Segment 3 Of 3 Previous Hearing Segment(2)
SPEAKERS CONTENTS INSERTS Tables
Page 520 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Tell me a little bit about that. That may not be specifically in the purview of this committee, Mr. Chairman, but obviously the savings that it affects either in house or out house can be used for capital expenditures.
Mr. PIRIE. Well, the A–76 process requires that when an activity is selected for study the government part of the activity essentially go into competition with the private sector, and the government part of the activity is then under the gun to develop the most efficient way of doing it.
So you have the effect of competition both on the government side of the execution of the project, and of course whoever comes in from the private sector. The private sector has to show something like a ten percent additional savings over the most efficient government organization at the end of the day to be the winner.
But the track record of these competitions is over the long haul the average savings run up to 30 percent, and that is fairly well documented in the academic literature.
Only about half of them are won by the private sector. The other half stay as government operations, but the competition forces that operation to tighten itself up and save money.
So that is how that works.
Mr. HOYER. Just as an aside, my experience has been—and I have been at this A–76 a long time, as you can imagine, not necessary related to DOD, but other agencies as well—that in the short term the private sector in many instances can show a significant savings. In the longer term, that is, five years out, experience, though not consistent, is pretty dramatic in terms of the escalation of costs to the private sector.
Page 521 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PIRIE. I think we always have to be real careful that the private sector doesn't buy in and then hold us up in the long run. And also organizations that have been doing the same thing for five and ten years tend to get set in their ways and complacent, and do not tend to adapt new technologies and new methods.
Mr. HOYER. Mr. Secretary, focusing on the same paragraph, you talk about 85,500 Navy and Marine Corps billets in support areas. Again this is not this subcommittee per se, but one of the things that concerns me, and I would just say this for your interest, is—and I have talked to Admiral Lockhart about it and others, and to Secretary Dalton—contracting out technical services as opposed to support services, where our technical competence may be compromised both in the short and long term.
I would make that as an aside, but I am very concerned about it, particularly at Patuxent River. As you know, we are going through this issue at Pax, and it is causing not only morale problems, but what it causes in my opinion is a risk of losing your very best people who are the most competed for, and who can get the best deals.
And they leave your central, core function, and pretty soon the idea becomes the father or mother of the reality that you have to contract out because your core capability has been undermined.
That is not obviously this committee, Mr. Chairman. But I know you are very concerned about that.
Page 522 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
NAVSEA moved to the Navy Yard. Can you give me a brief view of how the shoe horn is working?
Mr. PIRIE. We have let the contract for the conversion of the buildings, and it is on schedule, and I think it is going to be a good scene in the long run. The whole Navy Yard——
Mr. HOYER. How long?
Mr. PIRIE. I do not think it will take very long. I understand that the follow up activities, all the aerospace companies and so forth are beginning to show up in Southern Maryland around Patuxent River already. I would expect the same thing to happen with the follow on activities of NAVSEA along the M Street corridor, and I think that is going to be a real winner.
I do not think that the rank and file at NAVSEA are particularly happy to leave Crystal City and go to the Navy Yard. We are going to do our best to make it comfortable and safe and a decent working environment for them.
Mr. HOYER. Mr. Chairman, this is something I think the committee really needs to focus on. Obviously as a representative of this area I think rehabilitating the Southeast quadrant of this city is a good thing to do. I come across the South Capitol Street Bridge. It is the worst entrance to Washington, D.C. that we have.
Page 523 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
It is, I think, shameful, and we ought to do, and I am going to be working on it, a Pennsylvania Avenue-type project for South Capitol Street. There is no reason why that vista and that entrance should not be a quality entrance.
Mr. Chairman, I was talking about the Southeast Federal Center, which I know the administration and previous administrations have had a great deal of interest in. Mrs. Norton and the District of Columbia, but all of us in this region have an interest in doing that.
That was my last question. I wanted to ask about the Navy Yard. I have some others, but they are asked in this packet, and I presume you are going to submit that.
Mr. PACKARD. We will.
Mr. HOYER. No point in my asking.
Mr. Chairman, I know you have had an opportunity of working with the Secretary. The Secretary has been down to Pax, and I have had an opportunity to work with him and visiting with him in the Pentagon.
And it ought to be a continuing source of great pride to the American public that not only the people that we have in uniform, but the people that we encourage to come back, entice to come back from the private sector in which they are earning geometric sums above what they earn in the public sector, agree to come back and give of their time and talent.
Page 524 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
And I thank him for not just what he has done to Pax—I know what I wanted to say. We have, in our BRAC success stories——
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir.
Mr. HOYER [continuing]. You mention those that were closed that were helped out. Let me tell you something, Mr. Secretary. I want to congratulate you and Admiral Lockart and Captain Roberts and all the civilian personnel that were involved. You moved 5,000 people on time, under budget in an incredibly efficient and effective way down to Pax River, and that is a logistics success in and of itself.
I know it is not on your list, but I want you to know that some of us are really very appreciative of that, and you did a great job.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you.
Let me now proceed through some of my questions in more of an orderly way than when I initially started out.
SUPPLEMENTAL REQUEST
On a general basis, the supplemental request, we are moving, and will be moving rather quickly to mark up a 1998 supplemental appropriations bill for the Defense Department and for other things, too.
Page 525 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
We have not yet received an official request for additional military construction funds from the Navy. Do you expect that to come, and will there be some areas where you will request a supplemental for this budget year in light of great operations in the Mediterranean and some of the operations over around Iraq?
Are we seeing a need for a supplemental for military construction?
Mr. PIRIE. I'm not sure about the military construction aspects of the Bosnia supplemental. I do know that we will certainly be coming forward and asking for money to deal with storm damage, for example, at Camp Pendleton and in Guam, which was ravaged by Typhoon Paca.
And we have had some discussions in the Department, and whether that will be appended to the Bosnia supplemental, or it will be a stand alone, it looks as if it will now be a stand alone. That is the current thinking.
Mr. PACKARD. Okay.
Mr. PIRIE. We will try to get it to you as fast as possible, because we know you are on a fast track.
Mr. PACKARD. Yes, thank you.
FAMILY HOUSING—GENERAL REDUCTION
Page 526 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The construction annex to the budget request, the C–1 document, contains an entry for ''Congressional reductions minus $6.3 million'' in the Navy Family Housing Program. Could you explain that? Are you familiar with it?
Mr. PIRIE. Is this the issue of do we finance current housing with prior year savings? I think that's right.
Mr. PACKARD. That's right.
Mr. PIRIE. I think the committee rather explicitly told us not to do that in the past. And all I can say is that it is a budgetary device over which I have no control.
Mr. PACKARD. It shows a reduction. I did not know exactly what it meant, and my staff is not sure.
Mr. PIRIE. What it means is we under-ran some projects in the previous year, and we take the savings from that and apply them as part of the cost of the next thing, and offset that project and make a cut in the budget.
Mr. PACKARD. I see.
Mr. PIRIE. It is a budgeteer's device, which are virtually unlimited.
Page 527 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. Are these unobligated funds that are made available to pay for costs of storm damage or whatever in a supplemental, in other words?
Mr. PIRIE. Where someone has applied those funds for some other thing that he or she would like to have like a weapons system or——
FAMILY HOUSING PRIVATIZATION
Mr. PACKARD. I see. Now, I want to get into the privatization issue, because you spent quite a bit of time in your testimony on it, and it is very comprehensive, and as I read it there were some concerns and questions, and I thought we could spend a little time on it.
We have received notification that the Army's Family Housing Privatization project at Fort Carson is under review, and the Navy has executed the two that we referred to earlier in Texas and Washington.
There are several questions I would like to have you answer if you could in relation to some of these items as it relates to privatization. Does the Navy anticipate that there are any significant financial savings from privatizing?
Mr. PIRIE. Well, what we hope to do is take the same amount of money and produce more housing through leveraging private capital.
Page 528 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. Which is a savings.
Mr. PIRIE. Which would be a substantial savings. Our—in very rough, general terms, it costs about $15,000 to provide and maintain a government house for a family. Our allowances for our people who live in the private sector run around $7,100 a year. So there is a big disparity between those two numbers.
The private sector appears to be able to produce and maintain an acceptable house at about half of what it costs us to do it. So accessing the efficient and robust American housing market seems to be good policy for us.
Mr. PACKARD. So the per unit cost, it appears that PPVs will actually render a significantly less per unit cost?
Mr. PIRIE. We will get more houses for the same money, yes, sir.
Mr. PACKARD. That is different from the Army. The Army testified last week on that. We asked them the exact same question, and they answered that they did not anticipate a significant savings, or any savings at all in fact, the way I remember it.
And so it will be interesting to follow up on that. Because I think that is important. As I read your testimony, I think the Navy and the Marine Corps are moving more vigorously into privatization than perhaps any other branch of the services.
Page 529 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
And I am not critical of that effort. We have been pushing privatization. But it does lead to the next question, and that is do you see privatization, PPVs replacing the traditional way of constructing military housing, or any other military construction?
Mr. PIRIE. Not completely. I see it as a supplement, not as a replacement. There are places and conditions in which the only answer is going to be the government provides the housing, because the market cannot do it.
But on the whole, if the market can do it, if we can figure out some way to get a private developer interested in coming and providing housing near or on our installation, and using private capital for the bulk of this——
Mr. PACKARD. Is it correct that the cost of the family housing program is being shifted from this bill to the housing allowances subaccounts within the military personnel accounts of the National Security appropriations bill?
Mr. PIRIE. The money that finances the housing, in the case of public/private ventures, is essentially the housing allowances of the individual. So it is in the military personnel account, not in the military construction account.
Mr. PACKARD. Will there be a savings in this cost shift?
Mr. PIRIE. The savings—the cost shift is a mechanism which gives us more houses for the same money.
Page 530 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. Have we done a fairly thorough evaluation of the process and the results as we have gone through the Texas and the Washington State projects? We are moving vigorously into proposals now that are involving—and those are small projects. Everything we have tried so far under PPV really have been small projects. Hundred-fifty units or something in that general area.
You are now talking of one in San Diego, I read, which my notes say, a very large effort, 9,000 family housing units, constructing up to 2,400 new homes. We are moving big time into the privatization effort here when we are talking in those numbers.
Have we learned sufficiently from the existing prototypes, Texas and Washington State, to where we feel competent and comfortable in moving this vigorously into the process?
Mr. PIRIE. I do not think that the small prototypes are necessarily the model that we will ultimately follow in San Diego which is why we have taken so much time and effort and care in trying to construct the bigger packages as we have.
I think it important that we do these things on a large scale in order to bring in the big developers and to get access to the big guys and achieve economies of scale, and access this robust housing market.
In the case of the San Diego projects, we have had a major conference out there. We are working quite hard to make sure that we understand all aspects of the project before we go forward with it. And there are lots of stages of approval.
Page 531 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
This cannot be done without the approval of the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and it cannot be done without your approval prior to execution.
Admiral Nash, do you want to add anything to the San Diego picture?
Admiral NASH. Yes, sir. I think we feel confident in the business processes now that we have developed, and we feel like we understand what is going on, and so we are right on the cusp of moving ahead. But I will assure you that we are going to be very careful.
Mr. PACKARD. We are moving into another area that is of interest to me and one that I have not been aware of before, and again I am not speaking with any reluctance of us moving forward with this. But it something that's, at least to my knowledge, unplowed ground.
And that is transferring existing government units to the private sector. In other words, homes that are built, some of them probably recently built, in the Camp Pendleton and San Diego area, transferring them to the private sector and negotiating something in return.
Could you explain that process, and how you expect it to work, and what experience you have had in this, and if in fact you think that we are moving into an area that is unknown. I would be interested in your comments on it.
Mr. PIRIE. Well, we do not have a lot of experience in this, but as one of the authorities that was given to us three years ago, in what was called at that time the Perry Initiatives, and so forth, and essentially it is that the government brings to the negotiating table as part of its stake the property that we are going to transform.
Page 532 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
And that becomes a part of our contribution, and so forth. The developer brings his financing and so forth, and then a calculation is done about what the cost of the project is going to be and what cash flow is necessary to finance it, what kind of units we can have, and whether those can be afforded by all of our members, or only, let's say, the top grades—a lot of really very complicated business calculations.
Mr. PACKARD. So not only are we building new and refurbishing old units under the PPV process, but we are actually now moving in the direction of transferring housing that was built under the traditional military construction process into the private sector, away from the public sector.
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir.
Mr. PACKARD. Looking at it from the long term picture that Mr. Hoyer was referring to, we feel comfortable and confident that—because again that is moving in the direction of really moving into the private sector wholesale. I mean, to a very large extent. Much, much more than we ever envisioned, at least at this early date. And moving away from traditional housing stock that we were accustomed to.
Does that include barracks?
Mr. PIRIE. It can.
Mr. PACKARD. On-base housing?
Page 533 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PIRIE. It can. We think that the private sector can build a garden apartment, let's say a two bedroom garden apartment under ordinary circumstances at considerably less cost than it takes us to build a one plus module in a BQ.
If that is the case, we sure ought to be looking at private sector alternatives to our BQ construction business.
Mr. PACKARD. We hope your projects and your estimates and your feelings are right in this, because we are moving quickly. Again, the Navy and the Marine Corps are moving more vigorously in this direction than I have seen any other agencies.
I am not suggesting that we put a yellow light up yet, but certainly this is a huge change of direction for housing. Do you have any estimates as to how quickly that will move the Navy and the Marines out of the backlog?
Mr. PIRIE. That is the unfilled demand for housing in places like San Diego and——
Mr. PACKARD. Throughout the entire country.
Mr. PIRIE. It is worse in some places than in others. I don't expect that we will ever have zero waiting lists for government housing. But we are hoping at least to reduce the backlog in places like San Diego, high cost of living areas, to half or a quarter of what it is now, which I think is unconscionably large.
Page 534 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. On particular bases, do you expect any revenue return, as you negotiate existing housing facilities transferred to the private sector?
Mr. PIRIE. Well, one of the provisions of these public/private partnerships is that we, in some cases, are a limited partner, and revenue that accrues to the partnership is shared by us. And we can use that to finance other public/private ventures.
So far we do not have the experience of a vast influx of funds. We are hoping to get some.
Mr. PACKARD. I was looking at the one in Westover, Massachusetts that Mr. Olver might be more aware of than I am. It is where you are projecting that you would convey 320 existing houses to the private sector, and another 279 homes in a different area to a private developer to manage and so forth.
And I am wondering, in an isolated situation like that, maybe you are proposing to build new units there in exchange. But if you are just transferring existing homes to the private sector, and there is no need or no reason to build new, then are there any revenues?
How do you negotiate those kinds of deals?
Mr. PIRIE. Basically the negotiation is for the maintenance of these things, rather than refurbishment and all that kind of thing. And it is more economical for us to have a private concern operate and maintain the units than to do it through our existing NAVFAC organization.
Page 535 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Do you want to speak to that?
General HAYES. No. I think that captured it. The dynamics of those two instances, for instance, Mr. Chairman, are an area where there has been a draw down, so we can leverage the existing stock for the fewer numbers of people there, and provide quality housing in an area that is very expensive for the serviceman.
The good news there is all four services are participating in that. We are running it from the Navy, becoming ours, privatizing it, and the influx is really, the new influx——
Mr. PACKARD. Maybe I am not seeing it clearly, but on some of your projects you contract for a private entity to build, and then sign a long term maintenance agreement, and they maintain the new housing stock. But they also build, to transfer existing units to the private sector simply for the cost of maintenance.
Sounds like it is maybe out of reason. But maybe new construction is a little different than old.
General HAYES. In that case, sir, the housing stock is in fairly good shape, and so it is renovation that we are looking for from the private sector.
Mr. PACKARD. I see. I do not want to prolong this. Do you have any further questions, Mr. Olver? We can go through a third round if you like.
Page 536 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
OUTSOURCING COMPETITIONS
Mr. OLVER. I did have one, if I could find out where it is. I've been rifling my own notes here.
I have it. On page 4, where I think Mr. Hoyer had been talking earlier, on outsourcing competitions, you were speaking of studying a series of billets and another series of billets, and ultimately you are going to study 85,500 Navy and Marine Corps billets.
Now, I take it there are studies of different groups here. There is some portion of these, recruit services, some of them housing management, but that sounds as if—does that cover all of what now is done in food services, housing management, ground maintenance and so forth throughout the Navy?
Are some sections of it—I take what they are trying to do is figure out whether you should contract out for all of these services, and then have your enlisted personnel be majoring in actually being military personnel rather than potato peelers, whatever it is, food service entails.
Mr. PIRIE. Or Navy civilians. Whether the Navy civilians are the right way to do it, or whether contract services are the right way to execute it.
Mr. OLVER. So the study is which of those, but not to continue to do them by enlisted personnel themselves?
Page 537 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PIRIE. These are not military performed functions. These are functions that are currently being done by civilians employed by the Navy Department.
Mr. OLVER. And does that 85,000—does that mean that there will be 85,000 Navy and Marine present active positions that may no longer be there, some portion of them may have disappeared into these contracts?
Mr. PIRIE. Some portion of these billets will be simply excessed, because the contractor will be performing those functions.
