data required by NRPC to include in data entry.
4. Minimize form to RCCPDS input.
5. Reduce frequency of input to update changes only.
6. Delete requirement to submit form.
7. No change from current procedure.

Issue #2. PSA Test as part of the Medical Exam for Male Naval Reservists over 45 years.

Discussion:

The Naval Reserve requires healthy members to enable quick mobilization. Men over the age of 40 years are at higher risk of prostate cancer. Mobilizing a Reservist with prostate cancer is not a good policy for either the Navy or the individual. Good health care recommends a prostate exam annually for men or 40 years of age. The digital rectal examination has been included in the Navy’s exam. Recent developments have created some blood lab tests that can measure risk for prostate cancer. The most common is the Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) test. An early warning indicator for prostate cancer, this test is relatively inexpensive ($16.00) and provides a measurement range to indicate a need for further testing.

Suggestion: That the PSA test be included in the full navy exam for male Reservist over age 45 years.

Issue #3. Required final years of service in Reserve Component required for Reserve Retirement.

Discussion:

Current law requires the eight final years of a Reservist to be in a reserve component before qualifying for reserve retirement pay. With force manning problems, a waiver has been allowed, until 1 Oct 2001, reducing this eight-year requirement to six, which according to NPC, Millington, resolves most problems of discharging individuals before they qualify for retirement pay.

With retention problems, the active Navy is encouraging more junior officers to remain on active duty for three more years among those Lieutenants who have been twice passed over for LCDR. On transfer to the Naval Reserve at 13-year active service, this new group of officers would be precluded from attaining eligibility for retired pay at age 60 at twenty years of qualifying service.

The Marine Corp faces a similar problem, where with slower promotion rates, Majors can leave active service at 13 years with two pass-overs.

Recommendation. Make the final years of service in a reserve component, six versus eight years.

Issue # 4. Mandatory retirements of Limited Duty Officers who have been passed over.

Discussion:

Limited Duty Officers receive their commission because of their technical expertise. Competition for advancement in the LDO and Warrant Officer ranks is fierce, because an outstanding group of people, who were already screened and selected for promotion, has to compete at limited promotion rates. Yet, they face the same retirement requirements as other communities of up or out. Statute requires, unless SECNAV allows a deferral, retirement with two pass-overs for promotion, an O-2, O-3, or reversion to enlisted status. The Navy is losing a lot of technical expertise, because we have more good people than promotions permit.

Recommendation: That SECNAV policy be changed to exempt by waiver LDO’s from retirement stipulations, permitting them to continue to serve beyond the second look as an 0-2, 0-3.

Issues # 5. Cross assignment of officers between vacant billets between USMCR and USNR.

Discussion:

Currently, there are vacant officer and enlisted in the US Marine Corps Reserve program; and there are qualified members who drill without pay or IAP in the US Naval Reserve. If individuals are qualified to fill a vacant billet in a sister service, cross assignments between USMCR and USNR should be considered, if no one is available to fill that position within the host service. The complication of this is the ability of one sister service to pay members of another service.

Recommendation: Seek authorization from Congress for reimbursable funding. Such authorization presently exists in the Joint Intelligence community.

Issues #6. Allow Naval Reserve Officers to wear the command insignia if they have qualified and been awarded the NOBC.

Discussion:

For the Naval Reserve, NOBC qualifications are included in individual readiness. Qualifications take a combination of schools and experience. Several NOBC’s parallel command positions where, on active duty, individuals can qualify by tenure on job. If an reviewing authority awards the NOBC, than a Reservist should be viewed as qualified to wear the breast insignia, while serving as Commanding Officer or subsequently, according to uniform regulations.

Recommendation: An NOBC qualification is authorization to wear the breast insignia, for either hardware or non-hardware units in the Naval Reserve.

Issue #7. The duration of the process in the release of the names of Promotion Board Selectees.

Discussion:

The goals of the Department of Navy has been set at 100 days between the ending of deliberation by promotion boards and publication of the promotion board results. Release of Board Selectees has taken longer than 100 calendar days. The 100 days seems viewed as a target, rather than a maximum. This continued delay in releasing the results of promotion boards is still negatively impacting the morale of Naval Reservists.

Recommendation: That the Secretary of the Navy, and the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs scrutinize the process of tracking board results, and discourage unnecessary delay or aging of these lists. The goal should be for a minimum process time, rather than maximum.

Item #8 Forty-Eight hours Hold on the Release of Naval Reserve Selection Board Results.

Discussion: Following formal approval of Active Duty promotion board results, a 48 hour hold is placed on the promotions list, to enable Commanding Officers to download the list from a navy site, and then to inform and counsel eligible officers of their status. The message is then publicly released. A similar policy is being considered for the Naval Reserve.

The infrastructure of the Navy Reserve precludes as easy a communications link as Commanding Officers on active duty have. Informing USNR COs, who are removed from Reserve Centers and NR Activities is more difficult. USNR COs would not be accessing the official listing from navy.mil computers but from personal or corporate sites complicating security issues. Also, a proportion of USNR COs are geographically remote from members of their wardroom, complicating contact of individual members and counseling within that 48 hour period. It would be easier to simply post the boards results as soon as they have been reviewed by the President’s Office.

Recommendation: Do not hold Naval Reserve Promotions for 48 hours, after presidential approval, until a system is developed and satisfactorily tested to accomplish the intended counseling results.

Issue #9 VTU Eligibility for the Montgomery GI Bill

Discussion:

In the Reservist’s "Memorandum of Understanding" for the Montgomery GI Bill, it states that if you go into the VTU, your benefits stop. Because many O-5’s and O-6’s are forced into the VTU as a result of being temporarily promoted out of a billet, the Naval Reserve has created a problem. The majority of members drilling in a VTU are cross-assigned into Selected Reserve Units and contribute to mission accomplishment.

Recommendations: Allow VTU members, who maintain qualifying years and who are already covered by the Montgomery GI Bill to continue benefits.