Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. TED LIEU of California. Mr. Chair, I rise today to express my support for the Space-Based Infrared Systems (SBIRS) Wide Field of View (WFOV) effort.

Unfortunately, the House's Defense Appropriations bill for FY16 would completely eliminate SBIRS WFOV funding due to concerns that the initiative was being used to develop new technology rather than making evolutionary upgrades to existing programs.

I believe that these concerns are misplaced, and I am concerned that eliminating funding will derail this valuable effort at a critical juncture. It is my understanding that SBIRS WFOV does in fact support evolutionary development of the Program of Record (POR). Data gathered from WFOV efforts will support risk mitigation efforts to the POR and will facilitate cost savings by maturing technologies before implementing them on the POR.

It is worth noting that the Senate and House Armed Services Committees fully funded the WFOV effort in their respective versions of the FY16 National Defense Authorization Act, as did the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee.

The SBIRS WFOV initiative is designed to lower future costs while evolving vital components of our national security space architecture. I urge my colleagues to support full funding for this initiative during conference negotiations.

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