Berry Amendment threshold to stay at $150,000
The text of the Fiscal Year 2016 National Defense Authorization Act has been released, keeping the threshold to trigger the Berry Amendment (10 USC 2533a), its specialty metal variant and the Kissell Amendment at its current level—the inflation-adjusted figure of $150,000.
The Berry Amendment requires the Department of Defense (DOD) to procure certain items, including textiles and clothing, made with 100 percent U.S. content and labor. The United States Industrial Fabrics Institute (USIFI) and the Narrow Fabrics Institute (NFI), divisions of ATA, have actively lobbied to keep the threshold at $150,000, instead of increasing it to a proposed amount of $500,000.
Section 817 of the report adds multiple new thresholds beyond $1 million after 41 USC 1908(e)(2)(C)—“Inflation adjustment of acquisition-related dollar thresholds”. Because the $100,000 to $1 million threshold in 41 USC 1908 (e)(2)(C) is unchanged, the Berry and Kissell thresholds will remain unchanged.
Section 884 provides instruction on price issues related to personal protective equipment, ensuring that “the Secretaries of the Army, Navy, and Air Force, in procuring an item of personal protective equipment or a critical safety item, use source selection criteria that is predominately based on technical qualifications of the item and not predominantly based on price.”
