To assess DLA headquarters efforts to correct the Year 2000 computer problem, we (1) met with DLA’s Chief Information Officer (CIO), Deputy CIO, Chief of the Customer Support Team, headquarters Year 2000 lead official, and a headquarters Year 2000 Test and Evaluation Support Team official, (2) analyzed documents issued by these offices that describe organizational structure and responsibilities for carrying out DLA’s Year 2000 efforts, and analyzed business requirements, resource management, and DLA’s automated information systems, and (3) reviewed the DLA CIO’s Year 2000 compliance directive that provides guidance and direction and assigns responsibility to the DLA Systems Design Center and all other DLA components. The Department of Defense provided written comments on a draft of this report. The systems that interface with DLA systems are just as vulnerable to the Year 2000 problem as DLA’s own systems. The Center has taken the following actions as part of its efforts to address the Year 2000 problem: developed a detailed Year 2000 plan; conducted a Year 2000 impact assessment, which identified the number of systems owned by DLA and the lines of code associated with those systems; estimated which mainframe, mid-tier processors, and desktop computers would still be in use by the year 2000; conducted pilot projects with DLA’s major automated information systems, including SAMMS, MOCAS, Defense Integrated Subsistence Management System, and Defense Fuels Automated Management System, to assess potential Year 2000 impact on these systems; and developed Year 2000 policies, guidelines, standards, and recommendations for the agency. These include (1) ensuring consistency in handling date information passed among systems, (2) incorporating thousands of locally developed, unique applications in the Year 2000 systems inventory and assigning responsibility to the DLA Systems Design Center’s Year 2000 program office for ensuring that the unique applications are Year 2000 compliant, (3) prioritizing systems for correction, and (4) developing contingency plans. If these issues are not promptly addressed, DLA may well negate any success it may have in making systems within its control Year 2000 compliant, and it will hamper its ability to deal with unanticipated problems and delays. Because these systems are also vulnerable to Year 2000 problems, they can introduce and/or propagate errors into DLA systems. We believe that DLA needs to communicate its interface plans to its customers and contractors so that its data exchange partners will be aware of DLA’s plans and can alert the agency to possible conflicts with their own plans. DLA Has Not Prioritized Its Systems

An important aspect of Year 2000 correction is prioritizing which systems have the highest impact on an agency’s mission and thus need to be corrected first. This helps an agency ensure that the most vital systems are not treated the same as systems that have little to do with the agency’s core business. While DLA has progressed in its Year 2000 effort, there is no guarantee that the initiative will be completed on time or be free of unforeseen problems. However, DLA is unnecessarily putting its Year 2000 strategy at risk of failure because it has not yet taken the fundamental steps associated with ensuring that the proper date information is passed between systems. DOD believes that DLA’s planning efforts and strategy for renovating its systems are adequate and that DLA has adequately prioritized its mission critical systems.
Why GAO Did This Study

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Defense Logistics Agency's (DLA) program for solving its Year 2000 computer problem, focusing on the: (1) status of DLA's efforts to correct its Year 2000 problems; and (2) appropriateness of DLA's strategy and actions for ensuring that the problem will be successfully addressed.

What GAO Found

GAO noted that: (1) DLA has recognized that the Year 2000 problem has the potential to be the largest information technology dilemma it has encountered to date and that if not successfully resolved, the supply, technical, logistics, and contract services that DLA provides to the military services could be severely disrupted; (2) to its credit, DLA has already: (a) assessed the Year 2000 impact on its operations; (b) inventoried its systems; (c) conducted pilot projects to determine Year 2000 effects on some of its major systems; and (d) developed and issued policies, guidelines, standards, and recommendations on Year 2000 correction for the agency; (3) these steps are consistent with GAO's guidelines and the Department of Defense's (DOD) five-phase approach for planning, managing, and evaluating Year 2000 programs; (4) however, DLA has not yet completed several critical steps associated with the assessment phase of Year 2000 correction that are designed to ensure the agency is well-positioned to deal with delays or other problems encountered in the remaining phases; (5) DLA has not been working enough with its customers and others who have established system connections or interfaces to ensure consistency in handling date information passed between systems; (6) the agency has not included thousands of field-developed, unique programs as part of its Year 2000 systems inventory or made these programs part of its Year 2000 program office's responsibility; (7) these unique programs can introduce errors into DLA's automated information systems just as easily as those systems that have external interfaces with DLA systems; (8) in addressing these two issues, DLA can help ensure the success of its efforts to correct the systems within its control; (9) DLA has not: (a) prioritized the 86 automated information systems that it plans on being operational in the year 2000 to ensure that the most mission critical systems are corrected first; or (b) developed contingency plans to establish the course of action that should be followed in the event that any of DLA's mission critical systems are not corrected on time; and (10) since DLA activities are critical to supporting military operations and readiness, GAO believes that the agency should begin prioritizing its systems and developing contingency plans so that logistics operations can continue even if unforeseen problems or delays in Year 2000 corrective actions arise.