Mr. OLVER. What is a billet?
Mr. PIRIE. A billet is a job.
Mr. OLVER. Okay.
Mr. PACKARD. I have maybe three or four quick and simple questions, and then hopefully we can wrap it up.
LINE ITEM VETO
The Line Item Veto items. Thirty-eight projects. Can you assure us that these projects will be executed as quickly as possible?
Page 538 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir.
Mr. PACKARD. You are moving forward with them?
Mr. PIRIE. We are moving forward with them, and I believe that at least five of them will be executable in the fiscal year. I think the rest will be very shortly thereafter.
Mr. PACKARD. Within the fiscal year. You say five of them?
Mr. PIRIE. Yes.
Mr. PACKARD. I know part of the year is gone, but we certainly are—five out of eleven? Would you give us a written report on the progress of those eleven projects?
I think it would be helpful for us to follow up. I think Congress went to the effort of overriding, and we would like to make certain that we didn't just go through the exercise and then nothing is happening.
Mr. PIRIE. We will proceed with those as rapidly as we possibly can.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much.
Page 539 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
[The information follows:]
The projects restored to the FY 1998 budget will be executed as promptly as possible. The six month delay between original appropriation of the FY 1998 program and the overturn of the line item veto has impacted our ability to execute all line item veto projects in FY 1998. Our best estimate of execution of the projects at this time is as follows:
FY 1998 EXECUTION
Coronado CA Waterfront Ops Facility (9/98)
Whiting Field FL Runway Improvements (9/98)
Fort De Russy HI Asian Pacific Center (9/98)
St Inigoes MD Maintenance Hangar (9/98)
Johnstown PA Marine Corps Reserve Ctr (9/98)
Johnstown PA Marine Corps Maint Hangar (9/98)
Yorktown VA Tomahawk Magazine (7/98)
FY 1999 EXECUTION
Page 540 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Pasadena CA Marine Corps Reserve Ctr (12/98)
Mayport FL Pier Improvements (11/98)
Crane IN Chem/Bio Warfare Facility (1/99)
Norfolk VA Air Operations Building (3/99)
Portsmouth VA Waterfront Improvements (2/99)
CHILD CARE IN SAN DIEGO
Mr. PACKARD. I will submit these questions for the record, and you can respond to them. The Child Development Center in San Diego is being outsourced, and I would be interested in something on that.
[The information follows:]
An A–76 Commercial Activities study will determine if the private sector can manage the entire child care program in the San Diego region. The goal of the outsourcing study is ''using on and off-base centers and in-home care, determine if the private sector can manage the current program, as well as meet the child care requirements, at equal or better quality and availability, for less cost to the government.'' The solicitation is on the street but will be amended to include five additional areas (El Centro, Port Hueneme, Point Mugu, Fallon, Lemoore). The current POA&M calls for a decision whether to contract or remain in-house by December 1998.
Page 541 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
DREDGING IN SAN DIEGO
Mr. PACKARD. There are two quick questions I would like to ask. As you know, Mr. Secretary, you and I have been working together, along with a lot of other people out in the San Diego area in dredging the harbor, making ready for the Stennis, the carrier coming into San Diego Harbor this fall.
Would you bring us up to date on the progress of that dredging and the problems we have run into in terms of sand deposits on the beach?
Mr. PIRIE. The dredging has begun again.
Mr. PACKARD. It has.
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir. As you know, two years ago we had planned and obtained permission to take the sand that we dredged from San Diego Harbor and put it on various beaches there in Southern California.
And the additional cost, we obtained some funds to offset that additional cost, and there was a provision in the authorization act that the communities should match that dollar for dollar and so forth.
There was a lawsuit by an environmental group in San Diego that had to be settled before we could begin the dredging. So they did not get started with the dredging until some time last year.
Page 542 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Almost immediately after we had begun to deposit sand on the beach, we discovered that there was some ordnance in the sand. That being the case, we felt it was just not consistent with public safety to go on putting that sand from the harbor on to the beaches.
We believe that the right way to do this is to proceed with the dredging project in the most efficient manner and get it over with, and take the money that will probably be left in the project, because we are not doing the extra steps required to put the sand on the beaches, take that money and use it to finance getting clean sand from some other location put on the beaches.
And in that way Southern California will be assured of getting at least some of the sand for the beaches. And that is what we have been pursuing.
Mr. PACKARD. Are you on schedule in dredging the harbor for the Stennis?
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir. We can make August of this year, if we do not have any further lawsuits or interference from well meaning environmental groups.
Mr. PACKARD. To do all this requires some legislative language change. Do you intend to put that in the supplemental?
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir. In fact, I do not believe it is coming in the supplemental. I think it will be in our legislative language package.
Page 543 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
NAPALM
Mr. PACKARD. The second item is again parochial. We have as you certainly know a Naval ordnance depot adjacent to Camp Pendleton, and they have been storing for 20 some years now napalm, old stored napalm bombs. They are deteriorating to where the canisters are leaking, as you know, and are beginning to impact the soil and so forth there.
We have now contracted to have it moved. Would you bring us up to date on that process? There is a delay, a certain delay, I understand. Would you bring us up to date on that delay, what has caused it, and when it will be lifted, and when the move will start?
Mr. PIRIE. The delay is a mechanical problem with the devices that are going to be used to shift the material from the canisters that they are in into the specially designed canisters for shipping off to the site in which the napalm will be blended with other fuels to create industrial fuels for kilns, for ceramic drying and things of that kind.
Mr. PACKARD. I know there are some Illinois concerns. But I think the general understanding is, and all the science and research has shown that it is actually safer to ship the napalm to be recycled and burnt for fuel, it is safer than shipping gasoline that we ship every day in our tankers on the highways and on the rails.
Mr. PIRIE. We have been working on this project for a considerable length of time.
Page 544 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. It is an educational problem.
Mr. PIRIE. And we finally came up with a design that the Department of Energy and Battelle Northwest Division, that is entirely consistent with environmental regulations in California.
We have had to require public interest and done the necessary environmental impact statement for that part of it.
The shipping is entirely permitted. The facility that is going to blend this fuel and turn it into something that is useful in some other mode of operation is completely permitted, and so forth. So there is no indication that there is any legal or environmental deficiency in this project.
And we believe that it should go forward.
Mr. PACKARD. I do, too. Thank you.
Is there anything further?
Mr. OLVER. I have a couple of others here. Mr. Secretary, can I have a report on that question that I raised about the Marine Air Reserve, the snag between there and how it is progressing? That's pretty much very current right now.
Mr. PIRIE. We will keep you current on that. I think we can work that one out.
Page 545 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. OLVER. All right. Look, I do not want to be pedantic about this, but I really am trying to understand. Let me take you back to this language on page 4 that I was questioning about, which produced the question about what was a billet.
You say there in January of 1997 you provided Congress with an intent to compete 10,000 positions. Then the next sentence says the Navy has now put contracts in place to support the studies. Most of these studies are now under way.
Are we still talking about the 10,000? They haven't actually been competed? They are still in study. Most of these studies are under way and are expected to be completed later this year or early next year?
Mr. PIRIE. The process, looking at the government operation and coming up with a most efficient organization and so forth requires hiring some people to help you to develop a new organization. And those are the studies that are being referred to there.
Mr. OLVER. But this is all in relation to the 10,000 that you had issued an intent to compete.
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir.
Mr. OLVER. And so—all right. It is only a year and a half. Less than a year and a half. So those studies are expected to be completed, and then you would execute whatever it is that seems feasible from the studies.
Page 546 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
But in the meantime you say that you do intend to study, which is again you really intend to compete more positions, 7,200, an additional 7,800, but those, the studies on those will start, and that will take some time. So we are moving on.
And when you are talking about we plan to study 85,500 in all these support areas, that may take us, at this rate, that may take us quite a few years down the road.
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir.
Mr. OLVER. It is a ten year out overall plan to get to that point.
Mr. PIRIE. Yes, sir.
Mr. OLVER. And then my last question, which I now understand, was when you have done those 85,000, if those are all contracted out or privatized, or whatever the procedure is there, would that be all the personnel who are doing those services for the Navy and the Marines?
I guess the obvious answer is——
Mr. PIRIE. Would they all lose their jobs?
Mr. OLVER [continuing]. Feasible and efficiently done.
Page 547 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PIRIE. The experience is that half of these things result in—well, some of them——
Mr. OLVER. You just won't do.
Mr. PIRIE. We will not do. Prove to be not feasible. Some of them, if the savings are appropriate, we will have a more efficient government operation, which will be done with fewer people.
Mr. OLVER. Okay. So you are going to study 85,000. Do you have any guess as to how many of those will actually go this route of outsourcing?
Mr. PIRIE. If we are going to save the historical 30 percent, it would be 30 percent of the 85,000 people.
Mr. PACKARD. However, some of those would go to the private sector and do the same job as a private contractor.
This is a personnel issue, not a military construction issue, but the fact is that I think there are some concerns among the civilian workers at our bases, that they are going to lose jobs, and job security, but I think they have always had that concern as you privatize.
Again, many of those jobs are picked up in the private sector, and many of those people are qualified and trained and they go to the private sector and are literally transferred just from the public to the private sector.
Page 548 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. OLVER. However, Mr. Chairman, there will obviously be losses of jobs.
Mr. PACKARD. But that is true any time we look to savings in government. There will be some loss.
I have a list of about 16 or 17 pages of very specific projects that I would like your staff to respond to that I will submit for the record. These are a variety of very, very specific projects and I would appreciate that they take a look at it.
Mr. PIRIE. Certainly. We would be glad to do that, sir.
Mr. PACKARD. With that, ladies and gentlemen, we appreciate very much, Mr. Secretary, your testimony, and your very patient deliberations on the questions and answers.
Mr. PIRIE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. PACKARD. And the hearing is now adjourned.
[CLERK'S NOTE.—Questions for the record submitted by Chairman Packard.]
ARIZONA—NAVAL OBSERVATORY FLAGSTAFF: OPTIC INTERFEROMETER SUPPORT FACILITY—$990,000
Page 549 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Quantify the savings that will be realized by permanent use of the prototype interferometer, compared with the originally planned follow-on interferometer.
Answer. The project cost of the originally planned follow-on interferometer was $5.15 million. The current project cost to support the prototype interferometer is $0.99 million. The savings realized are $4.16 million.
CALIFORNIA—NAVAL WEAPONS CENTER, CHINA LAKE: MISSILE MAGAZINE—$3,240,000
Question. What is the payback period for this project, in avoided lease payments to the Army for storage space at Hawthorne, Nevada, and for related transportation costs?
Answer. Hawthorne Army Ammunition Plant in Hawthorne Nevada is 280 miles from Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake. Leasing 9,600 square feet for missile magazine storage space at Hawthorne and using trucks to transport the missiles would have an estimated cost of:
Estimated cost over 25 years is $10,120,000. This produces a simple payback of about three years.
CALIFORNIA—NAVAL AIR STATION, LEMOORE: AIRFRAMES FACILITY MODIFICATIONS $1,510,000
CALIFORNIA—NAVAL AIR STATION, LEMOORE: HANGAR RENOVATIONS $5,430,000
Page 550 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
CALIFORNIA—NAVAL AIR STATION, LEMOORE: TRAINING FACILITY ADDITION $4,270,000
Question. (a). Is it correct that all three of these projects are required solely due to the stationing of F/A–18 E/F aircraft at Lemoore beginning in November of 1999?
Answer. These three projects are required to support the introduction of F/A–18 E/F aircraft at Naval Air Station Lemoore, CA beginning in November 1999. All Military Construction (MILCON) projects required to support the introduction of the F/A–18 E/F aircraft to Naval Air Station Lemoore, CA were identified in the F/A–18E/F Site Evaluation Report, prepared by Naval Air Systems Command and issued April 1997.
Question. (b). Will each of these projects be completed in time to meet the requirement?
Answer. Yes. Construction for all three projects should begin in November 1998, affording sufficient time to complete construction just prior to the aircraft arriving. The Training Facility Addition is dependent on the delivery of air trainer equipment, which is also on schedule.
CALIFORNIA—NAVAL AIR STATION, LEMOORE: WEAPONS ASSEMBLY FACILITY IMPROVEMENTS $9,430,000
Question. Is the need for this project independent of the conversion to the F/A–18 E/F aircraft?
Page 551 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. Yes. The Weapons Assembly Facility Improvements have been a pre-Super Hornet introduction requirement and are required to eliminate three operational waivers. NAS Lemoore is currently assembling missiles and bombs, parking explosives laden trucks and storing components for high explosives under a CNO waiver. In addition, the small door sizes on current magazines do not support such missiles as the SLAM, AMRAAM, and HARPOON. This project will eliminate three existing waivers, modify existing magazines and provide proper storage facilities for the newer, longer missiles.
CALIFORNIA—NAVAL FACILITY, SAN CLEMENTE ISLAND: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $8,350,000
Question. (a). Is it correct that block 12D for the form 1391 for this project means that the future barracks requirement, upon completion of this project, will be deficient by 104 billets?
Answer. No, The number listed in the Block 12D in an error and should be zero.
Question. (b). If so, now is this deficiency going to be corrected?
Answer. The deficiency will be corrected by this project.
CALIFORNIA—NAVAL SUBMARINE BASE, SAN DIEGO: SUBMARINE SUPPORT FACILITY $11,400,000
Page 552 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Describe the economic analysis that was performed to determined the cost-effectiveness of decommissioning the submarine tender USS McKee and performing its work at shore-based facilities.
Answer. Three alternatives were analyzed; The status quo retains the USS McKee on active duty with operational costs ranging from $6.1M to $13.OM per year and personnel costs ranging from $42.1M to $97.6M per year over the 30-year period. A major overhaul would be required in the next several years which affect SSNs requiring servicing. Another alternative would use existing DoD facilities at Naval Air Station North Island (located across the bay from Submarine Base San Diego) and the Depot Maintenance Facility for nuclear aircraft carriers. This alternative would require dredging and construction of repair and dry-dock berths at North Island for the submarines and for the floating dry-dock ARDM 5 (ARCO). Some work on the submarine Radiological Propulsion Plant would require moving the floating dry-dock from the sub base. The last alternative analyzed requires new construction at Submarine Base San Diego, immediately adjacent to the existing submarine pier and the ARCO. This alternative has significant operational benefits and efficiencies. It also has positive quality of life aspects as training, housing, messing and personnel support function are close to the workplace. The summary of the net present value calculations are as follows:
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA—COMMANDANT, NAVAL DISTRICT: FITNESS CENTER $790,000
Question. (a). Will the use of this facility be limited to active duty military personnel assigned to the Washington Navy Yard?
Answer. The use of this facility will be limited to active duty military personnel assigned to the Washington Navy Yard. It will not be large enough to accommodate the civilian personnel.
Page 553 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (b). How many such personnel will be stationed at the Navy Yard at the time this center becomes operational?
Answer. The facility was sized to service the expected 2,300 military personnel.
Question. (c). Upon completion of this project, how will the existing facilities be re-used?
Answer. The existing Fitness Center in the basement of Building 166 is in poor condition and will be disestablished. The Commandant, Naval District Washington will decide upon an appropriate reuse for the basement space upon completion of repairs to the building. The existing Fitness Center in Building 22 will be shut down and the space will be used as a food court, in accordance with the Town Center plan for the Washington Navy Yard.
FLORIDA—NAVAL AIR STATION, KEY WEST: CHILD DEVELOPMENT CENTER $3,370,000
Question. The form 1391 for this project refers to a CNO letter dated January 22, 1990. Former facilities were condemned, and leased temporary mobile units are being used, despite concerns that they can ''become wind borne during tropical storms which are common in the area.'' Why has it taken so long to present this project for funding?
Answer. This project was slipped for several years due to budget constraints. The Navy has attempted to provide child care by contracting with commercial child care providers. All of these attempts have been unsuccessful. Temporary workarounds have been provided through the leasing of the mobile units.
Page 554 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
HAWAII—FLEET AND INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY CENTER, PEARL HARBOR: CENTRAL RECEIVING FACILITY $9,730,000
Question. To what extent will this project reduce the backlog of real property maintenance requirements, which now totals $27,586,000 for this location according to the form 1390?
Answer. The real property maintenance requirements will be reduced by $2,009,000 as a result of this project.
HAWAII—NAVAL STATION, PEARL HARBOR: ELECTRICAL DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM UPGRADES $18,180,000
Question. (a). Is it necessary for this project to precede the two BEQ modernization projects that are programmed for this installation for fiscal year 2000, at nearly the same cost?
Answer. This project has safety and operational benefits and is considered to be of higher priority for the activity than the bachelor quarters modernization and, therefore, precedes them in programming priority. The electrical upgrades will correct electrical distribution deficiencies along the Naval Station waterfront providing safe and adequate electrical power for ships. This project does not provide power for buildings.
Question. (b). Why not do the barracks this year, and this project next year?
Page 555 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. As discussed above, this project has a higher priority than the bachelor quarters modernization projects.
