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Senior Advisors
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By Master Sgt. Bob Haskell National Guard Bureau ARLINGTON, Va. (10/4/2004) — Six retired Army National Guard senior sergeants have been working behind the scenes for nearly a year now to explore pay and other personnel problems that many Guard troops have encountered while serving their country during the global war against terrorism. “These six retired sergeants major have worked very hard to make deployments a lot easier for our Army Guard Soldiers who are serving overseas for long periods of time and for their families,” said Command Sgt. Maj. John Leonard Jr., senior enlisted advisor for the chief of the National Guard Bureau. “They have explored and dealt with many issues, such as pay and promotions, that impact our Guard men and women,” Leonard added. “They have a lot more work to do because the National Guard is going to actively support this war for as long as it takes to win it.” Leonard is the chairman and spokesman for the Blue Ribbon Senior NCO Advisory Panel that LTG H Steven Blum, the Guard Bureau’s chief, has chartered to advise him and Leonard about Guard Soldiers’ problems and to find solutions. How does a Guard Soldier from one state get promoted on schedule while serving for 18 months with another unit from another state? How do Guard Soldiers on active duty know they are getting all of the pay and allowances they are entitled to when they are enrolled into the Army’s finance system? Why do some active Army Soldiers get bigger bonuses for re-enlisting than do Guard Soldiers? Those are among the issues that the six explore when they meet every few months, it was explained. The six members, all retired, are Command Sergeants Maj. Anthony Savino, Tom McNamara, Robert Oram and R. J. Moulton and Sergeants Maj. Dan Golden and Sam Kanouse. Leonard commended the retired senior NCOs for volunteering to help Army Guard Soldiers. They bring their experiences of more than 180 total years in personnel and operations to the panel that, members say, examine many of the issues that other people on the Guard Bureau’s staff, such as the Army Guard’s Personnel Policy and Programs Division, and other advisory groups are already exploring. The panel is being expanded to include retired chief master sergeants to address Air National Guard issues, Leonard said. “Sometimes this panel validates a problem that other people are already dealing with, such as the Army National Guard’s Command Sergeants Major Advisory Council which performs a similar function for Army Guard Command Sgt. Maj. A. Frank Lever III,” Leonard acknowledged. The same is true for the Air Guard’s Enlisted Field Advisory Council that reports to Air Guard Command Chief Master Sgt. Richard Smith. Each council will have a representative on the panel. The Blue Ribbon Panel reports directly to Leonard. He reports directly to Blum. And the Guard Bureau chief can order the appropriate people on his staff to deal with a situation. That kind of access to the top, it was explained, makes it less likely for an issue to be delayed or confused in the chain of command. “The panel is designed to use the individual and collective experiences and judgment of professional Noncommissioned Officers to enable the National Guard to fulfill its missions ...,” states its charter. Other senior NCOs with specific areas of expertise may also be brought to the table. Guard Soldiers’ pay is one example of the issues the panel explores, Leonard explained. Army Guard leaders have resolved many of the pay problems that Soldiers initially encountered when large numbers began being mobilized for a year or 18 months of active duty in Afghanistan and Iraq because the reserve components’ and active duty finance systems were not compatible. “Most of the time it’s a communications problem,” acknowledged one panel member. “Many Army people don’t know the nuances of the Guard, plus there are many differences in programs between inactive duty status and active duty. And we didn’t have time to fix many of these issues when Soldiers were being mobilized and deployed on fairly short notice.” Guard Soldiers were frequently underpaid or not paid at all, according to a General Accounting Office report to Congress late last year. That means their families were not getting money to pay their bills. One group of Guard Soldiers was told they owed the government an average of $48,000 apiece because their orders were incorrectly entered into the payroll system, the report stated. The GAO also learned of one Guard Soldier whose plane came under enemy fire while he was flying from Uzbekistan to Kuwait to resolve a pay problem for his unit. Guard Soldiers encountered a tremendous number of pay problems during mobilizations in 1990-91 for Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm, said one panel member who explained “it took many months, sometimes years, to get the pay straightened out for a few of those Soldiers.” Blum quickly heard, nearly everywhere he went, that Guard Soldiers were encountering the same problems when they were being mobilized for Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom. He knew something had to be done. Blum appointed Leonard as his senior enlisted advisor last fall. Then the general told the command sergeant major to form the panel so that the retired sergeants major could identify and begin getting to the roots of the problems and recommend ways to fix them. Last 10 Stories
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2004 National Guard Bureau |
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