TIM DILL: Good afternoon, everyone. Good to see many of you again from yesterday and I appreciate that we're not on camera today. It's fortuitous. So we're here today to talk about permanent change of station moves, or PCS moves. PCS moves are essential to the Department's efforts to support operational requirements, develop service members and ensure that we're prepared to meet our ever more critical defense mission.
I'm excited to talk to you today about the Department's efforts to reduce the frequency of PCS, moves for service members, driving much needed efficiencies for the Department and improving the quality of life for warfighters and military families. So on May 22nd, the official performing the duties of Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, Jay Hurst, signed a memorandum that you received several hours ago that focuses on mid to long term manpower planning and accomplishes two things for the Department. One, to improve the quality of life for service members and their families by improving their geographic stability; and two, by conducting fewer PCS moves, being an effective steward of taxpayer money by incurring fewer PCS costs annually for the Department.
I talk to service members and their families frequently. I've had several engagements in recent weeks with military spouses. Specifically, we just reviewed the results of the 2024 Active Duty Spouse Survey and we hear from them frequently about all of the concerns that are typically associated with PCS moves.
And it's clear that it's time for the Department to look at reducing the frequency of those moves, especially if we want to maintain the momentum that we have today, both in recruiting and the retention of our service members. That memo that Jay Hurst signed on May 22nd, the PCS Targeted Reductions Review and Personnel Policy Changes Memo is a step forward for the Department and enhancing the PCS process while generating efficiencies, optimizing the Department's resources and allocating them against core functions and offering greater geographic stability to service members and military families.
The memo directs the military departments to spend 120 days reviewing their PCS budgets and to consider how they would pursue future reductions to those budgets and to develop holistic and comprehensive implementation plans for those proposed changes. Specifically, that memo asks the military departments to reduce their PCS discretionary move budgets by 50 percent by fiscal year 2030, and that's based on FY '26 budget and adjusted for annual inflation and also for the military Departments to propose various career development modifications to permit some officers and noncommissioned officers to further specialize and remain in place, contributing their unique skills over an extended period of time at one duty station.
That four-month timeline for the military departments to develop their proposals for PCS budget reduction shows the Department's ongoing propensity to take action and to move quickly, both to meet mission requirements and to be responsive to the needs of service members and their families. Now one point of clarification, this memo that we're discussing from May 22nd is a separate policy initiative from the memo that the Secretary signed prior to that, that dealt specifically with the PCS move process, the execution of that process. So this is a separate line of effort the Department is already pursuing, improvements in the reliability and the efficiency of the execution of the move process itself.
This policy we're discussing today, which is separate, is focused on when should we move a service member and their family. Both of those issues are top of mind for the Department. But today we're focusing exclusively on the PCS-targeted reductions review. I'm very excited to announce this initiative. Again, it's responsive to what we frequently hear from military families.
We understand how disruptive a PCS move can be. There are many aspects to that challenge and that disruption. One of the biggest ones is military spouses' employment, when they often have the need to find a new job at their gaining location. And sometimes they end up underemployed at that location. Families have to go find a new home.
They need new arrangements for their children, whether that's in child care or a new school system, and they're displaced from the community of support that they've developed over the years in their previous duty station. All of those concerns can be effectively addressed by examining when the Department does not need to move a service member and their family to accomplish the mission.
So thanks very much for listening to all of that. I'm happy to take your questions.
MODERATOR: OK. Before we get started, please announce your name, your outlet and you can have one question and one follow up. Todd Lopez.
Q: Hey. Sir, just for a point of clarity. Todd Lopez, DoD News, first, just as a point of clarity, these percentage reductions, are these cumulative or is it a drop in the PCS budget from $5 billion to $2.5 billion by fiscal '29?
TIM DILL: I'll walk through it a little bit to try to answer that question, Todd. So currently, the Department spends about $5 billion a year across the Departments to conduct PCS moves. And so while we're indexing that budget for inflation, we're looking at the Departments to start with a proposal for how they would reduce the spending by 10 percent as the first reduction in fiscal year '27, and then escalating those reductions to by fiscal year '30 have achieved a 50 percent reduction once indexed for inflation to FY '26 numbers in the year 2030.