HAWAII—NAVAL SUBMARINE BASE, PEARL HARBOR: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS MODERNIZATION $8,060,000
Question. (a). In what year was the existing BEQ constructed?
Answer. The BEA was constructed in 1969.
Question. (b). How confident is the Navy in the structural soundness of the building?
Answer. The soundness of the existing barracks building was confirmed during the design phase of the project. The foundation, structural walls, roof and floors are all adequate and will be capable of providing a safe, sound structure for an additional 20 or more years. The structure of the existing building is not a threat to life safety. However, the existing facility lacks required fire protection features and is not in compliance with current fire codes. The project will provide fire alarms, smoke detectors and sprinklers. Asbestos and lead paint, which also could have adverse impacts on health, will be removed.
Question. (c). Upon completion of this rehabilitation and addition, what is the estimated design life of the building?
Page 556 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The estimated design life of the upgraded building is 25 years.
HAWAII—NAVY PUBLIC WORKS CENTER, PEARL HARBOR: SEWER OUTFALL EXTENSION $22,877,000
Question. (a). Has the State of Hawaii agreed with the Navy's proposed correction of Class I and Class II environmental violations?
Answer. The Hawaii Department of Health (DOH) has not formally responded to any query by the Navy concerning the proposed resolution of the environmental problems at Fort Kamehameha by extending the ocean outfall. However, we believe DOH views this project favorably based on the numerous informal discussions held between the Navy and various DOH agencies, including the Clean Water Branch, and the Environmental Planning Office. The Environmental Protection Agency has also been consulted officially and unofficially regarding this project. All of the regulatory agencies appear to view the outfall extension favorably. In addition, extension of the ocean outfall would be consistent with the intent of the Hawaii Administrative Rules for Water Quality Standards. Since compliance with the numerical water quality standards for the State of Hawaii are directly related to the physical characteristics of the outfall and placement of the discharge, we have concluded that the project meets the approval of the regulators.
Question. (b). Why wasn't the need for this extension foreseen as part of the Fort Kamehameha Wastewater Treatment Plant expansion, and why wasn't it included in the cost of that project?
Answer. When the original plans for the Fort Kamehameha plant expansion were being developed, the State of Hawaii had not issued the effluent discharge permit that directed effluent performance caps. The Pearl Harbor estuary designation as a ''water quality limited segment'' in the current permit immediately placed additional restrictions on the wastewater treatment plant that could not have been reasonably foreseen. The Pearl Harbor Estuary is a limited discharge area for the broad term of ''nutrients,'' all pollutant parameters that increase the ''nutrient'' loading are ''capped'' pursuant to Section 304(I) of the Clean Water Act. This was not foreseen by the Navy nor the regulatory agency who issued the original permit in 1990. The result of the limitations on Pearl Harbor means that the effluent discharge permit for Fort Kamehameha will require nutrient discharge limitations that the current existing treatment facility and planned expansion cannot accommodate. Therefore, the alternatives basically equate to reuse, additional treatment or discharge into a receiving water that is not limited. Based on the evaluations, outfall extension is the most reliable and cost-effective alternative.
Page 557 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
HAWAII—NAVY PUBLIC WORKS CENTER, PEARL HARBOR: STEAM CONDENSATE RETURN SYSTEM $6,090,000
Question. (a). This project is required to eliminate discharges of hot condensate directly into Pearl Harbor, at a ''tremendous waste of energy and water.'' Does the Navy have an estimate of the savings that will be realized?
Answer. A formal economic analysis was not performed to verify the savings. The project is being justified on the basis that it will obviate penalties that otherwise would be levied upon the Navy by violation of the Clean Water Act since the steam condensate is being discharged currently into Pearl Harbor.
Question. (b). Will these savings be passed along to ships as lower utility rates?
Answer. Not applicable—please see explanation above.
Question. (c). For the record, list the current utility rates and the anticipated rates upon completion of this project.
Answer. Not applicable.
HAWAII—PEARL HARBOR NAVAL SHIPYARD: ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT BUILDING $11,400,000
Question. (a). This project will convert warehouse space to administrative space. What non-demolition work will be included beyond the footprint of the existing building and the 1.5 meter building boundary?
Page 558 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The non-demolition work that will be included beyond the footprint will consist of the following:
1. New outdoor electrical substation and primary ductlines from existing manholes.
2. Additional telephone lines from the telephone switching station.
3. Sitework after building demolition such as excavation, grading, topsoil, grassing, seeding, and irrigation.
Question. (b). Describe the ''special construction features,'' which total $2,380,000.
Answer. Seismic upgrade is required to convert the existing 4th floor of Building 167 from warehouse use to administrative use. Executive Order 12941 requires seismic upgrade for any change in a building's function which results in a significant increase in the building's level of use, importance or occupancy. The addition of administrative personnel to 8,361 sm of the building, which currently houses administrative personnel on 13,400 sm of the building and warehousing operations on the remaining 28,000 sm, poses a significant increase in the building's level of use and occupancy and warrants seismic upgrade. Work involves constructing footings and shear walls on the bottom four floors of the five-story concrete building.
HAWAII—NAVAL COMMS AREA MASTER STATION: FIRE STATION $1,970,000
Page 559 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Will the existing fire station be demolished, and is the cost of demolition included in this project?
Answer. Yes, the existing fire station will be demolished and the cost ($490,000) is included in the project.
ILLINOIS—NAVAL TRAINING CENTER, GREAT LAKES: APPLIED INSTRUCTION BUILDING MODIFICATIONS $5,750,000
ILLINOIS—NAVAL TRAINING CENTER, GREAT LAKES: GAS TURBINE TRAINING FACILITY $7,410,000
Question. Are each of these projects required to perform current missions, independent of any impacts of base realignment and closure?
Answer. Yes, both projects are required to support current missions as well as new training systems and training equipment which are not related to BRAC.
MARYLAND—NAVAL SURFACE WARFARE CENTER DIVISION, INDIAN HEAD: ANNEALING OVEN FACILITY $6,680,000
Question. This project will replace existing facilities that cannot be made to comply with current air quality and water pollution standards. Has the State of Maryland agreed with the Navy's proposed correction of Class I environmental violation?
Page 560 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. Control of water pollution falls within the cognizance of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). EPA has concurred with the Navy's proposed correction to install a wastewater collection system to correct Class I environmental violations at Indian Head, as documented in a 23 December 1996 letter from the Director of EPA Region III's Water Protection Division to the Commanding Officer of Indian Head Division.
The Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) has sole enforcement rights over the air pollution violation since it is a state standard only (i.e., it is not federally enforceable). MDE has agreed with the proposed course of action.
MISSISSIPPI—NAVAL CONSTRUCTION BATTALION CENTER, GULFPORT: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $10,670,000
Question. The fiscal year 2000 program includes a BEQ modernization project. Is this near the practical limit of how much such work can be accomplished at this installation in a single fiscal year, roughly $11,000,000 in barracks construction per year.
Answer. Well over $11,000,000 per year can be constructed at an installation in any one year as long as it is primarily new construction. However, in the case of modernization projects, places have to be found to house displaced functions and people during the renovation of the existing facilities. The amount of modernization work done in one year at an installation is often limited by the availability of ''workaround'' options. In this case, the barracks renovation follows the new construction project which will be temporarily utilized at greater than 1+1 occupancy during the period of the renovation project. The two projects comprise the complete plan for BQ requirements at Gulfport.
Page 561 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
RHODE ISLAND—NAVAL EDUCATION AND TRAINING CENTER, NEWPORT: BOILER PLANT MODIFICATIONS $5,630,000
Question. The Navy is working hard to get out of the utilities business whenever possible. What efforts were made to privatize utility service at this installation, in part to avoid the need for this military construction project?
Answer. DoD directives require DON to have the privatization of utilities completed by January 2000. Steam plants are not yet included in the current plan, but it is expected that they will be added at a later time. The privatization of utility services will not preclude the requirement for MCON P–406. MCON P–406 is being constructed to replace boiler plant 86 which is currently in violation of Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management and U.S. EPA clean air standards. A consent agreement with the state and EPA allows limited operation of BP 86 until 31 December 2002. Under privatization, base facilities would still be utilized and the requirement for a new boiler plant (P–406) to replace BP86 would still exist.
RHODE ISLAND—NAVAL UNDERSEA WARFARE CENTER DIVISION, NEWPORT: UNDERSEA WARFARE FACILITY $9,140,000
Question. Qualify the economies the Navy expects to realize through the capabilities offered through this project to provide synthetic undersea warfare battlespace to supplant live exercises.
Page 562 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The construction effort will enable the Navy to continue to conduct live exercises with the degree of realism required to maintain Fleet operational readiness in the face of reduced budgets. By integrating virtual and simulated exercise participants (generated in a computer) into otherwise limited live Fleet exercises, the Navy will be able to provide the additional supporting units and realistic threats needed to adequately stress Fleet operators and systems. The only alternatives to the use of virtual and simulated exercise participants are less training or the use of very expensive Fleet platforms and targets. Since less training will not maintain Fleet readiness, the facility will provide a much needed capability.
The analysis of the economies to be realized is based on a normal undersea warfare training scenario typical of how the Navy conducts training when the required Fleet platforms and targets are available. The economies result when the cost of live exercise participants is obviated by the availability of synthetic exercise participants. Typical live participant costs are:
One hundred exercise undersea warfare munitions (torpedoes, mines, unmanned vehicles, targets, etc.) cost the Navy $5.0M per year.
A single ship-day spent at sea for training, taken across the force, costs the Navy $2.5M per year.
Aircraft cost the Navy $1.5M per year. This is based on an average of $0.75M in flight hours costs ($0.5K per flight hour times 6 hour mission duration times 250 aircraft), plus $0.75M in associated aircraft maintenance costs.
Page 563 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
As a concrete example, a nominal live undersea warfare training exercise might include one destroyer, two submarines, and 18 exercise munitions. Calculating the cost of days at sea, flight hours, and exercise munitions support yields a cost of $5.0M. Using the facility, the number of live exercise participants would be reduced to the single unit being trained and the exercise munitions would be eliminated. The cost of this live/synthetic exercise would be $1.0M for a total cost savings of $4.0M. Such exercises are conducted several times each year on both coasts.
SOUTH CAROLINA—NAVAL WEAPONS STATION, CHARLESTON: ORDNANCE RAILROAD REALIGNMENT $9,737,000
Question. Has this project been submitted for NATO funding, as part of a reinforcement capabilities package?
Answer. The project has not been submitted for NATO funding. Correction of existing safety deficiencies such as the elimination of explosive safety waivers is not NATO eligible.
VIRGINIA—NAVAL SURFACE WARFARE CENTER, DAHLGREN: WEAPONS SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT LABORATORY ADDITION $5,130,000
Question. (a). What is the current status of the ''Vision 21'' effort by the Department of Defense to consolidate its testing and evaluation centers and laboratories?
Page 564 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. ''Vision 21'' has been placed on hold pending inclusion in the two additional rounds of base closure and realignment requested by the Secretary of Defense.
Question. (b). How does this project fit with that effort?
Answer. The requirement for this project is to fulfill existing and future operational needs which would not be affected by a DoD laboratory consolidation study. Details follow:
TOMAHAWK is a Navy-unique program, and Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division is the single activity designated to provide life cycle support for the TOMAHAWK Weapon System and the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle. The equipment and tasking for life cycle support of shipboard strike warfare functions is consolidated at Dahlgren. The new facility will house personnel and equipment necessary to provide this support.
This project is required to continue operational support for current and future TOMAHAWK baselines. Dahlgren is the single site for validating TOMAHAWK targeting and mission data before deployment, and serves as operational back-up to CINCLANT and CINCPAC for cruise missile support activities (since all systems, software, communication links, and data reside there). It is the only site where the entire TOMAHAWK weapon system software is tested end-to-end to ensure accuracy of each version before fleet release, and it is the only site where fleet reported problems can be duplicated for rapid software corrections and returned to the fleet.
Dahlgren is the single location for fleet support to the UAV Joint Tactical Control System for the Navy, Army and Air Force. Each service's equipment is required to be integrated in FY 2001 and FY 2002 to ensure interoperability before deployment. Dahlgren is also the only site where the AEGIS, TOMAHAWK, VLS and UAV systems are physically linked for validating combat system interoperability and for supporting fleet response with rapid corrections to problems. A delay in construction will delay the scheduled deployment of TOMAHAWK Baseline IV system upgrades in FY 2001 and FY 2002 to U.S. ships and the United Kingdom and the deployment of shipboard UAV Tactical Control Systems. It also creates a problem in receiving for the activity planning to receive $21M of highly specialized computer equipment and no adequate place to put it until the facility is ready.
Page 565 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
This facility supports an expanding DoD mission and is the only one of its kind. Therefore, it is not a viable candidate for elimination or consolidation at another site.
VIRGINIA—NAVY TACTICAL TRAINING GROUP, ATLANTIC, DAM NECK: TRAINING BUILDING ADDITION: $2,430,000
Question. How large is the existing building, by how much will this project expand the building, and will the expansion fully meet the requirements?
Answer. The existing building is 2778 SM. This project will expand the building by 1385 SM. The expansion will fully meet the requirements.
VIRGINIA—FLEET INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY CENTER NORFOLK: FIRE STATION $1,770,000
Question. (a). Upon completion of this replacement project, will the existing fire station be demolished?
Answer. Yes, the existing fire station will be demolished upon completion of this project.
Question. (b). The Defense Logistics Agency funds tankage projects at Craney Island. Do they have a role in reviewing the fire protection requirement when they expand tankage?
Page 566 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The Defense Logistics Agency reviewed the plans for this project and provided design input with regard to the fire protection requirements for their fuel tanks at Craney Island.
VIRGINIA—FLEET TRAINING CENTER, NORFOLK: ENGINEERING TRAINING FACILITY ADDITION AND RENOVATION $5,700,000
Question. The existing facilities are 50 years old, deteriorated, and ''beyond economical repair,'' according to the form 1391. Is this the same building that is being renovated as part of this project at a cost of only $190,000, or does this describe buildings to be vacated and demolished?
Answer. The categorization of the facilities as ''beyond economical repair'' refers to three buildings that are to be demolished. Only a small portion (95 square meters) a fourth building N–19, which is not inadequate or beyond economical repair, will be renovated. A fifth building KBB, which is substandard, will be turned over to the Naval Station Norfolk.
VIRGINIA—NAVAL STATION, NORFOLK: BERTHING PIER (PHASE I) $32,030,000
Question. (a). Is the second phase of this project for pure demolition of the existing pier?
Answer. The second phase of this project planned for the fiscal year 2000 budget request will demolish existing Pier 2 and will provide some additional dredging.
Page 567 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (b). Would the replacement pier be complete and usable without demolition of the existing pier?
Answer. The new pier will be built to the south of the existing pier. The replacement pier will be complete and usable without the demolition of the existing pier. However, operational use of the north side of the new pier will be restricted until the old pier is demolished.
Question. (c). Describe the scheduling adjustments in ship berthing that will be necessary to continue to operate while Pier 2 is under construction.
Answer. There will be some operational impacts on the existing pier during construction. Berthing on the south side of the existing pier will be occasionally restricted during times of dredging and during some portions of construction of the new pier. Overall, the impact will be minimal and berthing restrictions can be temporarily accommodated through ship scheduling at other piers.
VIRGINIA—NORFOLK NAVAL SHIPYARD, PORTSMOUTH: DREDGING $6,180,000
Question. (a). How long has the Navy been operating with a current depth of 40 feet at wet slips 3, 4, and 5?
Answer. Norfolk Naval Shipyard has been operating wet slips 3, 4 and 5 at a depth of 40 feet since 1943.
Page 568 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (b). What is the existing carrier draft depth for CVN's in a fully downloaded configuration?
Answer. The existing carrier draft depth for CVN's in a fully downloaded configuration is 37.9 feet. A fully downloaded CVN is one which has all the aircraft, weapons, and jet fuel off-loaded and has a reduced number of on board personnel, equipment and stores.
Question. (c). Why is this project designed to provide wet slips and turning basin to a depth of 47 feet plus two feet overdepth?
Answer. The 47 feet of water complies with depth of water requirements established by the Navy for CVN68 Class carriers to provide sufficient clearance under the hull to operate carrier systems and to accommodate differences in carrier trim and list. CVN68 Class carriers have experienced problems related to sea water discharges and intakes and therefore, require a minimum bottom clearance of six feet. CVN68 Class carrier seawater discharges stir up the bottom and floating organic matter. This material clogs the seawater intakes for the propulsion plant; requiring that the plant be secured.
Question. (d). Is a 5% contingency an adequate budget for any dredging activity in this area, with any environmental concerns and other unknowns?
Answer. Yes, the five percent contingency is adequate for this dredging project based on sediment samples taken in June 1995, past maintenance dredging conducted (maintenance dredging in this area last performed in November 1994), soundings in January 1995 and disposal of dredge spoils at an Army Corps of Engineers disposal site Craney Island located 6 miles from the shipyard.
Page 569 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
WASHINGTON—STRATEGIC WEAPONS FACILITY, PACIFIC BANGOR: SECURITY FACILITY UPGRADES $2,750,000
Question. (a). This project is for the exclusive use of the Marines. Why is it listed as a Navy project, rather than a Marine Corps project?
