Green Corner

‘PART’ helps units eliminate waste

Ingrid Barrentine/Northwest Guardian

As the 57th Transportation Battalion was gearing up to deploy to Iraq and Kuwait in 2008, the battalion’s rear detachment maintenance section was left with a bit of a headache.

The Soldiers were tasked with emptying all 20-foot portable CONEX storage units in the battalion area so the containers could be shipped to support the unit downrange.

“Everything in them ended up in our bays,” said Staff Sgt. Robert Harris, the 57th Trans. Bn. motor sergeant who managed the task.

What used to be a warehouse-sized maintenance building soon became an over-stuffed, extra parts closet.

“We had a lot of (left-behind) equipment,” said Sgt. 1st Class Shawn Thornton, the battalion motor officer.

Everything from wrenches and shovels to vehicle doors and old office furniture.

Fortunately for Harris, FORSCOM created the Property Accountability Recovery Team two years ago so units had a more convenient way to handle their extra inventory.

Anytime units deploy, the PART teams help them get rid of their excess stuff and put it back into the system, Thornton said.

Rather than cart all their unused items to a landfill, Harris built a relationship with PART and turned a lot of the unit’s excess items into their Joint Base Lewis-McChord Lewis Main warehouse.

“They came over as a courtesy and walked around and looked at the stuff and told us what they could and couldn’t take,” Thornton said.

“We go out to units that are deploying or units that have contacted us that have excess expendable property to get rid of,” said Red Driver, a PART warehouse manager.

And the kinds of things the PART team is looking for?

“Repair parts for vehicles, trailers, construction materials, tools, concertina wire, that kind of stuff,” Driver said. “We go (to) unit motor pools, we (pick the) stuff up, we pack it in containers, bring it here, stage it and process it.”

Once the inventory is processed, it is placed on shelves at the PART warehouse and is available for Soldiers with a signature card to start shopping — for free.

“It’s like free funding,” Thornton said. “If there’s something for one of these trucks that we need and they got it on their list, all (we) have to do is ... go over there and sign for it and it doesn’t cost (us) anything.”

The PART warehouse on JBLM is just one of many across the country. PART employees can place orders from other locations through an online database.

According to Driver, a lot of inventory is sent to Fort Bragg. then on to theaters in the Middle East and Southwest Asia.

The PART warehouse helped the 57th Trans. Bn. turn in nearly $100,000 worth of equipment that otherwise might have gone to waste.

Now that most of the Soldiers with the battalion have returned, Harris and Thornton are on the procuring end again.

“We (chastise) our motor sergeants if they are ordering parts and it’s on that PART list,” Harris said. “That’s a no go, because that is money that we could be saving.”

Both Soldiers are strong proponents of the advantages of working with the PART team.

“You eliminate that fraud, waste and abuse,” Harris said. “Why order it when you can get it from your neighbor?”