Actions and Implementation to Address Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment in the Military. Independent Review Commission Recommendation-Implementation Roadmap.

 

Sept. 22, 2021

Today, the Department of Defense announced the Independent Review Commission Actions and Implementation to Address Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment in the Military.

Over the past seven months, the Department has made progress on a set of actions to evaluate our installations, assess compliance with existing policy, comprehensively improve our efforts at the installation level, take the initial steps to establish a violence prevention workforce, and initiate changes to the military justice process governing the handling of sexual assault and sexual harassment cases.

The establishment of the 90-day Independent Review Commission (IRC) on Sexual Assault in the Military, provided the Department a set of comprehensive and actionable recommendations to improve our approach in four lines of effort: accountability, prevention, climate and culture, and victim care and support.

The Deputy Secretary has developed a tiered implementation roadmap in consultation with the uniformed and civilian leadership of the Department. The Secretary of Defense approved the roadmap in its entirety and expect the Department leaders to move swiftly and deliberately to implement it.

This includes the following actions across four Tiers:

• First, the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness (USD(P&R)) will issue enterprise-wide guidance for Tier 1 by October 13, 2021. Tier 2 guidance will be released by November 12, 2021.  Guidance for Tiers 3 and 4 will be released by December 15, 2021; 
• Then each of the Military Services and relevant components will develop implementation plans and resource mapping for Tier 1 by November 12, 2021, Tier 2 by December 15, 2021, and Tiers 3 and 4 by January 31, 2022;
• The USD(P&R) will develop an Outcome Metrics Evaluation Report by May 1, 2022, to track effectiveness and progress of implementation of all Tiers; and
• The USD(P&R), in consultation with the uniformed and civilian leadership of the Department, will assess the roadmap formally no less than twice annually and recommend any adjustments to the Deputy Secretary, through the Deputy’s Workforce Council (DWC). The DWC will meet quarterly to monitor implementation progress and timelines wherever possible.

The memo for Commencing Department of Defense Actions and Implementation to Address Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment in the Military and the Independent Review Commission Recommendation-Implementation Roadmap can be found here.