Answer. The Navy is responsible for providing security facilities to support the Marine force. The Marines provide security personnel for Navy property under Title 10 USC, Section 5063.
Question. (b). Is there any concern that the form 1391 may be overly specific in describing the current situation?
Answer. The 1391 has been prepared to ensure that the seriousness of the condition is understood. Temporary compensatory measures are in place to address security deficiencies. Completion of this project will provide long-term resolution of deficiencies and provide quality of life improvements for the Marine security force.
GREECE—NAVAL SUPPORT ACTIVITY SOUDA BAY, CRETE: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $5,260,000
Question. (a). What generated the relocation of the reconnaissance mission from Athens to Souda Bay, which in turn created the requirement for this project?
Answer. The requirement to relocate the Navy/Air Force reconnaissance mission from Hellenikon Air Base in Athens, Greece to Naval Support Activity, Souda Bay, Greece was generated by the U.S. Secretary of Defense. The Secretary announced in January 1990 that the Hellenikon Air Base should be closed in June 1991 as part of the Department of Defense European base reduction. The U.S. functions were moved to Souda Bay and made use of temporary facilities while new facilities were budgeted and constructed. This is the last major construction project required for these functions.
Page 570 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
GUAM—NAVAL ACTIVITIES, MARIANA ISLANDS: SPECIAL WARFARE UNIT FACILITY $5,500,000
GUAM—NAVAL ACTIVITIES, MARIANA ISLANDS: WATERFRONT CONSOLIDATION FACILITIES $4,810,000
Question. Has recent storm damage changed the scope or price of these projects in any way, or modified the requirement?
Answer. No, the damage was isolated to the roll-up doors and roofs where repairs can be effected with maintenance support.
ITALY—NAVAL SUPPORT ACTIVITY NAPLES: NII PUBLIC WORKS FACILITIES $18,270,000
Question. Will this project fully meet the requirement for public works facilities at Capodichino?
Answer. Yes, this project fully meets the requirement for the Public Works Facilities at Capodichino. The scope of the project was determined by utilizing NAVFACENGCOM P–80 criteria and by interviewing the activity staff.
UNITED KINGDOM—JOINT MARITIME COMMUNICATIONS CENTER, ST MAWGAN: EDUCATION CENTER ADDITION $2,010,000
Question. (a). This project constructs an addition to an existing Royal Air Force library/education center. Was this addition sized solely to meet the influx of U.S. Navy personnel?
Page 571 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The addition was sized based on the number of U.S. and Royal Air Force personnel eligible to use this facility.
Question. (b). Is the additional size for U.S. needs, or for joint needs?
Answer. The additional size is for joint use of an existing RAF facility.
Question. (c). Is it correct that this addition is proposed to be funded solely by the U.S.?
Answer. Yes, by agreement with the U.K., this addition will be funded solely by the U.S. The U.K. funded the major operational facilities.
ARIZONA—MARINE CORPS AIR STATION, YUMA: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $11,010,000
Question. (a). Upon completion of this project, will the existing 40-year-old wooden barracks be demolished?
Answer. Yes.
Question. (b). Are the existing barracks in the footprint of this project?
Page 572 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. Yes.
Question. (c). If so, is demolition included in the cost of this project?
Answer. Yes.
ARIZONA—MARINE CORPS AIR STATION, YUMA: LAND ACQUISITION FOR ORDNANCE STORAGE
Question. What is the current status of land acquisition for ordnance storage at Yuma Marine Corps Air Station, and why are no funds requested for fiscal year 1999 as the Committee directed in our report last year?
Answer. A waiver to the DoD Land Acquisition Moratorium has been obtained from DoD, a Record of Decision (ROD) on the Environmental Impact Statement is expected in December 1998, and the project remains programmed in the FY 2000 Military Construction program.
Top-line constraints require that we make tough decisions in order to maintain a program that is properly balanced against the total needs of the Marine Corps. Although we would have liked to accelerate this project, fiscal constraints did not allow us to do so.
CALIFORNIA—MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $12,400,000
CALIFORNIA—MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $15,840,000
Page 573 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. The form 1390 for these projects indicates that no further barracks projects are programmed at Camp Pendleton until fiscal year 2003, but the forms 1391 state that the future requirement for unaccompanied housing at Camp Pendleton totals 10,198 barracks spaces. With this large requirement, why are no barracks projects programmed for fiscal years 2000 through 2002?
Answer. In order to provide a program that is balanced against the total needs of the Marine Corps, other activities with deficiencies and urgent needs have received the focus of our barracks replacement effort in fiscal years 2000 through 2002. Between 1996 and 1999 Camp Pendleton has over $100 million (approximately 30% of the total barracks funding) in new bachelor quarters construction. This funding provides over 2,500 new room-configured spaces. Although MCB Camp Pendleton's need for new bachelor enlisted quarters remains great, we have been unable to further accelerate these funds under present fiscal constraints.
CALIFORNIA—MARINE CORPS AIR STATION, MIRAMAR: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $29,570,000
Question. The form 1391 states that the future requirement for unaccompanied housing at Miramar totals 1,522 barracks spaces, but the form 1390 indicates that no further barracks projects are programmed through fiscal year 2003. Is this deficiency being fixed via projects funded under the real property maintenance account, rather than by military construction?
Answer. In order to provide a program that is balanced against the total needs of the Marine Corps, other activities with deficiencies and our urgent needs have received the focus of our barracks replacement effort in FYs 2000 through 2002. Between 1996 and 1999 MCAS Miramar has received approximately $96 million (28% of the total barracks funding) in new bachelor quarters construction. This funding provides almost 2,500 new room-configured spaces. Although there is a requirement for new bachelor quarters at MCAS Miramar, this requirement must be weighed against total Marine Corps requirements for bachelor quarters.
Page 574 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
HAWAII—MARINE CORPS AIR STATION, KANEOHE BAY: BACHELOR ENLISTED QUARTERS $27,410,000
Question. Two more major barracks projects are programmed in fiscal years 2001 and 2003. What are the operational limitations on how quickly the barracks construction program can be accomplished at Kaneohe Bay? That is, do you need to spread the work out like this, or could it be accelerated?
Answer. For the Marine Corps, all future barracks projects plan to demolish existing inadequate barracks and build new barracks in their footprint. Therefore, we will temporarily lose billeting space while the new barracks are under construction. To minimize the dislocation of enlisted personnel we have scheduled one barracks project per year. Accelerating the project would unnecessarily displace a larger number of enlisted personnel
For the Navy, this project supports the increased Navy bachelor housing requirements at Marine Corps Base Housing after the closure of Naval Air Station Barbers Point. Based on the site given for this project, there should be no negative impact to the Marine projects. No requirements exist to suggest acceleration is required.
NORTH CAROLINA—MARINE CORPS BASE, CAMP LEJEUNE: FIRE STATION $1,830,000
Question. (a). The French Creek area of the base is currently served by a fire station that is not located properly to meet response time and distance parameters. Will this project supplement that station, or will it replace the existing station?
Page 575 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. Yes, the existing fire station will be replaced by this project.
Question. (b). If this is a replacement, what is the plan for demolition or reuse of the existing station?
Answer. The old station will be converted to an emergency dispatch center and will be used for maintenance and storage of fire alarm equipment, fire sprinklers, fire extinguishers, and reserve apparatus, as recommended by the Head Area Fire Marshal for Atlantic Division, Naval Facilities Engineering Command.
NORTH CAROLINA—MARINE CORPS BASE, CAMP LEJEUNE: INFRASTRUCTURE PHYSICAL SECURITY: $12,770,000
Question. (a). Does this project support existing training ranges in the Greater Sandy Run area of the base, or is it designed and sized to support future construction?
Answer. This project will increase accessibility to three new ranges that are scheduled to become operational during CY 1998. However, the primary purpose of this infrastructure project is to provide a tactical trail network within the Greater Sandy Run Area (GSRA) that provides access to the ranges and maneuver areas within the GSRA (west side of US Highway 17).
The tactical trails will connect to the existing tactical trail network located on the main Camp Lejeune complex (east side of US Highway 17) via three overpasses across US Highway 17. The State of North Carolina is constructing these overpasses to carry US Highway 17 traffic, thus allowing Marine Corps tactical vehicles to travel below. These grade-separated access points and internal circulation routes are designed to minimize conflict between civilian and military vehicles, to maximize security, and to efficiently provide access for heavy tracked vehicles to and from the maneuver areas and ranges.
Page 576 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (b). Provide for the record the future projects, if any, that would be supported by this project.
Answer. This project contributes to the support of the following future projects.
P–029 LAV/AAV Gunnery Range
P–031 Multi-Purpose Machine Gun Range
P–032 Infantry Squad Battle Course
P–033 Anti-Armor Tracking Range
P–034 Multi-Purpose Machine Gun Range
P—035 Multi-Purpose Machine Gun Range
NORTH CAROLINA-MARINE CORPS AIR STATION CHERRY POINT: AIRCRAFT FIRE AND RESCUE STATION ADDITION $1,620,000
Question. (a). The existing facility has enough space to park six aircraft fire and rescue vehicles, compared with a requirement to house nine vehicles. How long has this requirement been unmet?
Page 577 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The original requirement to house aircraft fire and rescue (AFR) vehicles was submitted to HQMC in 1985. In February 1996, trucks belonging to the 2d Marine Aircraft Wing were transferred to the air station under an indefinite intraservice support agreement, bringing the total authorized vehicles at MCAS Cherry Point to 14. Since four of the 14 vehicles are down for maintenance at any given time (and thus housed in the maintenance facilities), and one vehicle is on the flight line for flight operations, there is a requirement to house nine vehicles.
Question. (b). Is the requirement driven by the sortie rate, or by other factors?
Answer. The requirement for vehicles is driven by the aircraft maximum gross takeoff weight in pounds handled at the air facility. MCAS Cherry Point has a gross weight category of three, which means the minimum number of P–19A vehicles needed is four. Additionally, at least one truck is needed for response off base, and several for use away from the air station on exercises. Because the P–19A is so maintenance intensive, additional vehicles are needed to ensure that at the height of flight operations, at least seven vehicles are available to meet mission requirements.
Question. (c). How long has the operational tempo been at the level of 13,000 landings and departures per month?
Answer. The operational tempo has averaged approximately 13,000 landings and departures per month since 1985.
Page 578 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
NORTH CAROLINA—MARINE CORPS AIR STATION CHERRY POINT: CHILD DEVELOPMENT CENTER $4,420,000
Question. There are 268 children in the existing facilities, and an average waiting list of 195 children. This project will provide a center with a capacity for 258 children. How was this project sized to meet the requirement?
Answer. The size of this project was based on the total number of children that require child care minus the number of children being taken care of in permanent adequate facilities. There are 463 children requiring child care at MCAS Cherry Point (200 in adequate permanent facilities, 68 in temporary trailers, and 195 on the waiting list). There are adequate permanent facilities available for 200 children, so the remaining number of children requiring child care is 263.
SOUTH CAROLINA—MARINE CORPS AIR STATION, BEAUFORT: MISSILE MAGAZINES $1,770,000
Question. (a). This project involves the renovation of two of the three existing inadequate missile magazines at Beaufort, and construction of one new magazine. Why can't the third existing magazine be renovated in order to avoid the need for new construction?
Answer. The third existing missile magazine, if renovated, would not have enough capacity to store the remainder of the missiles. The existing missile magazines were not designed for the size of today's missiles and do not have enough space to allow for aisles. This means that if the missile(s) needed are not in the front of the magazine, all the missiles would have to be removed from the magazine until you reached the required missile(s). (This also applies to the two magazines being renovated, but these will be used to store missiles that are infrequently accessed.) The chance of accidentally damaging a missile increases with handling or movement.
Page 579 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (b). How will the third (unrenovated) magazine be utilized, or will it be demolished or abandoned?
Answer. The third existing magazine will be used to store moderate explosives (as opposed to high explosives) so as not to infringe on Combat Aircraft Loading Area (CALA) operations.
Question. (c). These magazines will store 544 Sidewinder, HARM, and AMRAAM missiles. What is the dollar value of this inventory?
Answer. The total value of the 544 missiles is approximately $190 million.
SOUTH CAROLINA—MARINE CORPS RECRUIT DEPOT PARRIS ISLAND: WEAPONS BATTALION MESS HALL $7,960,000
Question. (a). How will the existing inadequate mess hall be re-utilized, or will it be demolished or abandoned?
Answer. The existing inadequate mess hall will be demolished.
Question. (b). Does this project include the cost of all required food service equipment?
Answer. The project includes the cost of built-in equipment. An additional $1.5 million for collateral equipment is planned for FY 2000.
Page 580 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
WORLDWIDE VARIOUS—MINOR CONSTRUCTION: UNSPECIFIED MINOR CONSTRUCTION ($8,900,000)
Question. Provide for the record a ten year history of amounts that have been requested and appropriated for unspecified minor construction.
Answer.
WORLDWIDE VARIOUS—PLANNING & DESIGN: PLANNING AND DESIGN ($58,346,000)
Question. Will this funding level meet the known requirements for the fiscal year program, including the necessary work on projects programmed for fiscal years 2000 and 2001?
Answer. The total of $58,356,000 will be sufficient to design the projects in FYs 2000 and 2001. Planning and design funds approved in FYs 1997 and 1998 are being used to complete the designs for projects in the FY 1999 program.
BARRACKS
Question. Provide for the record a chart that will show the Navy's barracks construction program at the time the ''one plus one'' standard was approved, and the current program through completion, broken out by locations in the U.S. and Europe, and other overseas locations.
Page 581 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. In July of 1995, the Navy developed the following programmatic plan for the conversion of permanent party barracks to the 1+1 standard:
At the time, we believed that applying $2.65 billion ($2.05 billion MILCON, $0.3 billion OMN and $0.3 billion anticipated foreign government construction) from FY 1995 to FY 2013 would provide 1+1 barracks for permanent party personnel by FY 2013.
This program has been superseded by new policies on berthing of 3–5/6, revised allowances, and the development of installation implementation plans for the new standard directed by Congress. These changes are causing major revisions to the original plan. The implementation plan is due in April and will provide base-by-base comprehensive plans that will outline the construction, renovation and repair required to upgrade the Navy's bachelor quarters.
FAMILY HOUSING INVENTORY
Question. Provide for the record a chart that will show the average number of family housing units supported for fiscal years 1996, 1997, and 1998, and those expected to be supported in fiscal year 1999, broken out into government owned (U.S. and foreign), leased (U.S. and foreign), and privatized under Public—Private Ventures.
Answer. A chart showing the average number of family housing units supported and available for occupancy for fiscal years 1996, 1997, and 1998 and projected for fiscal year 1999, broken out into government owned (CONUS, U.S. Overseas and foreign), leased (U.S. and foreign), and privatized under Public Private Ventures follows:
Page 582 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
PRIVATIZATION OF UTILITY SYSTEMS
Question. (a). Describe in some detail the Navy's ongoing efforts to privatize utility systems.
Answer. As part of the Defense Reform Initiative Directive (DRID), the Services have been directed to develop a plan for privatizing all utility systems (electric, water, wastewater and natural gas) by January 1, 2000—except those needed for unique security reasons or when privatization is uneconomical.
The Navy and Marine Corps worked jointly to develop the required privatization plan. The plan addresses the proposed approach, timeline, and cost estimate for each privatization effort. It includes issues involving contracting, real estate, environmental, and economics.
The Department of the Navy recently submitted the privatization plan to the Defense Management Council. Execution guidance and generic contracting documents are being prepared to facilitate this effort.
Question. (b). Are you seeking any legislative language to change existing authority?
Answer. No. Special legislation was passed last fall which gives Service Secretaries the authority to approve the transfer of utilities systems to a privatization company when life cycle analysis determines that the privatization action is economical to the government. A congressional notification period is also included in the legislation.
Page 583 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (c). Can you document any savings or avoided costs, in net present value—or are costs merely being amortized through future rate payments?
Answer. The Department of the Navy, having just submitted its plan to the DMC, has not yet completed any privatization efforts. The necessary analysis will be done later during the development of each individual function to be considered for privatization.
PUBLIC-PRIVATE VENTURES IN FAMILY HOUSING
Question. (a). Under current law, can the Navy transfer Family Housing funds to the Military Personnel accounts?
Answer. Under current law, DON cannot transfer funds authorized and appropriated by Congress from the Family Housing (FHN/FHMC) to the Military Personnel accounts (MPN/MPMC). Adjustments to the accounts are made during budget preparation prior to submission of the President's budget to Congress.
Question. (b). If not, what execution difficulties can you anticipate?
