Report on Opportunity for Savings by Reducing Overtime on Revetment Construction and Maintenance on the Lower Mississippi River, Corps of Engineers (Civil Functions)

The General Accounting Office has examined into selected aspects of the use of overtime by the Corps of Engineers (Civil Functions), Department of the Army, relating to revetment construction activities at the Memphis and Vicksburg Districts, Lower Mississippi Valley Division. Our review, covering the period January 1956 through May 1965, was made pursuant to the Budget and Accounting Act, 1921 (31 U.S.C. 531, and the Accounting and Auditing Act, 1950 (31 U.S.C. 67). This review was undertaken because of the substantial amount of overtime costs incurred each year by the Corps of Engineers (Civil Functions). We selected the revetment construction and maintenance operations performed on the banks of the Mississippi River for detailed examination because it constitutes one of the major activities on which significant overtime costs were incurred on a continuing basis. During the period of our review, the annual costs incurred by the districts for force account labor and related revetment construction activities exceeded $9 million. The average overtime costs incurred each year amounted to about $850,000 and $650,000 in the Memphis and Vicksburg Districts, respectively. Our primary emphasis during this examination related to those matters apparently needing attention and included a review of policies and procedures concerning the scheduling of revetment construction and an analysis of the districts' use of scheduled overtime in relation to the length of revetment construction seasons. Our review was conducted at the Lower Mississippi Valley Division and the Vicksburg District, Vicksburg, Mississippi, and at the Memphis District, Memphis, Tennessee.