NEWS RELEASE 15-05                                                                                   March 25, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MMSB processes, stores more than 560,000 Marines' records
By Marine Sgt. Donald Bohanner
 
MARINE CORPS BASE QUANTICO, Va. (March 24, 2005) –  "Marines take care of their own -" about 4.6 million of their own throughout history. The Personnel Management Support Branch takes care of 565,000 active duty and reserve official military personnel files at Quantico and over four million OMPFs at the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis. This three-part series will look into what your Official Military Personnel File is and how to read it, fitness reports through Automated Performance Evaluation System and common mistakes made and "Who tracks your records?"
 
"We are here to take care of the individual Marine and the Marine Corps as an intuition," said William Swarens, head, MMSB.  "Our goal is to package the most current and timely information that is available and present that information so that the decision maker such as a promotion board member can read, think, discuss, and vote."
 
The support branch directs and controls the functions necessary to create, maintain, and archive OMPFs and directs and controls the functions and operation of the Performance Evaluation System. In addition, their mission includes unit diary research activities and worldwide locator service for the Marine Corps.
 
"High on our priorities are the 105,000 active duty and reserve records that represent the 105,000 sergeants and above.  These are the records that we send to the 80 annual (promotion and selection) boards," said Swarens. "Currently, we are providing 7,761 staff sergeant OMPFs and master brief sheets for the April gunnery sergeant Board. The decision makers will decide who is best qualified of all the fully qualified, but their decision is based on the information that we provide."
 
"But what's most important for the individual Marine to understand is that we manage and maintain their records and ensure that they are up-to-date for their boards," explained Maj. Todd Ford, head, MMSB-20 Records Management Section. "We distribute the Marine's OMPF to the Marine on request and to authorized officials for purposes of selection to staff sergeant and above, for enlisted and officer assignments, for selection to resident schools, screening for command and for retention. Upon retirement or discharge and with the Marine's authorization, we provide OMPF information to other federal agencies plus potential employers."
 
MMSB is made up of five sections: Records Correspondence, Records Management, Performance Evaluation, System Support and the Marine Corps Liaison Office at the National Personnel Records Center.
 
The Records Correspondence Section, or MMSB-10, compiles and furnishes information from OMPFs; provides copies of OMPFs and master brief sheets; corrects administrative information contained in OMPFs or as directed by the Performance and Evaluation Review Board, Naval Discharge Review Board and the Board for Correction of Naval Records. MMSB-10 also provides personnel records for use in courts, replaces and amends DD214s, a certificate of release or discharge from active duty,   processes medical records and responds to correspondence regarding Marines on the temporary disability retired list, provides worldwide locator service for the Marine Corps and researches unit diary information.
 
"We send out over 65,000 CDs around the world each year," said Sgt. Maj. Charles Castle, MMSB sergeant major. "These CDs contain the individual Marine's OMPF, old and new master brief sheets, and reporting senior and reviewing officer profiles.
 
The Records Management Section, MMSB-20, is responsible for the physical operation of scanning, indexing, and storing documents in the OMPF, and providing a copy of the OMPF to all selection/promotion boards. MMSB-20 also operates the customer service office, coordinates outgoing mail service, and distributes all incoming mail for the branch.
 
"The most important thing Marines need to remember about what the records management section does for them is that we take care of their record," said Ford. "We have three Marines that do nothing but board support. There are 80 boards a year - that's promotion and selection - where my Marines provide the most up-to-date OMPF and master brief sheet. They ensure that all the information in the OMPF, including the master brief sheet, is correct up to 12 hours before the board."
 
The Performance Evaluation Section, or MMSB-30, establishes and enforces the policies and procedures for performance evaluation. They process 200,000 fitness reports annually. If a fitness report is not administratively and procedurally correct then it is returned to the reporting officials. Once a fitness report is accepted as correct then it is written to the digital OMPF. The data that is extracted from the fitness report is entered into the Performance Evaluation Section database and then is used to compile a master brief sheet.
 
"The Automated Performance Evaluation System is unique to the Marine Corps," said Lt. Col. Robert Clements, head, MMSB-30. "This paperless process allows the Marine reported on, the reporting senior and the reviewing officer to use web technology for completion of the worksheet, completion of the fitness report and the electronic forwarding of the fitness report to each reporting official and to MMSB."
 
A-PES enhances the timeliness and accuracy of every fitness report. Reports that we receive through A-PES are 97 percent accurate and can be processed and put on the OMPF in - at the latest - 48 hours, whereas 50 percent of the paper copies we receive have some type of error and can take up to four weeks to process."
 
The Policy and Research Unit of MMSB-30 provides assistance to Marines and commands on fitness report policy questions and research, correction and accountability for all active duty Marines. They also assist in the recovery of lost or missing fitness reports through the fitness report audit program.  They also process requests for administrative corrections to fitness reports and the master brief sheet.
 
"We receive almost 200,000 fitness reports a year and process between 500 and 2,500 daily," said Castle.
 
The Fitness Report Processing Unit, or MMSB-32, is responsible for the receipt and initial screening of fitness reports to ensure that reports are administratively and procedurally correct.
 
The Reserve Matters Unit, MMSB-34, provides the same services for reserve Marines, as does MMSB-31 for active duty Marines.
 
The Systems Support Section provides the branch and the five digital boardrooms with computer and network support and applications development.
 
The last section, Marine Corps Liaison Office at the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, manages requests for archived Marine Corps personnel records from 1905 to 1999. Their information services are critical for funeral details, recruiters and HQMC congressional correspondence and for the loan and transfer of OMPFs to MMSB for various purposes.  
 
"We have not retired a record to St. Louis archives since 1999 when we went all digital and transferred all our microfiche to optical imagery digital," said Swarens. "Someday the reader of this article will retire or leave the Marine Corps and all of a sudden - there is a requirement for their lost DD-214 or any other information in their OMPF. Remember that if your contractual obligation ends after 1999 then your OMPF is at MMSB at Quantico. Otherwise it is at NPRC St. Louis."
 
All four of the sections at Quantico are equally important and together make certain that your records are up-to-date.
 
"We ensure the your records are up-to-date, but it is the individual Marine's responsibility to review their OMPFs for accuracy and completeness," explained Swarens.
 
For more information on MMSB visit www.mmsb.usmc.mil.