Q: OK. So the budget dropped from $5 billion to about $2.5 billion over the course of the next four years.
TIM DILL: But in real terms — but again, I'd point to this, it'll be indexed for inflation as well.
Q: OK. So based on that, the military doesn't just move people to move people, they move it so they can move soldiers into positions of greater responsibility wherever they need to. With only half of soldiers moving in '29 to a new location, are soldiers going to find themselves in a position where they are losing out on advancement opportunities? And is the Department trading these advancement opportunities and breadth of experience for geographic stability and cost savings?
TIM DILL: Yeah, well, there's a lot of aspects to the question, so I'll try to take some of them in turn. So right now, Personnel and Readiness has issued direction to the Departments to come back with plans for how they think they could best achieve those reductions while ensuring that they continue to prioritize the mission and the development of service members.
So some of the things that they consider in doing that is where can we be more efficient when we do moves and we're spending that money, how can that process be done in a more cost effective manner, as well as things like where do we provide our service members with broadening opportunities and continuing leadership opportunities without the need for a PCS move.
So I don't consider this all to be counter to the goal of developing service members, ensuring that they have the right leadership opportunities as they ascend in rank. We're asking Services to look at where is a move absolutely necessary to accomplish that and where is a move not necessary to accomplish it and it's simply how we've been doing things.
You know, it's one of the Department's priorities not to maintain vestiges of the past, but to ensure that when we're doing something, it's because it allocates our resources best against our core missions today, not just because we used to do it that way.
MODERATOR: Chris.
Q: Hi. Chris Gordon, Air and Space Force Magazine. If I could follow up on something in the memo, it's directing the departments to create plans, but it says these plans should adopt a holistic approach, not limited to personnel policy actions. Can you please pick apart exactly what that means and explain that a little more?
TIM DILL: Yeah, sure thing, Chris. So part of this process or one of the things driving a PCS is because of the career planning for that individual, filling the needs of units. So I'd describe that as personnel actions. So the other side of that could include the other areas of how do we do a move more efficiently in a way that's not personnel driven, that's a logistical task is there a way to do that in a more cost-effective way.
MODERATOR: Liz.
Q: Hi. Liz Friden with Fox News. Thanks for doing this. Could a possible outcome be that families stay and the service member moves? And could another possible outcome be service members having more choice or a direct input in whether they want to move their families or not?
TIM DILL: Yeah, thanks, Liz. I think there's a lot of ways that this could be addressed and we understand there's some risks associated with some of the methods. And so what we're doing right now is directing the Services to develop a plan and come back to us and when they brief us on the possible courses of action, they could choose to accomplish those reductions to tell us where they see risk as well.
So we intend to work hand in hand with them. We're not dictating the way in which this needs to be done and we would want to hear from the Services, their concerns about some of the examples you named. So I won't get ahead of them and how they would assess those risks. We want to ensure we work hand in hand with them to make this better for the Department, for the taxpayer and to be a net positive to service members and their families.
Q: Hi. Mallory Shelbourn with USNI News. How will this affect efforts already underway in the Services like the Navy and the Marine Corps to give service members flexibility and more choice in PCS moves?
TIM DILL: Well, to the extent that a Service already has plans to do those things, I think this nests very well with that goal. So I think it's a positive if a Service has already been looking at what's the most effective way, what's the most efficient way, what's a way that maintains quality of life and preserves geographic stability.
And I think any lessons learned they have from that process and any plans they have for PCS can integrate in this well and they can bring those ideas and that data back to us at the 120-day mark. And we'll work with them to figure out how to put those things together.
Q: So is that work already happening to integrate with the Services you're doing or is that what this memo is going to start?
