§719 Research Projects; Transactions Other Than Contracts and Grants

Summary

The Commandant may use special kinds of deals (not regular contracts, cooperative agreements, or grants) to do basic, applied, and advanced research. The Commandant can also team up with DARPA, military department leaders, or other Defense officials chosen under 10 U.S.C. 2371b to join prototype projects and follow-on production work that directly helps the Coast Guard’s cyber and command-and-control, communications, computers, and intelligence efforts. These deals are extra authority beyond the usual contract and grant rules and can use money from operations and support; research, development, test, and evaluation; and procurement, construction, and improvement funds if Congress provides it. Those cooperative agreements or special deals may require recipients to pay the Coast Guard or another federal agency; any payments go into the Treasury’s general fund and may be used only if Congress allows. The Commandant must avoid duplicating Coast Guard research and use these special deals only when normal contracts or grants won’t work. Staff who handle these deals must get training and meet learning and certification rules. Proposals, confidential business plans, and technical information submitted for possible awards are protected from public disclosure under FOIA for 5 years. The Commandant will write rules as needed and must report each use of this authority yearly to the House Appropriations and Transportation and Infrastructure Committees and the Senate Appropriations and Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committees, listing amount, parties, product or service, the research project, and cost sharing.