The Chief of Staff (your senior rater) is furious with your legal review of the Commanding General's decision to build a Paratrooper Museum on post. You opined that he could not use Operation & Maintenance (O&M) money on the museum because the funded costs exceed $4,000,000. The total funded costs are $4,200,000. The Chief of Staff asks you why the concrete foundation and site preparation can't be purchased with current (FY 2024) O&M funds for $850,000, then the remainder of the project can be finished next year with FY25 O&M funds? Each contract will be less than $4,000,000. You thoroughly research the matter and give the following correct advice:
a. There is no legal objection to this course of action. If the site preparation and foundation are compete and useable in FY24, then the command can acquire the rest of the building's construction in the next fiscal year if the remaining construction in FY25 is also deemed to be complete and usable.
b. Programming a military construction project in separate increments solely to reduce the project's Program Amount below an approval threshold or a construction appropriation ceiling amount, which would result in programming an other-than complete and useable facility, is