TIM DILL: So this memo is specifically kicking off the process of asking the Services to take a look. You know, this isn't ruling out anything that they've already been developing, but specifically establishing goals and a timeline for coming together and figuring out a way that we can reduce the frequency of moves, or reduce overall spending on PCS and improve quality of life.
Q: Hi. Thank you. Tony Bertuca, Inside Defense. Two things, one, was this a DOGE adjacent initiative? And two, you seem to be starting with the cost cutting goal and the analysis is going to happen in four months. What is to say that you don't have that right, that why not 30 percent, why not 55 percent? How do you know that you can cut this in half and not do damage or create a major disruption at this point?
TIM DILL: Yeah. Thanks, Chris. I'll take those in turn. So to the first one, this is an initiative from Personnel and Readiness because it's our task to be looking out for these types of policies for service members and their families, things like assignment policy. And then second to the question of how do we know this is the right number, so this is not prescriptive in nature beyond telling the Services to come back with their design for how they would best accomplish this and to propose with this various reduction levels in the year targets, how would they do that and what would be the risks. So there's still space for P&R in conjunction with the military departments to have a discussion about, OK, here's how you're telling us. You could accomplish that level of reduction by this time, what's the level of risk you see associated with that?
So we're not tied to one course of action at all. I understand what you're saying that if we were simply directing them to do this with no conversation and no review, that there would be room to say how do you know this is the right number. We want them to come back and tell us if that seems like the right number for them, because again, on top of being efficient from a fiscal perspective, the other goal of this policy is a people driven policy is to ensure that this works well for service members and their families. And so that is one of our primary goals in the policy to ensure it works well. If they come back and say, well, this specific course of action could be harmful, then we don't want to accomplish it that way.
Q: So this number could be adjusted downward, maybe?
TIM DILL: Yeah, there'll just be room for discussion, right? We haven't directed that any specific course of action must be implemented. We look forward to having that conversation and figuring out how we can do this best.
Q: Thank you.
MODERATOR: Yes, in the back.
Q: Hey. Nick Schifrin, PBS NewsHour. Thanks for doing this. Can I ask the same question just a little differently? Is the primary goal of this to make cuts or to improve performance? And is there any risk to performance in making a 50 percent cut?
TIM DILL: So when you say performance, can you elaborate on that?
Q: You know, improve the overall program to actually deliver for the warfighters, deliver for your goals as part of the DOD.
TIM DILL: Yeah, both things are important, both improving quality of life for service members and their families and being efficient with taxpayer dollars, which lets the Department put finite resources where they're most needed. The most important thing in this policy is that we're taking care of service members and their families.
If we thought it would be detrimental to them, we wouldn't even pursue it because when we're being efficient with taxpayer dollars, make sure we do that in a thoughtful and deliberate way. So I describe this as a people-first policy. It also has a second objective, which is that if what we hear from service members and their families is it's difficult to move, that PCS moves are disruptive, we hear that where those are necessary for the mission they need to happen. But if there are some of those that are not necessary for the mission, we can accomplish the mission in a different way and it also happens to be accomplished by spending fewer taxpayer dollars in that area, then that's a win-win for the Department.
MODERATOR: Yes.
Q: Hi. I'm Patty Nieberg with Task and Purpose. Do you foresee, kind of similar to Liz's question, kind of policies being different for maybe single service members versus families? Because I know that the emphasis is on keeping families in one place and the spouses. Would you see kind of different policies for the different groups?
TIM DILL: Thanks, Patty. For one, I'm not going to anticipate what the Services will provide back to us. So I have an open mind about what they'll tell us would be best. When I say service members and their families, I don't mean exclusive to service members with families. I want to highlight the importance of both populations.
Some service members have families, some are single and it impacts all of them when they move, right? There are some impacts that are additional for a family. For example, if you don't have dependents, you don't have child care and school restrictions. But we understand that PCS moves affect everyone and so this is not a policy where we just think we need to take the moves away from the families and put it on someone else.