Answer. The Services allocate resources to particular budget categories (appropriations) up to two years in advance of the actual need during development of the President's budget. We program sufficient funds in the personnel accounts to pay the Basic Housing Allowance (BAH) for eligible members, and the family housing account to pay for the operation and maintenance of government owned units. When we expect to privatize government owned units, we adjust our planned budget to reduce funding in the family housing account because we will no longer expect to operate or maintain those units, and increase funds in the personnel accounts to pay BAH. These assumptions are included in the President's budget submitted to Congress. The difficulty comes about if privatization occurs at a different rate than planned in the budget request. If privatization occurs sooner than planned in the budget, it creates a surplus in the family housing account and a shortage in the personnel accounts. Conversely, if privatization occurs later than planned in the budget, it creates a shortage in the family housing account, and a surplus in the personnel accounts. The greater the difference between the planned privatization date and the actual privatization date, the greater the execution challenge. Further complicating matters is that we have little experience to date to reliably predict a PPV implementation schedule.
Page 584 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (c). In the preparation of this year's budget materials, have there been ''transfers in the estimates'' for fiscal year 1999, moving funds out of the family housing account and into the military personnel account?
Answer. During preparation of this year's budget request, the Navy transferred $3.9 million from the family housing account to the military personnel account. Funding transfer was based on anticipated family housing operation and maintenance cost avoidance resulting from the potential privatization of government homes. The Marine Corps did not transfer any funds in this years budget request.
ALBANY, GEORGIA: PUBLIC-PRIVATE VENTURE FAMILY HOUSING PROJECT
Question. Submit for the record a copy of the Congressional notification regarding the PPV project at Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany, Georgia.
Answer. For the record, copies of the Congressional notification to the four subcommittees on the PPV project at MCLB Albany are attached.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
BRAC ENVIRONMENTAL RESTORATION
Question. (a). Upon completion of the current Base Realignment and Closure program in the year 2001, under which account does the Navy's Future Year Defense Program envision funding ongoing environmental restoration for those locations?
Page 585 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. BRAC requirements for funding ongoing environmental restoration in Navy's Future Year Defense Program after 2001, will be held in the Environmental Restoration, Navy (ER, N) account.
Question. (b). Is there a current estimate of the annual funding requirement beginning in fiscal year 2002?
Answer. The current estimate of the annual funding requirement beginning in fiscal year 2002 is as follows:
AVAILABILITY OF LAND SALES REVENUES
(PROPOSED GENERAL PROVISION SECTION 123)
Question. (a). Provide for the record a history of the proposed general provision Section 123, regarding land sales revenues at Paine Field in Snohomish County, Washington.
Answer. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1993 authorized the Secretary of the Navy to sell approximately 68 acres of land, together with 74 units of Naval family housing located at Paine Field in Snohomish County, Washington. The law also authorized the Navy to use the funds, subject to the availability of appropriations, to acquire or construct not more than 350 units of family housing for Naval Station Puget Sound. The property was conveyed to Snohomish County in July 1996 and the proceeds, totaling $6,000,000 are currently held in escrow pending the availability of appropriations to use the funds for the intended purpose. At the present time, the Navy is leasing back the 74 units from the purchaser of the property at a cost of approximately $1,000,000 per year.
Page 586 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The provision in the current legislation ''subject to the availability of appropriations'' is precluding us from using the funds for their intended purpose. To our knowledge, there are only two means to make the funds available:
Make an amendment to Section 2842 of Public Law 102–484, deleting the opening phrase ''Subject to the availability of appropriations for this purpose.'' We are unaware of any scoring implications associated with this alternative, but we understand that there are procedural rules within the House of Representatives that may impact upon this alternative.
Appropriate the funds received by the Secretary of the Navy, making the funds available for the purposes authorized in PL 102–484. It is our understanding that the appropriation of these funds for these purposes would be subject to scoring.
Question. (b). Does the Navy agree with scoring by the Congressional Budget Office that states that this language will cost $6,000,000 in budget authority and $1,000,000 in outlays during FY 1999?
Answer. The Navy has no objection with the scoring by the Congressional Budget Office that states this language will cost $6,000,000 in budget authority and $1,000,000 in outlays during fiscal year 1999. However, there is concern that our FY 1999 request could decrease by $6,000,000.
MARYLAND—U.S. NAVAL ACADEMY, ANNAPOLIS; BANCROFT HALL RENOVATION
Page 587 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (a). Outline for us the military construction project that was requested but not appropriated in fiscal year 1990, for the expansion of Bancroft Hall, and provide the form 1391 for this project for the record.
Answer. The 1990 Military Construction project was intended to add two additional 170,500 square foot wings to the existing eight wings of Bancroft Hall. Designated as Wings 9 and 10 these wings would have provided housing for an additional 924 Midshipmen. Copies of form 1391 dated 1 Jan 1989 for this project are provided for the record.
Question. (b). This fiscal year 1990 project requested $24,000,000 for the first phase of a two phase project, totaling $48,000,000. Is it correct that the Navy is in the midst of an Operation and Maintenance account-funded project to renovate but not expand Bancroft Hall?
Answer. This is correct. The current Operation and Maintenance funded project repairs the existing eight wings of Bancroft Hall.
Question. (c). Give us the history of annual funding of the O & M project, from inception through its scheduled completion.
Answer. The table follows: Note that values do not include design cost. ''*'' denotes projections.
Question. (d). Give us a detailed comparison of the differences in scope of work and cost between the $48,000,000 proposed military construction expansion project and the O&M renovation project.
Page 588 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The Proposed Military Construction project added two additional five story, 170,500 square foot wings to the existing eight wings of Bancroft Hall. This addition would have provided additional berthing for 924 Midshipmen. Costs identified in the Military Construction project are solely related to the construction of the additional wings. The current O&M funded project repairs the 1.4 million square feet in the existing eight wings. Repairs are being done to the mechanical and electrical systems, building envelope, life-safety and other code requirements. Costs identified for this repair effort are solely related to restoring the existing facility to a state of operating efficiency.
Question. (e). Submit for the record the guidance the Navy relies on when deciding whether work should be funded by military construction or by O&M.
Answer. Guidance used by the Navy is included in the Facilities Project Manual, OPNAV Instruction 11010.20F. It incorporates all applicable laws and regulations, and applies to all facilities projects, regardless of cost or method of accomplishment, financed from: (1) Operations and Maintenance, Navy and Naval Reserve; (2) Research, Development, Test and Evaluation Navy; (3) Military Construction, Navy and Naval Reserve; (4) Non-appropriated funds; (5) Other Procurement, Navy; and (6) Navy Working Capital Fund (NWCF). The instruction includes the requirement for Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Installations and Environment) approval of repair projects exceeding over $5 million. The instruction's definition of repair is consistent with that stated in Section 2811 of Title 10, United States Code and as amended by Section 2802 of the National Defense Authorization Act for FY 1998, Conference Report (105–340) to accompany H.R. 1119.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Page 589 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
LOUISIANA—NAVAL AIR STATION, NEW ORLEANS: ENGINE TEST CELL MODIFICATIONS $2,200,000
Question.This project will provide a ''hush house'' engine test cell for testing approximately 72 F/A–18 (F404) jet engines. Will this facility fully meet the requirement for maintenance that is performed at this location?
Answer. This project will result in NAS JRB New Orleans being fully capable of performing all of the intermediate level maintenance actions on the F/A–18 (F–404) engine.
MINNESOTA—NAVAL RESERVE READINESS COMMAND, MINNEAPOLIS: ADMINISTRATIVE HEADQUARTERS BUILDING $3,630,000
Question. Submit for the record a copy of the current agreement between the Naval Reserve and the Air Force Reserve Base in Minneapolis/St. Paul.
Answer. The Air Force Reserve Base memorandum of August 15, 1996 confirmed the extension of the permit to May 31, 2001. Please see attachment (1). Southern Division, Naval Facilities Engineering Command, Real Estate Division letter dated August 28, 1996 confirms permitted use and permission by the Air Force to the Navy to remain at the existing facility. Please see attachment (2). The Base Civil Engineer's letter of October 8, 1996 stated that ''There will be no further lease extension.'' Please see attachment (3).
Extrapolating the time line to solicit, construct, equip and occupy the new building based on acquiring obligation authority in November 1998, allows use in June 2000. Exiting the existing facility prior to lease termination is in the spirit of cooperation with the Air Force. The Air Force has an emerging and growing requirement for billeting. Turning over the building as soon as reasonably possible offers the Air Force the opportunity to ease their billeting problem. The Air Force was extremely helpful in obtaining a site for the new headquarters building, and as such, the good will generated by returning the old facility will only benefit future working relations.
Page 590 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Can you tell us why the Air Force Reserve wants its building back?
Answer. The Air Force wants the building returned in order to convert it back to its original purpose as lodging quarters.
Question. The Air Force Reserve has provided a 1.79 acre site for this project. Will they have any control over this building in the future, or will this facility be under the Naval reserve's exclusive control?
Answer. The permit on the 1.79 acre site is ''revocable at will by the Secretary'' [Secretary of the Air Force]. The revocable clause is a standard government clause that is rarely used. The new Headquarters Building is expected to be under the Naval Reserve's exclusive control, subject to normal rules and regulations of the Installation Commander.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Virginia—Naval Air Reserve Center, Norfolk: Hangar Alterations $1,660,000
Questions. (a). How large is hangar 200? What is its current replacement value, and what fraction of the hangar will be refurbished under this project?
Answer. Hangar 200 is 83,223 square feet or (7.740 square meters). The 1997 Current Plant Value for hangar 200 is $23,661.000. This project will renovate 10,495 square feet or (976 square meters). This is 12.6% of the total square footage of the facility.
Page 591 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Questions. (b). Why is this a military construction project rather than an operation and maintenance project?
Answer. The Naval Reserve is limited for Operations and Maintenance funded new construction to $500,000 by 10 U.S.C. 2805(C). The cost of the new construction portion of this project, which is the building area being added to the facility, is estimated to be $638,000.
Massachusetts—Marine Corps Reserve Center, Fort Devens: Reserve Center Renovations: $840,000
Questions. This project renovates three buildings at Fort Devens to provide facilities for a unit that is now located in Lawrence, Massachusetts. Will this renovation fully meet the facilities needs of this unit?
Answer. Yes, this project will full meet the facilities needs of this unit.
Texas—Marine Corps Reserve Training Center, Galveston: Marine Reserve Training Center $4,090,000
Question. (a). Is it correct that this project will be built on 44.9 acres of land that is currently owned by the Marines?
Answer. Yes, this property was assigned to the Marine Corps in September, 1991.
Page 592 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Questions. (b). Upon completion, will this project meet all land and building requirements for the assigned unit at full strength, or will leased land or facilities still be required?
Answer. When this project is completed it will meet all land and building requirements for the assigned unit at full strength.
Supplemental Request
Questions. The Committee will be moving quickly to mark-up a fiscal year 1998 supplemental appropriation bill, including funds for the Department of Defense. We have not yet received an official request for additional military construction funds, but we understand that the Navy may be seeking funds for storm damage repairs. Is there anything you can tell us today about the Navy's request?
Answer. To date, the Marine Corps has identified a total requirement for flood damages of:
Funding to cover El Nino damage is in the supplemental appropriation request as part of a Department of Defense $50M lump sum for unspecified projects. Damage incurred at Department of the Navy facilities is part of that request.
Family Housing General Reduction
Page 593 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (a). The Construction Annex to the budget request—that is, the ''C–1'' document—contains an entry ''Congressional Reductions, minus $6,323,000'' in the Navy's Family Housing program. Please explain this entry.
Answer. The C–1 Annex entry reflects our intent to partially fund this year's $59,504,000 construction request using $6,323,000 in savings from prior year new construction programs. The savings resulted from favorable bids on prior year projects.
Question. (b). Is this unobligated balance currently available to pay the costs of storm damage that will be requested in any supplemental for fiscal year 1998?
Answer. No, unobligated funds are budgeted for Navy replacement construction projects included in our FY 1999 program. Loss of the $6,323,000 unobligated balance would result in a reduction in the scope of our FY 1999 projects.
Family Housing Privatization Through the Family Housing Improvement Fund [''Public-Private Venture'' Program, or ''PPV'']
The Committee has received the notification for the Army's family housing privatization project at Fort Carson, and it is under review. The Navy has executed two projects in Texas and Washington under somewhat different authorities, and several other projects are under review within the Navy. We will be going into detail about the ongoing privatization program when we have our hearing with Under Secretary Goodman on March 12. I have several questions that I will ask you to answer, from the Navy's perspective.
Page 594 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Does the Navy anticipate that there will be any significant financial savings from privatization as compared with the traditional program?
Answer. The Navy and Marine Corps will leverage its capital investment, and expect to realize a life-cycle cost savings of 20–30% over the term of the agreement. These savings will be reinvested in housing programs in order to solve our housing challenges faster.
Question. To what extent is privatization becoming a substitute for the traditional family housing program, rather than the supplemental program that Congress originally intended?
Answer. It has been DoD policy to rely on communities near military installations to provide housing for our service members, and to program military family housing where the community cannot meet housing requirements or where available housing is unacceptable. Using the investment authorities provided by Congress, the Department of the Navy will rely on PPVs to satisfy housing needs where the private market cannot meet our requirements. PPVs also will be the first choice for accomplishing whole-house revitalizations, acquiring replacement units, and solving housing deficits. We believe that by using the PPV authorities, we can leverage our scarce resources to gain three to four homes for the same investment required to build and maintain one home using traditional military construction. However, if an analysis of economic, quality and market factors demonstrates that a PPV is not feasible, we would turn to our military family housing program to meet our requirements.
Question. Is it correct that the cost of the family housing program is being shifted from this bill to the housing allowances sub-accounts within the military personnel accounts in the National Security appropriations bill?
Page 595 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The only funds that will be transferred from the Family Housing, Navy account to the Military Personnel, Navy or Military Personnel, Marine Corps accounts is an amount equivalent to the housing allowances associated with the occupants of the privatized houses. During preparation of this year's budget request, $3.9 million was transferred from the Family Housing, Navy account to the Military Personnel, Navy account. There was no FY 1999 transfer for the Marine Corps.
Question. Is this a ''zero-sum'' game, that is will there be any savings or is it just a shift of costs?
Answer. If we are successful with our PPV projects there will initially be significant housing revitalization cost avoidance for the Navy and Marine Corps. We also anticipate a life-cycle cost savings for a PPV project compared to a military construction project. We specifically intend to reinvest these savings into housing programs in order to solve housing challenges faster. There is a significant up front benefit—we expect to leverage our housing funds to get at least three to four times the housing compared to traditional military construction.
Question. Is there any assumption about the future funding levels for housing allowances?
Answer. As government homes are privatized the Department of the Navy will rely on housing allowances to ensure families are suitably housed. However, with the recent enactment of the new Basic Housing Allowance (BAH), it is difficult to predict future funding levels. BAH is being phased in over the next five years and will better tie housing costs to local market conditions and equalize out-of-pocket costs for equivalent housing, across the nation. The Department of the Navy will be watching closely how this affects the housing situation for our members and their families. None of our PPV projects assume any major changes in current housing allowance levels.
Page 596 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. (a). Is the Navy holding up the execution of family housing projects for which funds have been appropriated, pending privatization efforts?
Answer. Yes. Family housing construction projects are being evaluated to realize maximum advantage from privatization's potential to provide three times more housing for the same money as military construction.
The Marine Corps is reserving the minimum level of MILCON funds required to successfully execute proposed PPV projects. All other FH MILCON funds have been released for execution. We believe this provides a balanced approach to steadily improve the quality of our family housing.
Question. (b). If so, which projects are being help up, and what is the total dollar amount being withheld from obligation?
Answer. The Navy list of projects undergoing PPV-potential evaluation prior to obligation of funds is attached.
For the Marine Corps the total dollar value is $102.9M, as shown below:
Question. (c). If so, are theses funds being withheld to meet OMB scoring costs on mortgage guarantees to developers against base closure, downsizing, or extending deployments?
Page 597 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. No, not at this time.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Question. The Army is proceeding very aggressively to execute ''whole installation'' type projects. The Navy policy envisions a ''regional scope.'' Does this mean the same thing, privatizing all family housing in a large geographic area?
Answer. All Department of the Navy housing in a region will be evaluated for inclusion in a PPV project. A ''region'' is defined in terms of contiguous commuting areas. Where appropriate, the inclusion of non-contiguous areas may be considered. Within these regions, the installations' entire inventory of housing would be considered for privatization.
Question. Under current authorities, family housing privatization involves government contribution of land, facilities, infrastructure, mortgage guarantees, and differential lease payments to developers and financiers. Wouldn't it be prudent to gain some experience with how well this program works, before making such a large commitment to turn over so many assets for a fifty year term?
Answer. As a general rule, the Department of the Navy has decided that it will not sell its assets, but, rather, will enter into long-term leases for its land and facilities. We have proposed 50-year deals where all land and improvements revert to the Navy at the end of the term, and the housing is renovated along the way. However, there will be exceptions, and each situation will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis.
Question. It took us many, many years to build up these family housing assets. Tell us about some of the steps the Navy is taking to protect its investments under its program.
Page 598 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. As a general rule, the Department of the Navy intends to protect its investment by entering into long-term leases for its land and facilities and not selling its assets. We have proposed 50-year deals where the control of all Navy-owned land and improvements revert to the Navy at the end of the term, and the housing is renovated along the way. However, there will be exceptions, and each situation will be reviewed on a case by case basis. The objective is to provide the best deal to the Department of the Navy that still provides adequate and affordable housing for our Sailors, Marines, and their families.
