Why It Matters
Intergovernmental support agreements, or IGSAs, expanded across Defense Department installations from 45 in 2018 to 316 in 2025, while questions remain about how the military estimates and verifies their savings, according to a new Congressional Research Service report. The arrangements allow installations to receive, provide, or share support services, including utilities and road maintenance, with state, local, and tribal governments. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that military-service cost-savings estimates did not reflect best practices for cost estimation and that some agreements lacked associated cost estimates or cost-benefit analyses. Officials from the Department of Defense, the Army, the Navy, and selected installations said they intend to promote future IGSA use.
GAO also found that the Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force lacked procedures to verify installation cost and cost-savings estimates or revise them when necessary. The evidence places the central issue beyond whether these agreements can be used, and on whether the services can demonstrate that projected costs and savings are sound before expanding them.
The Big Picture
Federal law authorized the military services in 2013 to enter into IGSAs with state, local, and tribal government entities for installation-support services. GAO analyzed data on IGSA use as of December 2025. Military-service guidance did not provide specific instructions for estimating costs and cost savings for prospective IGSAs that would provide multiple services to one or more installations. In the sampled agreements, public partners in nine of 21 single-installation IGSAs used private contractors for some or all of the work.
The McNamara-O'Hara Service Contract Act requires employees providing services to the federal government to receive prevailing wage rates for comparable employees in their locality, but the law does not apply to IGSAs. GAO compared minimum wages for five selected positions under IGSAs with minimum wages that might be required for comparable work under the act, using a nongeneralizable sample.
The Bottom Line
For the selected paralegal position, the public-partner minimum hourly wage was $23.92, compared with $28.89 under the comparable Service Contract Act wage, a 17 Percent difference. For the selected Driver I position, the public-partner minimum hourly wage was $15.36, compared with $18.98 under the comparable wage, a 19 Percent difference. For the selected EMT transport crewmember position, the public-partner minimum hourly wage was $16.37, compared with $18.84 under the comparable wage, a 13 Percent difference. For the selected senior accounting/payroll specialist position, the public-partner minimum hourly wage was $21.47, compared with $21.54 under the comparable wage, a 0 Percent difference. For the selected stormwater environmental specialist 1 position, the public-partner minimum hourly wage was $39.84, compared with $26.64 under the comparable wage, a 50 Percent difference (higher public-partner wage).
GAO made five recommendations covering cost estimation, savings estimation, and verification of actual costs and savings. The Army, Navy, and Air Force generally agreed with recommendations to improve task-order cost guidance, while the listed recommendations for those services remained open because responsive actions had not yet been taken or were still being planned.
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