On Wednesday (5 July), the SASC also passed its version of the defense authorization bill by a vote of 27 to 0. A few items explained in the committee’s Executive Summary of this bill:
• Would provide a 2.1 percent pay raise for members of the Armed Forces.
• Authorizes $25 million in supplemental impact aid to local educational agencies with military dependent children and $10 million in impact aid for schools with military dependent children with severe disabilities.
• Authorizes $1 million for a pilot program to develop a public-private partnership on military spousal employment.
• Increases pharmacy co-pays to generate discretionary savings for the DOD to fund improvements in military readiness and mandatory savings and to fund other personnel benefits and programs, such as permanently extending the Special Survivor Indemnity Allowance under the Survivor Benefit Plan and providing for annual inflation adjustments, and allowing reservists who are eligible for the Federal Employee Health Benefit to purchase TRICARE Reserve Select.
• Improves military family readiness by addressing the shortage of qualified child-care workers, requiring that realities of military life be considered in setting the operating hours of child-care centers, and by increasing flexibility for families in the permanent change of station process.
You can read all of the committee’s Executive Summary at: https://www.armed-services.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/FY18%20NDAA%20Summary6.pdf
An article in the Military Times about the SASC version of the NDAA tells us in part, “Senate lawmakers introduced a $700 billion defense authorization bill on Wednesday that sets the stage for another financial showdown with House budget planners and White House officials over the right target for national defense planning.
“The Senate draft calls for more base defense spending than either of the other plans, fewer troops and a smaller military pay raise than the House proposal, but 54 more aircraft and five more naval ships than the president had planned.”
You can read the complete article at: http://www.militarytimes.com/articles/sasc-ndaa-fy18-more-spending-unveiled