Question. Provide for the record a list of the Navy locations that are under consideration for such projects, including the number of units in the current inventory at each location, as well as some indication of the value of the total government contribution at each location.
Answer. We can not at this time provide the value of the total government contribution at each location. That will be determined by the specific nature of the PPV at each location, which may include government owned assets. The following table lists the current work estimate for each location along with the other information requested. For the Marine Corps:
All other projects are expected to be executed as Family Housing MILCON vice PPV.
A list of Navy locations that are under consideration for Public Private Ventures is attached.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Page 599 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Overseas Housing Authority
Question. Is the Navy interested in a legislative proposal for the establishment of an ''Overseas Housing Authority'' as a ''Non-Appropriated Fund Instrumentality,'' which the Army is pursuing, and which is now under review at the Office of Management and Budget?
Answer. The Department of the Navy supports the Army's proposal. The Navy intends to monitor the pilot program's progress for applicability and to ensure that the Navy, Marine Corps, and air Force military personnel accounts are adjusted to reflect allowances for their personnel living in Army homes at the pilot locations.
Cost of Base Closure
Question. When this Subcommittee took on the cost of base realignment and closure, we were assured that these resources would be returned to the military construction and family housing programs upon completion of BRAC. How has the Navy benefited from this program?
Answer. Navy closures and realignments directed under the four rounds of BRAC are 85 percent complete. The Navy will benefit from BRAC by having less infrastructure to operate and maintain. By the end of this fiscal year, we expect net savings (cumulative savings minus cumulative costs) from all 4 BRAC rounds to total $1.4 billion in savings. By the end of FY 2001, when all four rounds of BRAC will be complete, we project the Department of the Navy will have spent $10.0 billion and saved $15.7 billion, for a net savings of $5.5 billion. Equally important, beginning in FY 2002, we will save an additional $2.6 billion each year because we no longer operate and maintain those bases.
Page 600 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Line Item Veto
Question. The President's use of line item veto on last year's bill took a total of eleven projects for the Navy and Naval Reserve. The House overrode this veto on February 5, and the Senate followed suit on February 25. Can you assure us that these projects will be executed promptly now that funding is resolved?
Answer. The projects restored to the FY 1998 budget will be executed as promptly as possible.
Advance Appropriations
Question. (a). The budget request includes a proposal to provide advanced appropriations of $13,500,000 for fiscal year 2000 to complete a berthing pier at Norfolk, Virginia. What criteria were applied in determining which projects would receive advance appropriations?
Answer. The Office of the Secretary of Defense selected only one Navy project for which advanced appropriations are being requested. It was selected because it is felt that only $32,030,000 of the total $45,000,000 requirement can be executed in FY 1999.
Question. (b). What benefit is expected from advanced appropriations?
Page 601 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The benefit is that the funds that would have otherwise been appropriated in FY 1999, but not executed in that year, can be used to add additional items into the Defense Department's budget.
Question. (c). What problems would be solved by this approach, and what problems would be created?
Answer. This approach will mean that large projects that cannot be substantially executed over one fiscal year would be split funded and only the appropriations that can be executed in the fiscal year will be requested in that year. This will improve the Department's MILCON appropriations outlays. Problems would be created if the follow on appropriations were not provided which would preclude portions of the project from being executed in a timely manner.
Question. (d). What was wrong with the approach taken in the past—that is, full authorization followed by incremental annual appropriations?
Answer. The problem with the approach taken in the past was that there was no certainty that the follow on incremental appropriations would be approved. This meant that the Department was entering into construction contracts without having all the appropriations required approved up front. The Office of Management and Budget directed the Department of Defense to stop requesting incremental funding. The approach taken this year is to request advanced appropriations in FY 1999 for work to be done in FY 2000 so that the Department will have full approval of all required appropriations prior to entering into construction contracts.
Page 602 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Naples, Italy
Question. Bring us up to date with events of the past year and the current status of the Support Site Initiative in Naples, Italy, as well as the entire Naples Improvement Initiative.
Answer. Work continues at both Gricignano Support Site and the Capodichino Operations Site. At the Gricignano Support Site, over 170 families are now living in family housing and the K–12 school is operational. Community support facility construction is anticipated to begin in the summer of 1998. At the Capodichino Operations Site, BEQ and QOL facilities are nearing completion (e.g., the consolidated club, NEX, gym, theater, library, chapel, etc.) and construction of the dispensary, child development center, administration facility and air cargo terminal is underway. In January 1998, the Navy stood up a new office, Officer-in-Charge of Construction (OICC) Naples, which is responsible for all lease construction, MILCON and major OM&N construction at both the Gricignano and Capodichino sites. Additional details for each site follow:
Gricignano support site
Increment I (Housing and K–12 school): A total of 1000 FHUs are planned for construction. Two hundred forty family housing units (FHUs) were delivered through 30 December 1997. One hundred seventy are occupied and 173 have been assigned. New assignments and move-ins continue on a daily basis as personal property deliveries allow. An additional 222 FHUs are under construction. An option to construct an additional 360 FHUs was awarded 17 September 1997. A final option for the balance of the units remains on hold pending further Navy analysis of the requirement.
Page 603 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The discovery of artifacts during archeologtical surveys has delayed the Italian government's release of some sites for construction. Archeological surveys remain underway at 5 buildings (42 FHUs), one of which has 80+ grave sites with assorted artifacts dating from roughly 800 B.C. The proposed site layout is being reviewed to minimize the impact of these sites on the remaining work.
The impact of artifact finds is difficult to predict because the cultural and scientific values are unknown. Archaeologists disagree on what constitutes a ''significant fund'' and what constitutes an ''artifact,'' and on which items require lengthy investigation and which items can be quickly documented in place and removed immediately. In fact, most artifacts are removed immediately to prevent pilfering, and neither the Navy nor the Lessor are apprised of what has been found. The Lessor funds the surveys but the survey personnel are supervised by the Italian Ministry of Cultural Resources.
The August 1997 electrical subcontractor's default and material supplier's delays (smoke detectors) impacted the September 1997, November 1997 and January 1998 deliveries; however, all deliveries were made within 30 days of their Contract Completion Date (CCD).
The fire protection and potable water reservoir was structurally completed in October 1997; leak testing and start up procedures are underway. Fire protection and potable water are currently provided through direct connection to the aqueduct from the water source.
The schools were opened on schedule 25 August 1997, and the remaining issues include improving TV system/signal reception and normal minor ''punch list'' items.
Page 604 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Increment II (Community Support Facilities): This increment was awarded March 1997 and consists of three phases:
Phase A—Child development center (CDC), site improvements (primarily utilities and roads), fire station and housing welcome center.
Phase B—Recreation maintenance facility, public works building, housing maintenance facility, hobby shop.
Phase C—Village forum, AFRTV studio, POV processing and PW disposal and salvage facilities.
The Lessor has completed and submitted all facility designs, and the building permit process is underway. The archaeological survey for the CDC is complete and construction will begin upon receipt of permits, expected May 1998. Construction of the remaining Phase A facilities is expected to begin later this summer, depending upon the duration of archeolotgical surveys. Construction will last approximately 12 months. The dates for Phases B and C construction starts will depend upon archaeological survey completion.
Increment III (Health Care Facility): This increment consists of a hospital, dental clinic and energy building. Award of the hospital lease construct contract is anticipated in 1998 and the facility is expected to be operational in 2001.
Increment IV (Recreational/Retail Buildings): This increment consists of an exchange/commissary complex (including a food court, theater, post office, credit union), fitness center (gym, outdoor pool, and bowling alley and tennis courts), and bachelor lodge (moved from increment III to IV due to funding issues). The Request or Proposals for the entire increment was released in September 1997, and proposals are being submitted in two parts. The first part, the financial capability documentation was submitted in December 1997 and the second part, the rent/technical submission is expected in March 1998. Selection of a successful proposer is anticipated in July 1998. The exact construction start dates will depend upon approval of the building permits, and the completion of the archaeological surveys.
Page 605 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Capodichino operations site
The total MCON program at Capodichino is valued at $207M. The following facilities are completed and are operational:
P–126A C4I Complex (FY 1989)—Includes utilities, BEQ I, fire station/security building, west parking structure, and Marine general purpose building.
P–126B C4I Complex (FY 1990)—Includes C4I facility, administration building (Phase I), east parking structure, pass and ID facilities.
P–137 Utilities (FY 1992)—Includes addition to east parking structure, 9MW switch station, water treatment plant (treatment plant still under construction).
The following are in progress:
P–136 Quality of Life, Phase I (FY 1994)—The consolidated club is 93% complete and the enlisted dining facility (EDF) is 98% complete.
P–173 Navy Exchange (FY 1994)—The exchange is 99% complete.
P–179 BEQ—Phase II (FY 1995)—The BEQ is 90% complete.
P–189 Quality of Life, Phase II (FY 1995)—The gymnasium is 98% complete. Construction of the child development center will begin when EDF is complete.
Page 606 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
P–176 Quality of Life Phase III (FY 1996)—Includes BOQ, theater, library and chapel. Construction is 59% complete.
P–187 Admin Bldg, Phase II (FY 1996)—Construction is 66% complete.
P–651 Dispensary (FY 1996)—Construction is 80% complete.
P–112 Air Cargo Terminal (FY 1997)—Construction is 3% complete.
P–196 Air Passenger Terminal (FY 1998)—Awarded as an option to the contract for the air cargo terminal in December 1997. A notice to proceed (NTP) with design was issued in March 1998. A separate NTP will be issued prior to the beginning of the construction.
The following projects are planned in the future:
P–172 NII Public Works Facility (FY 1999)—$17.6M.
P–200 Administration Building, Phase III (Future)—$25M.
Child Care Centers Privatization
Question. Bring us up to date with the Navy's efforts to outsource child development center services in San Diego.
Page 607 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. An A–76 Commercial Activities study will determine if the private sector can manage the entire child care program in the San Diego region. The goal of the outsourcing study is ''using on and off-base centers and in-home care, determine if the private sector can manage the current program, as well as meet the child care requirements, at equal or better quality and availability, for less cost to the government.'' The solicitation is on the street but will be amended to include five additional areas (El Centro, Port Hueneme, Point Mugu, Fallon, Lemoore). The current POA&M calls for a decision whether to contract or remain in-house by December 1998.
[CLERK'S NOTE.—End of questions for the record submitted by Chairman Packard.]
Wednesday, March 4, 1998.
DEPARTMENT OF THE AIR FORCE
WITNESSES
HON. RODNEY A. COLEMAN, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE AIR FORCE (MANPOWER, RESERVE AFFAIRS, INSTALLATIONS AND ENVIRONMENT)
MAJOR GENERAL GENE LUPIA
MAJOR GENERAL PAUL WEAVER, DIRECTOR OF THE AIR NATIONAL GUARD
Page 608 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
BRIGADIER GENERAL RALPH CLEM, DEPUTY TO THE CHIEF OF THE AIR FORCE RESERVE
Statement of the Chairman
Mr. PACKARD. We'll go ahead and open the hearing. Welcome, Members of the subcommittee. I am happy to have Bill Hefner with us. This is the second time I've had the privilege of sitting with the Secretary, Mr. Coleman, in this type of a setting. We're delighted to have you here, along with all of those who are here to support and accompany you.
This is a hearing on the Air Force, the Air National Guard and the Air Force Reserve. We're aware that you have placed, as we have, the quality of life issues for your men and women in the service, in your branch of services, at the highest priority. I want to congratulate you for staying the course on barracks construction and particularly in foreign locations. There's not a great constituency for foreign bases and the upgrading of those bases. This committee and subcommittee is probably the only real constituency and no one votes over there for us, and so no one is here to really push for it.
I was pleased to see on your fiscal 1999 program a buy out of the last permanent party central latrine dormitories. I thought that was a little bit in the direction that you've been working on for some time and certainly we're pleased to see it happen.
I might comment and it's the same comment that we've made in all of the other hearings, we're quite disappointed, of course, in the level of funding for military construction this year. It's about a 15 percent cut from last year's appropriated levels. If you recognize the override of the line item vetoes, and that's a substantial one year cut.
Page 609 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
In the Air Force, unless I see it differently than you do, it appeared that you have a much greater cut in the Air Force. We're concerned. We're very concerned, but we're not only cutting into the quality of life issues and quality of work issues for men and women, but we may be reaching the point where we're really cutting into readiness and safety and other things, with those kinds of cuts.
That's of great concern. I hope that you'll address that a little bit, Mr. Secretary. Your testimony is certainly well organized and well done. We appreciate receiving it and after Mr. Hefner and other Members of the subcommittee make any statements they would wish to make, we'll then have you.
Go ahead, Mr. Hefner.
Mr. HEFNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd just like to welcome you to the committee and I think what our Chairman has said is something that we have said to everybody that's been here. It's been our concern for years and years and years, so there's nothing new, but for this old ground to be replowed. So with that, Mr. Chairman, I'll yield back my time.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you. Mr. Kingston, do you have anything you'd like to say?
Mr. KINGSTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Coleman, welcome to the committee.
Page 610 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. Mr. Edwards?
Mr. EDWARDS. Mr. Chairman, I'm just glad to have our witnesses here today.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much. We would be pleased now to have you summarize. We have your testimony. It's complete. It will be entered into the record as you've submitted it and if you'd like to summarize or——
Mr. COLEMAN. Very good.
Mr. PACKARD. Just don't read it all.
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes sir, no, I will not.
I want to introduce my partner here, Major General Gene Lupia.
Mr. PACKARD. Glad to have you back with us.
Mr. COLEMAN. Major General Paul Weaver, Director of the Air National Guard, and Brigadier General Ralph Clem, who is the Deputy to the Chief of the Air Force Reserve.
Statement of the Honorable Rodney A. Coleman
Page 611 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
We come before you to discuss our $1.5 billion FY 1999 military construction program for the Air Force and since last year a lot has transpired. The DOD has both issued a quadrennial defense review or QDR and a defense reform initiative or DRI.
The National Military Strategy states that we shape, respond and prepare now for an uncertain future. The QDR confirms and balances the overall defense program to support that strategy. And DRI offers three innovative approaches of executing that strategy, specifically adopting new business practices, streamlining our operations through competitive sourcing and eliminating unneeded infrastructure.
I believe we're on target and provide a clear road map for those two items, provide a clear road map for facility investments.
However, in order to embrace this military strategy and carry out the QDR and the DRI, I also firmly believe that we must be a seamless Air Force.
As you know, Mr. Chairman, today we have about two thirds as many of our people deployed to about four times as many places as in 1989 which is just nine years ago. And that remarkable feat, in our estimation, cannot be done without a seamless Air Force or using every component that we have, that being Guard, Reserve, active, civilians and contractors.
I mention this because as you read my testimony, this seamlessness is woven throughout our $1.5 billion MILCON and family housing budget. It provides a balance needed to sustain our force readiness, fund modernization and ignite the revolution in military affairs.
Page 612 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
We have kept the Guard and Reserve's military construction needs in the forefront of our MILCON investments strategy. That's why you see a National Guard MILCON budget that is comparable to Air Combat Command. In addition, you'll see that new mission funding for the Guard is greater than our European and Pacific Commands.
In concert with this balanced approach is our continued commitment to examine our internal operations and support activities to determine where we can right-size, demolish unnecessary structures, enhance joint use of facilities with other services, and truly embrace the revolution in business affairs through better business practices.
As you know, base realignment and closure or BRAC rounds are means of attaining those infrastructure reduction goals, and as you know, we fully support two more BRAC rounds as requested by the Secretary of Defense.
As in past submissions, Mr. Chairman, installation programs continue to reflect hard decision and tough choices. The Air Force corporate strategy for installation support programs includes supporting the quality of life priorities like family housing and buying out the gang latrine dorms, supporting Level 1 environmental programs, supporting new mission beddown and core modernization. Now that our overseas drawdown is stable, we are reinvesting in our remaining overseas bases, targeting dorm construction for our single members.
In conclusion, let me thank you for your past strong support of our MILCON program. Your commitment has resulted in countless benefits to Air Force readiness. I believe our MILCON submission does two things this year, Mr. Chairman. First, it reflects the corporate priorities, supporting the total force. And secondly, it balances our commitment to the intent of QDR and DRI.
Page 613 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
We stand ready to respond to any question that the committee may have.
[Prepared statement of the Honorable Rodney T. Colman follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
SUPPLEMENTAL REQUEST
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much, Mr. Coleman. It's a pleasure to have you summarize your testimony. Let me ask one initial question before we go to the other Members of the subcommittee.
We're expecting and in fact, we're already in the process of drafting up our priorities and levels on a supplemental. There's been some damage because of El Niño to some of our bases. I don't know how many of your bases have been affected, but I presume that there's been some requirements. And then we've had, of course, some operations in the Mediterranean and so forth that may require—Bosnia and a variety of other areas.
Could you give us some feeling as to what your requests will be in terms of a supplemental?