It's for everyone. I always make sure I add families in that discussion because we recognize for those with military families, it's also a big impact on them, right? They are right alongside the service member for a career and we often say in P&R that you recruit a service member and you retain the family.
So for those with families, it's a huge factor when they're making a retention decision, if their family is enjoying military service and wants to stay. If your family is not supportive of the service member staying in service, that's a very high predictor of whether or not the service member will decide to stay and we want them to stay.
Q: Can I also just ask a clarifying question on the memo? I think the, if I'm reading it right, the numbers for the reductions might be different in the memo and then in the template. Would you be able to go over kind of the fiscal year '27 reduction and so forth?
TIM DILL: Yeah, I'd have to compare the two again, but I have the memo in front of me and we laid out starting with a 10 percent reduction in '27, and then that scales up through '28, '29 and '30, ending with a 50 percent in 2030. So that's the controlling language. I'd have to go back and see the template and our other guidance, but that's P&R's direction.
Q: So follow the memo's numbers?
TIM DILL: That's right. That's right.
Q: OK.
MODERATOR: Yes, ma'am.
Q: Meredith Roaten with Janes. Training travel is listed as one example of discretionary cuts that you want to make here. How would that impact potentially large scale exercises that the US might be doing? Is that something that you're thinking about how to manage at this point?
TIM DILL: Yeah, thanks for the question. To clarify, I think you're talking about within the PCS move context, right, which is what this policy is focused on. So when we talk about travel for training within PCS moves, that means a permanent change of station that is being conducted in order to accomplish training.
For example, when I was in the Army, I did a permanent change of station to attend the captain's career course and then another permanent change of station to move to my next location. So that was training travel, but that's separate from an exercise. We're not discussing exercise related travel in this policy at all. This is just for a permanent change of station.
Q: Thank you.
TIM DILL: Did that answer the question?
Q: It did.
TIM DILL: OK. Thank you.
MODERATOR: OK. Liz again.
Q: Hi. Can you give an example of what a high priority move would be versus a low priority move?
TIM DILL: Yeah, so there are certain functions where in order to continue on your career track, you must go obtain certain accreditation or additional training, right, something that corresponds with your increase in rank or because of a career change, you need to go to a different duty assignment. That's just geographically distant located in a different place.
We also have critical missions that have to be fully manned and we have less critical missions. So without pointing to one or another in saying that they're low priority, there are some moves that are more discretionary. We estimate that about 80 percent of Departments PCS moves are in the discretionary category and 20 percent in their mandatory.
So what we're directing the Departments to do is purely to examine potential reductions in things that would be defined as discretionary. So if they see that as a mandatory for mission need, we're not even asking them to come back with a plan to reduce it. We want them to continue that course of action and do the mandatory moves.
Q: Thanks.
Hi. Matthew Adams, Stars and Stripes. Location is an important part of this. Are there certain bases that you've heard from service members that they don't want to go to? And is this something the Department is looking at to make sure that bases aren't being impacted in a negative way?
TIM DILL: Well, overall, in my conversations with service members, both from 10 years in the Army and then serving here, I've heard from many service members about bases they like or don't like, and all of those sets of preferences are different. So I've talked to people that very much enjoyed a certain assignment and someone else says they would not want to go to that assignment.
And I think that's one of the benefits of when we work hand in hand with the Services and the service members, they each have preferences that are individual to them, where they're from, where they have family, where they're accustomed, the areas they like. And so there's going to be a lot of room in this and we're preserving the Services' flexibility to come to us and propose reductions.
So we're very open to talking to Services about is there an installation that's harder to fill, that's easier to fill and do some of those installations have very core functions that they're struggling to get numbers with. So I do think that there are service members out there that are perfect for any installation.
And we want to make sure that where we can we match up with service member preferences as much as possible because we want them to have a positive experience and want to stay.
MODERATOR: Thanks, everybody. The embargo is broken.
TIM DILL: Thanks all very much for your time.
Q: Thank you.
Q: Thank you.
TIM DILL: Enjoyed speaking with you today.