Washington, D.C. — The following are opening remarks, as prepared for delivery, from Ranking Member of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure Rick Larsen (D-WA) and Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Salud Carbajal (D-CA) during today’s hearing titled, “Review of the Coast Guard’s Fiscal Year 2027 Budget Request.”
Video of Ranking Members Larsen’s and Carbajal’s opening statements can be found here and here.
More information on the hearing can be found here.
Ranking Member Larsen:
Thank you, Chairman Ezell, for calling this hearing and for giving us a chance to review how the Coast Guard’s FY2027 budget request will prepare the force for the future.
Welcome, and thank you, Admiral Lunday and Master Chief Waldron, for being here today.
Unfortunately, we’re meeting today amid yet another lapse of appropriations affecting the Coast Guard. We could pay Coasties and provide immediate certainty and stability if we were allowed to vote on the funding bill that already passed the Senate unanimously.
For many years, Congress and the senior leaders of the Service have called for increased funding so that the Coast Guard can perform as the $20 billion dollar agency that it should be.
Congress and the Administration cannot keep asking more from the Service without making these investments.
Every day, the women and men of the Coast Guard go out on their missions to save lives, protect our maritime borders and keep commerce flowing.
The Administration’s FY2027 budget request offers significant promise in some areas, particularly the Operations and Support (O&S) budget, which is increased by 20%.
Funding in this range will continue efforts to better prepare the Coast Guard for its core missions and increase the number of service members. This will be necessary as the Coast Guard reconstitutes the stations it downsized during COVID-era recruitment gaps.
More funding for the Coast Guard means more lives saved, safer maritime commerce and more interdicted drugs. Despite the misguided lethal actions taken by the Department of Defense, the Coast Guard remains the most effective tool to combat illicit maritime activity.
That said, the Administration’s Procurements, Construction, and Investments (PC&I) budget request fails to meet the needs of the current Coast Guard, let alone one with a growth goal of 15,000 personnel. I am eager to discuss this discrepancy between the two major funding pillars and how Congress can fill the gap.
The Coast Guard received historic funding last year from the Reconciliation bill.
Much of that funding was needed to recapitalize assets well past their service life and push the Service into the future with the acquisition of state-of-the-art systems.
However, this funding, and the increases to O&S, will be meaningless if we’re unable to support the new personnel and assets with adequate homeporting piers, workstations, housing, childcare and healthcare facilities. Supporting the Coast Guard must start with supporting the women and men who serve.
This is one of my primary issues with the Administration’s request. A 15% decrease in funding simply won’t do the job.
For example, $306 million of the $346 million dedicated to shoreside infrastructure is slated to be spent in Alaska for Arctic Security Cutter homeporting. That leaves only $40 million left to attempt to address the over $7 billion backlog.
I wholeheartedly support the funding and forward thinking of the Service to tackle these projects because they are needed. However, existing sites like Base Seattle, Training Center Cape May and the Coast Guard Academy have infrastructure demands that we should address now—and prioritize funding there.
I look forward to hearing from you both today about how the Coast Guard views the prioritization of these projects.
Furthermore, as the Coast Guard begins to acquire and reinvest in new or previously downgraded and shuttered shoreside facilities, it must prioritize sites that enables it to broaden the coverage of its search and rescue functions. Reconstituting these stations will be a vital benefit as the Coast Guard grows its personnel.
Finally, I want to draw attention to recent changes to the planned homeporting of assets at Coast Guard Base Seattle raised in the Seattle Times in an April 11th story and recently confirmed by Coast Guard documents.
Initial project plans included upgrades to the Seattle waterfront to homeport four Offshore Patrol Cutters but have now been scaled back to accommodating “up to four major cutters” instead.
I want to hear more details from the Coast Guard about this change and how the Coast Guard plans to prioritize the planning and funding associated with Base Seattle homeporting.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the Coast Guard’s ongoing effort to address sexual assault and sexual harassment in the Service.
The Accountability and Transparency Review initiated by the former Commandant steered the Coast Guard in the right direction, and I’m glad that you are building on that momentum. The Committee will continue to conduct vigorous oversight of the Service’s actions on the ATR, and we stand ready to help.
With that, I yield back.
Ranking Member Carbajal:
Good morning, and thank you, Chairman Ezell, for calling today’s hearing.
Welcome, Admiral Lunday and Master Chief Waldron, it is great to have you both here today.
Unfortunately, we’re holding today’s hearing while the men and women serving in the Coast Guard are facing financial uncertainty.
While I knew that my Republican colleagues and I disagreed about the direction of ICE and CBP, I hope we agree about value of the Coast Guard. I urge my colleagues to support the funding bill passed unanimously by the Senate that would provide financial certainly to Coast Guard servicemembers.
Last year, when we held this hearing, the Coast Guard was in the middle of great change across the board.
The Service was about to receive historic funding in Reconciliation, and Coast Guard leaders were championing service wide changes that were included in Force Design 28, even though that plan was, and still is, a relative mystery.
I may not have agreed with the former Secretary much, but she was right when she said that the Coast Guard has been neglected and under-resourced for far too long. Unfortunately, here we are a year later, and when I look at the budget, I remain just as concerned.
Overall, Coast Guard funding in the budget request increased by 15%, which is great news. With the increasing demands being placed on the Coast Guard, it is appropriate that the budget allows for significant growth among service members. This funding increase truly is long overdue and more than deserved. More Coast Guard is something everyone on this Committee supports.
Unfortunately, the budget takes a big step backward on recapitalizing the Coast Guard’s shoreside infrastructure by reducing the PC&I funding by 15%. Reconciliation funding becomes meaningless if it’s not met with strong regular appropriations.
The Government Accountability Office issued a report last year that found the Coast Guard’s $7 billion estimate for the shoreside infrastructure backlog is actually much higher, due to over 200 projects lacking cost-estimates.
A reduction at this stage is completely irresponsible and unacceptable.
Budgets show priorities. This President’s budget is a reflection of his values.
At some point, we must get past the awe of reconciliation and recognize that, just like a ship takes years to build and requires regular maintenance, so do buildings. So do piers. So do homes. So do childcare facilities.
This is a people issue. I’ve met a lot of service members and can say, without hesitation, they deserve better.
I am hopeful that with some of the recent programmatic and procurement changes, we will begin to see effective project management and better contracting decisions. I look forward to hearing about these changes and improvements in today’s hearing.
If the Coast Guard expects to grow the service by 15,000 members, it must continue to advocate for consistency in funding and must focus on managing this recapitalization effort judiciously.
Congress has the opportunity to right the ship, and I look forward to talking to our witnesses about the needs of our future Coast Guard.
With that, I yield back.
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