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes, we're looking at about $60 million—the Air Force, just for those unfortunate instances: a typhoon in Guam and El Niño at Vandenberg Air Force Base which did approximately, I feel it's about $60 million, whatever would be the supplemental request. You want to go into detail, we can discuss the——
Page 614 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. We have some facility costs. Many of those will be taken care of in the operations and maintenance account, things such as repairs to hangers and roads. Out at Vandenberg, for example, the biggest problem came from the erosion of roads, much of which we saw on CNN, as a matter of fact. We have some large expenses there.
Very small amounts, really, in family housing. I say small amounts, about $1.5 million in Guam and about $900,000 at Vandenberg were submitted by the Department in the original supplemental request.
Mr. PACKARD. Those were the two primary bases where there was damage?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes sir. There was a small amount of damage at Kadena in Japan, but that's not included in the supplemental. It's small potatoes.
Mr. PACKARD. Are we responsible for the damage in Japan or——
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. It was only a couple of million dollars worth and I believe we'll be able to take care of it with our own account.
Mr. PACKARD. Your total level of your request will be somewhere around $60 million?
Page 615 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. In the neighborhood of $60 million, yes sir.
KOREA
Mr. HEFNER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Chairman mentioned how difficult it is to get military construction funds for overseas projects outside the United States. In Korea, you've got a real need for barracks. These people seem to be forgotten. I remember when General Gary Luck was over there, we gave him some money when he first took over because there were such dire circumstances.
Is the financial crisis in Korea affecting any of the projects that you have underway?
Mr. COLEMAN. It's affected in the standpoint of trying to get the Korean initiative going where they come to the table and assist more than they have in the past.
I don't have any direct insight into the impact that that crisis has had, but I feel that that could be a reason why we're still not where we want to be with the Korean government with regard to support of our facilities.
Mr. HEFNER. Would you utilize local contractors to build these facilities?
Mr. COLEMAN. More than likely, yes sir.
Page 616 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
DEMOLITION
Mr. HEFNER. On the demolition, we believe that you would have to tear down before you can move ahead with this demolition. It makes good sense. But you didn't request any demolition funding last year. You only requested enough money this year for one million square feet. Does that mean you have pretty much eliminated your backlog?
Mr. COLEMAN. Pretty much, but I'll let General Lupia answer that.
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Sir, we typically do most of our demolition work at the operations and maintenance account, not the military construction account. We had a very good year in FY 1996. We spent $52 million on demolition and we were able to demolish 5 million square feet. For example, that would be equivalent to Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, just to kind of put 5 million square feet in perspective.
The following year, 1997, we were able to demolish another 2 million square feet that cost us $22 million, so we've demolished already going into this fiscal year 7 million square feet.
We do have a very large requirement in the out years. As a matter of fact, in the Air Force funded program we have $195 million between FY 1999 and FY 2003, $15 million in 1999; $29 million 2000, and these amounts are based on facilities being freed up as a result of other projects or consolidation or in some cases a new line item that builds us the space we need.
Page 617 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
That's a long winded answer to your question, but we have a long way to go. We've demolished about 7 million square feet. We expect to demolish another million this year and then have 14 million left to go, a total of about 22 to 23 million square feet which equals about four Air Force bases.
Mr. HEFNER. Have you projected a certain time when you will complete this, if you get the funding that you request?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes sir, by 2003, FY 2003.
Mr. HEFNER. I have no other questions.
Mr. PACKARD. Let me follow up, if I may, on that. Are we required to demolish old buildings in the base closing process or do you normally turn those over to the replacement landowner?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. I yield to Mr. Coleman.
Mr. COLEMAN. It would depend on—if we already had it in the program, we would more than likely and it's already under way, we would demolish it. Whether or not, I can't recall an instance, sir, and I will check this when I get back, of where we BRAC'd a base and we went on and did demo work. More than likely it was included in the transfer of the property.
Page 618 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. That's what I assumed.
Mr. COLEMAN. The local redevelopment authority.
Mr. HEFNER. I'd like to follow up on that.
Mr. PACKARD. Sure.
Mr. HEFNER. I don't know this for a fact, but I would imagine it would have no EPA impact, environmental impact and you would not be obligated——
Mr. COLEMAN. Oh yes sir. We would take the obligation.
Mr. HEFNER. What I meant was if the old buildings had no impact on the environment and you wouldn't be mandated to use funds to demolish——
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. You're exactly correct, Congressman. Our expert here, Ms. Pohlman, who was with the Base Realignment Closure Agency for some time just whispered to me that typically we leave the building standing and the local community makes the decision what to do with it, but the Air Force does not demolish it before we turn the base over.
Mr. HEFNER. Thank you.
Mr. PACKARD. Mr. Edwards?
Page 619 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. EDWARDS. No questions.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you. Mr. Olver.
Mr. OLVER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm not without questions.
Mr. PACKARD. I knew that.
AIR GUARD AND AIR RESERVE
Mr. OLVER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I'm sorry, I didn't come in early enough for all your statement, Mr. Coleman, but let me ask you what's the relative personnel in the Air Guard and the Air Reserve, roughly, what would be the total personnel in the two?
Mr. COLEMAN. The personnel, the Air Force Reserve has approximately 73,000 people, 110,000 Guard.
Mr. OLVER. And 110,000 in the Guard?
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes sir.
Mr. OLVER. 73,000 in the Reserve?
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes sir.
Page 620 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. OLVER. Interesting. Well, I'm not sure—I will keep those numbers in mind because they say something to me, in any case.
I noticed looking over the military construction history over a 5 year period, that the average amount for the Air Guard has been a bit over $200 million in the MILCON budget for the Guard, but under $50 million for the Reserve on a year by year basis, on average.
Now that's going back through to Fiscal 1994. The numbers in the early part of that time are a little higher. It could be year by year from 1994 forward, it's 241, 249, then 171, 189 and 190. You know, it's down a little, but holding at a pretty good size number.
In the case of the Reserve, it looks to me pretty ominous. In those same five years, it was 72, 57, 36, 52, then 15 last year and the request this year in the President's budget is only $10 million.
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes sir.
Mr. OLVER. The request, by the way, in the President's budget on the Air Guard is way down. It's only $34 million.
Now if we plussed up toward $200 million which is roughly their average, or $180 or $190 or whatever, somewhere in that range, we'd be plussing up a huge amount in the Air Guard and basically we haven't been plussing up much in the Reserve. I'm curious what it is that puts the Reserve in so much better shape that we can afford to be doing so little in relation to the Reserve, compared with the personnel that are there. I don't know where those personnel are, maybe base structures, but you told me there are 110,000 Air Guard personnel and 73,000 Air Reserve personnel. And what we're doing in facilities and generally facilities and quality of life housing, this, that and the other thing, clearly is way down comparatively for the Reserve.
Page 621 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
What's the reason for it?
Mr. COLEMAN. It's an important question. I'd like my colleague to respond after I make a comment. I don't think, with all due respect, that the ratio of the personnel strengths can be necessarily directly proportional to the MILCON budgets over an extended period of time. The corporate structure, as we explained last year, that is the racking and stacking process of priorities of projects of the three different areas, active, Reserve and Guard, all come to the fore when we're doing our racking and stacking. We have a $62 billion or so budget in which to work everything that we have. The Chief of Staff, General Fogelman and myself, General Lupia, stated last year on the record that we purposely went in and took Reserve and Guard potential monies and used that for modernization for 1998 and 1999 and we committed to you that we would start to ramp up in 2000.
I'm here to tell you that that is still the Air Force's intent. General Clem and General Weaver and General Lupia may want to add to this, but I don't—I hope we don't leave here with the fact that based on numbers of people, there's an automatic transference to the numbers of projects or the MILCON request money being on a percentile basis.
Mr. OLVER. Well, okay, clearly in the Air Guard there are bases in every state, in some states, two or three. And so on. Because it's meant to be spread all over. And the Reserve bases, I would assume, are a fewer number and larger by comparison because they are a concentration of units, so yes, that would make sense.
Mr. COLEMAN. And some are on active bases.
Page 622 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. OLVER. Pardon?
Mr. COLEMAN. Some units are on active bases.
Mr. OLVER. Are on active bases where the costs are covered on active Air Force rather than on the Reserve accounts?
Mr. COLEMAN. Some of the clusters share, like roadways and stuff like that. Their facilities are not.
Mr. OLVER. But they'd be built by active monies?
Mr. COLEMAN. No. I was only saying as a stand alone, as opposed to a stand alone operation like Stewart Air Force Base in New York, you have a Guard and Reserve unit at Andrews Air Force Base that is sharing the runways, sharing the road systems, gymnasiums and so forth.
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Child care centers.
Mr. OLVER. Okay.
Mr. HEFNER. How many of those facilities have joint use across the country?
Page 623 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. COLEMAN. General Weaver?
Gen. WEAVER. In the Air National Guard, we've got 89 on-going units and when you say joint units, you're talking about—we're on 66 civilian airports.
Mr. HEFNER. On what?
Gen. WEAVER. Sixty-six civilian airports around the country of those 89, and approximately 25 other joint bases.
Mr. OLVER. Okay, that's very helpful, but the 89 does, since every state has at least one, I guess that would be the case. That sort of tells us what the number of places where there were two and three in a few cases.
Gen. WEAVER. If you look at the different numbers and facilities, there's 89 flying units within the Air National Guard and 13 Air Reserve bases.
Mr. OLVER. Okay, well, that explains part of the difference, but I am, I still am truly puzzled how we're properly dealing with the Reserves and those 13 bases if we're down to 14 one project in 1999, 14 last year which was a couple of projects, that is for 1998, for 1999 is one project in the proposed budget. Your FYDPs for the future, you're apparently asked, allowed to ask in your FYDPs or put forward in your FYDPs something like $25 million on average per year. I don't know exactly the number you're told, but the FYDPs into the future, 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2003 are 25, 30, 33 and 35, but what's coming through is 15 in 1998 and one request in the President's budget for $10 million in 1999.
Page 624 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Is that adequate for the Reserve?
Mr. COLEMAN. I'll let the Reserve respond. The overall corporate response is that we have purposefully taken the monies that we could allocate to MILCON and devote them to the priorities that the Guard, Reserve and active collectively have said it has to be that way for 1998 and 1999.
You will see in 2000 a ramping up out across the FYDP, but we had to take this money now to use for some modernization projects.
General Clem and General Weaver would like to respond. I would open the floor, General Lupia?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Congressman, let me lay the ground work for you in terms of the process. When we collect the requirements to be put into the military construction program, we wind up with far more requirements than we have dollars to spend in military construction.
As we put the 1998 program together our major commands gave us $1.2 billion in requirements and we brought you last year a $600 million program. As we built this $500 million program, we had $1.4 billion in requirements, so we were only able to get about one third of the requirements into the program to begin with.
Mr. OLVER. How far is the program?
Page 625 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. It's the 1999 program, $1.4 billion in requirements brought your $500 million.
Mr. OLVER. Okay.
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Next year, for example, as we do 2000, we have $2.3 billion, this bow wave keeps growing in requirements and we'll only be bringing you about $600 million, depending on how the Air Force budget finally comes together.
We have eliminated any fair share for any command in the Air Force and we've taken every one of the requirements submitted to us and we've gone through a matrix that gives them points for nine different categories of things and then basically said we will spend every dollar we're spending in the Air Force on its most important requirements for military construction.
Remember that of the $500 million we brought you this year, we took $120 million off the top for dormitories for our enlisted folks because we were committed to solving the central latrine dormitory problem. So we then got down to only $380 million put against our other requirements. When we racked and stacked them, we came up with those smaller amounts for the Air National Guard and Reserve, but it was all for a very corporate process. Every meeting on every panel, each of the components was represented.
I'll yield to General Weaver, if I may.
Page 626 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Gen. WEAVER. Sir, if I may stand for a moment, I can't agree with General Lupia more. It is a total corporate process that we're involved in.
If you look at the numbers, are we satisfied with the numbers? Absolutely not. We're not. But we do, we are part of the corporate process. We have the ability to discuss all of the priorities within the budgetary constraints that we are given as an Air Force and we lay out those priorities. I can tell you that General Lupia, Mr. Coleman, Mr. Dishner are there fighting for us within the Air Force Council all the time for the Guard and Reserve, but when you lay out the priorities it looks at some of the things on active duty, the family housing, the barracks for the young troops and then look at our priorities as well, you've got to weigh that in which we do and take those priorities and within the budget, take your constraints and come out with that figure.
We know the figure is lower. I'm privileged to have a little bit better than the Reserves. We've got great support, especially from this committee in the past which has helped us in our quality of life as far as building facilities that our people are operating out of, but when we look at the entire corporate process, we as a total force have a platform to be able to speak to our priorities and then we go forward with a single voice.
Mr. OLVER. Well, General Weaver, you're active?
Gen. WEAVER. Guard.
Mr. OLVER. You're Guard.
Page 627 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Gen. WEAVER. Yes sir.
Mr. OLVER. Ah. Okay. Would I know that? Should I know that by looking at you?
Gen. WEAVER. Pretty seamless, aren't we?
Mr. OLVER. Seamless.
Gen. WEAVER. I looked a lot younger before. That's not for the record.
Mr. COLEMAN. Mr. Olver, General Clem is Reserve. General Lupia is active.
Mr. OLVER. Okay. Okay.
Mr. PACKARD. Let's have General Clem respond as well.
Brig. Gen. CLEM. Yes sir, thank you. I'd like to echo General Weaver's remarks about our full integration into the Air Force's corporate MILCON allocation process.
I am new to this job, as you know. This is my first time before this committee. I'm happy to be here by the way. When I came on board and looked at that one project for this current budget, like General Weaver, I said that's not going to happen. I went into the process to try to figure out exactly how we had arrived at that and it had occurred prior to my coming on board, so I was interested in going back and looking at the history of that.
Page 628 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
But clearly, I was told, that every stage of the process, Guard and Reserve people are at the table, fully involved in a way in which those projects are dealt with. My mind led me to look at the matrix that was referred to by General Lupia to find out exactly what those criteria were in terms of establishing the weighting and the prioritization list.
The way that that worked out in this present budget, sir, is that first of all a number of very high priority projects that had been referred to here before were essentially fenced off in a total MILCON budget. And then secondly, the particular weighting criteria do not necessarily lend themselves well to Air Force Reserve projects. New mission, for example, is something—we undertake some new missions, but of course, not as dramatically as does the active component. Things like dormitories, we typically have dormitories. We typically don't have dining facilities and other of the standard quality——
Mr. OLVER. Reserve doesn't have dining facilities? Guard does, but not Reserve?
Brig. Gen. CLEM. Very few dining facilities. We have some, but it's not a major activity as it would be on a residential Air Force base.
Mr. OLVER. I would have thought that they would be roughly the same as Guard.
Brig. Gen. CLEM. No.
Page 629 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. OLVER. Since that's not a residential air base either, really.
Brig. Gen. CLEM. I'm not sure about the dining facilities situation at Guard bases. Typically, Reserve bases will have some kind of dining facility, but not the very large types of facilities that you would need on an Air Force base to feed the resident population because most of our population is transient. Same lodging facilities.
Now what I would suggest is that for us and the Reserve, quality of life is defined slightly differently. Work place factors are very important issues for us as are lodging facilities particularly for folks coming in for the weekend for annual tour and so on.
I'm happy to report that in the beginnings of the 2000 process, that the Air Force Reserve has considerably more, at this point, four projects above the line and moving forward and we're confident that these short falls are going to be redressed in the out years.
Mr. OLVER. Well, okay, if I may just finish this on this general comment, then I have a couple specific ones and I'll wait for the next round, but it is—the rest of this pattern, at least as I look at the last two, three years of it, is that typically this committee has plussed up, if what you're saying, that there is an integrated command and you put forward the priorities, sort of in order, then proportionately, roughly when the plan comes in, the amount for the Guard and the amount for the Reserve would be in relation to their strategic need. Well, then this committee in its plus ups has plussed up the Guard by at least doubling in each what had been asked for in the President's budget, doubling in Fiscal 1996, considerably more than that, tripling in 1998, what had been there, but in the case of the Reserve, our plus ups have been only one third of what had been asked for in 1996. $1 million is a plus up from $51 in 1997 and $.5 million in 1998. So if you were proposing to us what was correctly proportioned between the active Guard and the Reserve on the basis of strategic need, then we have not kept up on the Reserve side, we've not proportionately upped to expend that, to cover additional congressional needs. That would be my only point there. It's an oddity, I think, in the totals.
Page 630 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I'll come back later, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for allowing me a few minutes further to finish a thought.
Mr. PACKARD. Mr. Cramer?
Mr. CRAMER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for your presence here today. I'm new to the committee and I'm very interested in the committee's issues and I won't bog you down as I attempt to catch up in the prior history and involvement here, but I was interested in your mission list in terms of determining, I assume it's a priority for your construction of family housing programs under this MILCON budget, to maintain what we own. Is that a list based on order of priority or is that just a statement of accomplishments, things that you want to accomplish, your philosophy there? And in Alabama, at Maxwell Air Force Base, under current missions, I assume, you've got the Air Force Reserve project ''Consolidated Aircraft Maintenance Facility'' $5.2 million, is that a priority to support that current mission?
Brig. Gen. CLEM. Yes sir.
Mr. CRAMER. That's very, very important. That's not my District, but I know that we as a state delegation talk about what needs to be accomplished there, so I'm very pleased to see you segregate that.
BASE REALIGNMENT AND CLOSURE
In terms of BRAC and determining priorities, how much has the BRAC process caused you to delay what you would otherwise like to do in order to accommodate what has to be done as you consolidate equally in new locations and sort through the needs of Air Force installations around the country?
Page 631 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. COLEMAN. We have taken the BRACs 22 closures, 17 realignments, I believe and shaped the force per what is remaining of finding that some cases 19PAA at our bases is still spreading it too thin and that's why we really do need another BRAC in our estimation without going through a detailed analysis of what, when and why.
Mr. CRAMER. Too many loose ends left or——
Mr. COLEMAN. Well, it's spread too thin. We're all over the map. A prudent businessman would say that you marshal your forces in the most efficient operations that you can find, the plants, for instance, you're taking an Air Force base as a plant, I want to maximize the capacity of that plant. We still have too much capacity in the Air Force. That's why we are supporting the SECDEF on two more rounds of BRAC.
Insofar as priorities and have we done things that we would not normally do, I don't think so. We're keeping our force fit and trim, based on the CONUS locations that we have. We fighters, as well as the political appointees, feel that just based on what is out there, what we know is there without going through a BRAC analysis, we still have too much infrastructure. And not only the Air Force, but the Army and the Navy has too much infrastructure for what we're doing in the next millennia.
Mr. CRAMER. How much of your budget is consumed with environmental issues that are necessary for you to spend money on in order to turn, closed bases over to communities?
Page 632 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. COLEMAN. Overall, I think we're going to expend approximately $2 billion over all our BRAC, over the course of time. I think between now and I would say 2005, 2006, something like that, 2010. So you're talking about a $2 billion bogey over the course of time for those 22 bases that we're going to close.
Mr. CRAMER. For environmental costs?
Mr. COLEMAN. For environmental costs, yes.
Mr. CRAMER. $4 to $5 billion.
Mr. COLEMAN. Just environmental, yes.
Mr. CRAMER. And as far as you can tell, that should be a stable figure?
Mr. COLEMAN. Well, it's a moving target. We're digging every day and most of it's behind us.
Mr. PACKARD. Could the gentleman yield for a moment? When do you anticipate crossing the line or maybe you already have where you actually reflect a savings versus an outgo?
Mr. COLEMAN. That figure is very hard to ascertain. We are receiving some benefit in the sense of monies for leases and sales and so forth and so on, but the actual cost savings, I would think, would not start to accrue until about 2001 from the earlier rounds where you had already manifested your personnel costs and your infrastructure costs at other bases to realign what you've taken out.
Page 633 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I wouldn't rush to judgment that BRAC is anything but a success until it has had time to mature. It has not had time to mature. Amortizing all of the costs that we've had to expend, like the $2 billion amortized over a course of time for the environmental, the BRAC-related costs on moving units and realignments. It's going to take a long time to amortize that.
Mr. PACKARD. To go a little further, Mr. Coleman, two other questions come to mind then. If, in fact, you're recommending and supporting the recommendation of two additional BRACs, our concern and our concern has always been before we have any additional BRACs, we ought to analyze and evaluate the success and the process and a lot of other factors for the existing BRACs.
You might want to respond to that. If we've not matured in that process yet, and I certainly agree with you in that statement, then is it wise that we go further into BRACs, base closing until we can evaluate and review the maturing process.
Mr. COLEMAN. Sir, I said not mature. I did not mean that we were myopic in our choices or we failed in our business practices in conveying the properties. What I was talking about is that all of the bases have not been fully turned over according to the economic development conveyance or the public benefit conveyances. The LRAs, local redevelopment authorities, haven't fully marketed their facilities that they are working with us on to turn over to private industry.
You're talking about enormous tracts of property. You're talking about industrial sites that have been for 40 and 50 years in communities. You're talking about a national understanding of industrial properties. I came from General Motors where I was in charge of plant consolidation. We closed 30 plants. There are some plants that still have not matured and that's been over the course of 14 years of my life, that still have not been able to fully come back as meaningful tax paying, tax producing properties in some of the Rust Belt communities.
Page 634 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
These properties that are on the market right now, like Loring Air Force Base, Maine, you're talking about an extreme property in the sense of geography. Likewise, K.I. Sawyer, Michigan in the Upper Peninsula. You just can't automatically turn over thousands and thousands and thousands of acres of property and automatically think that it's going to turn in a short time frame, unlike a—I mean a house, you can. A piece of bare property that has a good site, possibly you can get that off the market for a housing project, but you're talking about enormous industrial tracts of property that are on the real estate market of the United States all at one time, on the Air Force, Navy, plus industry.
So when you say that you're going to attract the American Can Company to some place, well, there's a lot of private sector firms out there that have industrial sites available to0.
Mr. PACKARD. Second question that you prompted in my mind is the reason that the Air Force is finding it a longer period of time to where you cross that point of actually reflecting the savings, different from the Navy and the Army, they are already to that point and is the reason because air bases have clean up problems and more serious and more expensive problems or are there other reasons?
I know that most air facilities have major clean up problems and they're often quite expensive and quite lengthy into the process.
Why is it that the Air Force is perhaps a year or two behind that crossover to where we reflect a savings from the Army and the Navy?
Page 635 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. COLEMAN. It's a good question, Mr. Chairman. I'm not here to debate my colleagues. I do not believe that they are at that crossover point, but that's a personal professional opinion.
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. I think Mr. Goodman has testified, Mr. Goodman from OSD, joined in and has testified that the savings from BRAC are greater than expected and the costs to carry out BRAC are less than expected in the report he actually will provide and, I believe, this comes from the auditors. I may not be right in that regard, but I believe it will show even better results than we were expecting.
Mr. PACKARD. We will be having a hearing on the 12th. We'll certainly get more——
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. I think he'll be telling you that.
Mr. CRAMER. Reclaiming my time, you're not contradicting that testimony?
Mr. COLEMAN. No sir, no. We're saying the results are even better than we thought.
Mr. CRAMER. You've got to be careful where you draw conclusions. I mean I don't want to put words in your mouth, you're not saying you're withholding judgment on whether you're successful or not?
Page 636 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. COLEMAN. No sir.
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. And the indication is that it's more successful than we thought.
Mr. PACKARD. Well, again, the question has to be then why are we crossing that line later rather than sooner in terms of savings?
Mr. COLEMAN. I don't want to get into a debate with a fellow service about their numbers and about what is deemed to be the crossover point. That's what I was trying to say when I said I have a personal and professional opinion about what you said with regard to the Navy crossing over faster.
I think that the Air Force has been very thorough, very prudent, meticulous in how we do things, how we report to Mr. Goodman the numbers and I think Mr. Goodman will comment and give you testimony that as a military—department of government, DOD is far ahead of where they thought they would be with regard to BRAC.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you. For the benefit of the Members that are here, we will be having our next hearing tomorrow at 9:30. We'll have the four Master Chiefs.
FAMILY HOUSING PRIVATIZATION
Let me proceed, before we go into the next round then with some questions on privatization and family housing that we've asked most of the others in most of the other hearings very much the same questions. The Army and the Navy are both moving forward, Navy quite vigorously, in privatization. The Air Force, would you review what your attitude is on privatization? Do you anticipate that it will lead to financial savings? Are you pursuing it? Is it a substitution for the existing traditional family housing process that we've had in MILCON years? Just generally. I'd be interested in what your approach to that whole question of privatization is.
Page 637 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. We are pursuing privatization and I'd be the first to admit to you that we're doing it very cautiously. We're going very slowly to make sure that we don't make mistakes because we clearly feel that a mistake is about a 50 year mistake if we make it.
Our first project is a small one, it's 420 units of housing. It's at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. We go from that to a project with a little over 600 units at Robins Air Force Base.
Mr. PACKARD. What are you doing on those two?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. The Lackland one we expect to have contract award by July of this year. The Robins one, the request for proposals from industry is about ready to be put on the street. That's 600. Our third one, we get a little bit bigger. It's at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska which will be almost 900 units. That's a combination of the first two, actually, and it's the first time that we begin to bite into a deficit, that is to say, at Elmendorf we give to the developer roughly 300 houses that he has to invest in to bring up to standards. A little over 200 houses that are in very good shape, so he will get the fund stream from, but he doesn't have to invest a lot in. But then we're going to give him a parcel of land where he will build 300 new housing units for us. All those numbers kind of rounded together, are nearly over 900 units.
Then we go sort of into even bigger projects where we have at Kirtland Air Force Base and Mountain Home Air Force Base, proposals to give our entire housing inventory to a developer, build the houses that we need to buy out our deficit and then receive the fund stream from, in some cases, 1600 to 2000 homes.
Page 638 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. Most of these projects are on base?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes sir. Many of them are on base. The one at Lackland is on base. The one at Robins Air Force Base is across the street, what we call Robins West. The one at Elmendorf, the houses are right in the middle of the base, that we give up, in addition to those we had built.
So what I try to portray for you is we start at 400 and went to 600 than almost 900 and are working to larger projects. We have 12 projects that we are looking into right now.
I should also tell you, Mr. Chairman, that of the projects that we have looked at, not every one has been a success for privatization. That is to say when we apply the economic models, we have had to eliminate three projects that were contenders because we just couldn't make the economics of the project work out.
Mr. PACKARD. What's the reasons for those, do you think?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. The reason was that the fund stream we were going to be able to give the developer would not cover the cost that he or she would have had to renovate the units that we were going to give them. They were not in good enough shape. So you had to make a very big investment renovation and the fund stream they would receive back would not have paid the mortgage for it. So went we on six different excursions, as a matter of fact, at one Air Force Base in Mississippi. None of those six could we make work.
Page 639 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. How do you approach bidders? To what extent do you use local bidders versus others?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Absolutely. We have what we call an industry forum where we put a draft request for proposal on the street and we say this is what we're thinking about doing. We give industry an opportunity to comment on that draft and then we have an industry day, as we call it, where anybody who is interested comes out to the base, listens to the proposal, hears our plan of attack, and kind of gives us their suggestions before we actually put the request for proposal on the street for bids.
We have very good bidding. In Texas, we had 22 proposals, I believe it was, to start with, that we whittled down to the final winner.
Mr. PACKARD. Do you expect the privatization projects that you have underway will reflect a savings to the Air Force?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. No sir, I don't. As a matter of fact, we've done—our financial management and comptroller community did a very sophisticated analysis and concluded that the life for the Air Force, the life cycle cost of the privatization project was the same as the military construction cost. However, there's tremendous saving in time. At the rate that we bring in projects to the Congress, and that's about $250 million a year in improvements and new construction, it would take us about 26 years to buy out our requirement to fix up 61,000 houses.
Page 640 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
We believe with the privatization projects, as a supplement to our existing programs, that we can buy out that requirement by the year 2010. So we'll cut the 26 years roughly in half by using privatization.
I want to go on the record, clearly, Mr. Chairman, as saying that we do not expect savings from the process.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you. Is it right, is it true that the cost of family housing programs being shifted from the bill, from this bill to the housing allowances subaccounts, in the military personnel accounts, in the National Defense Bill?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. In the Air Force today, that is not happening. The money is remaining in the Family Housing Account because of this 26 year backlog, we believe that the only way we can get there is to continue to invest at about the $1 billion level in the family housing account each year which is a significant amount of money. Out of $62 billion, $1 billion for family housing. So we have not shifted money.
But in the long term, I believe that shift will have to take place because eventually a lot more people will be collecting a housing allowance and giving it to the developer as opposed to living in a government house, and so the money will have to shift in the out years in the budget.
Mr. PACKARD. Are there any Air Force projects being held up by virtue of pending privatization? Is it holding up execution of typical MILCON construction?
Page 641 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. We have some funds that are against the Lackland Air Force Base project and against the Robins Air Force Base project. What has been executed through the military construction program, 1996, 1997, that we are using, in effect, the seed money to make these projects work.
Mr. PACKARD. How much money are we talking about?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. I've got it here. One second, sir. At Lackland Air Force Base, it's $17.7 million; $6.2 million of it comes from the 1996 appropriation, $11.5 million comes from the 1997 appropriation.
At Robins, it's $12 million; $5.2 million from the 1997 appropriations, $6.8 million from the 1998 appropriation. The third one, Kirtland Air Force Base, which I haven't mentioned to you in New Mexico, has $5.4 million and comes out of the 1997 appropriation and $20.9 million that comes out of the 1998 appropriation. Those are the only three projects that have military construction.
Mr. PACKARD. Are these funds being withheld to meet OMB scoring?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. No sir. Absolutely not. They are, in fact, the Air Force contribution to the project, but not as a result of OMB scoring.
Mr. PACKARD. The Army is proceeding with whole installation type projects. The Navy, more regional. Is there a—what's the policy on the Air Force?
Page 642 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. In the Air Force, we're looking at each of our bases individually and we intend to publish by this December a family housing master plan, much like the dormitory master plan which I was very pleased to see was laying on the table here when I walked in. And in that family housing master plan, we will look at each base in the Air Force and make an initial determination, is the right solution at this base, privatization or is it a military construction project or is it in the operations and maintenance program or is there an alternative that says we don't need all these houses anyway, let's just depend on the private sector.
So by December, we hope that we will be able to give you a copy of that family housing master plan. That's our approach.
OVERSEAS HOUSING AUTHORITY
Mr. PACKARD. Let me conclude my housing questions and then I'll come right back to you, John. On overseas housing, I have only one more question, really. Is the Air Force interested in a legislative proposal for establishing an overseas housing authority as a nonappropriated fund instrumentality? The Army is pursuing it.
Mr. COLEMAN. We'd like to see how they do it. We can use them as a barometer as to its validity. They're moving ahead on it. We'd like to study their experience.
Mr. PACKARD. So you're not moving into it at this point in time? You're in a wait and see——
Page 643 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. No sir. We're actually using build lease to solve some of our housing problems overseas. We have a 500 unit project in Aviano, Italy and a 500 unit project in Lakenheath in the United Kingdom. We've brought, as a matter of fact, to your committee staff to look over for us. We owe them some answers back on the economic analysis, but we believe without any investment and effect on our part, that the local developers will provide these houses for us and we have two very good projects.
Mr. PACKARD. Could you bring us up to date, briefly, on the Aviano project? That's a $404 million project. Is that the one that you're talking about?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Sir, the family housing part is to construct 500 units.
Mr. PACKARD. In Aviano?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes sir.
Mr. PACKARD. Okay. Mr. Olver?
Mr. OLVER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm going to ask for the record a question that would get you for the Air Force to put down the several criteria, I think you've indicated, that there are nine criteria in the development of your priorities.
I very much respect the idea that you are developing an integrated program here and just looking to ask questions about that might not otherwise have been asked, somewhere along the way, but what I'd like, obviously, is for the matrix of those nine criteria, so that with the explanation it's possible to at least explore without a long discussion here.
Page 644 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Let me go back to the FYDP business. I need to understand and maybe this is partially done by the previous comments. On your FYDP for the future, 2000 through 2003, you have items which are marked ARS. I take it that's Air Force Reserve Station? What would that be, ARS?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Air Force Reserve Station.
Mr. OLVER. And ARB is Air Reserve Base?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes sir.
Mr. OLVER. And the AFB, I think that's obvious as an Air Force Base. And when it's marked as an NAS, that would be a Naval Air Station?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes sir.
Mr. OLVER. So in any of these cases where it's not ARS or ARB, these are co-located, at least co-located on other parts of those 25 that are co-located locations for your major facilities, I take it, something along those lines?
Mr. COLEMAN. Carswell Air Force Base is now Carswell Air Reserve Base. It's run by the Navy, but the Air Force is there.
WESTOVER ARB
Page 645 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. OLVER. Okay. I'm down now to the parochial things, I guess, after the previous comments.
I notice in the 2001, I take it there's only one Reserve Base in New England, isn't there? That's Westover Base?
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes sir.
Mr. OLVER. I notice in the 2001 submission, there is a control tower there. Is that in design? Has that been designed? Can anybody tell me?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. My guess would be no. If it's in 2001——
Mr. OLVER. Your guess is no.
Brig. Gen. CLEM. Just starting the initial design.
Mr. OLVER. Starting the initial design. How long does the design take?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. What's the size of the project, sir?
Mr. OLVER. It's a $4 million design. It's a small project, relatively small project.
Page 646 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. From inception to completion, probably a year, to hire the architect/engineering firm, provide them the project description, then to come back, have their designs reviewed at maybe 35 percent, again, 65 percent—it takes about a year.
Mr. OLVER. Yes, a control tower is not a common cookie cutter or something like that?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. It could be.
Mr. OLVER. Could be.
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. But we don't know what that is.
Mr. PACKARD. Is that with the environmental reviews?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes sir. They're part of the process.
Mr. OLVER. All right.
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. And it could be, what you're calling cookie cutter, we call a site adapt. We adapt it to the site from some other site and therefore it could be six months or four months.
Mr. OLVER. Maybe if I see site adapt in the chart enough times, I'll drop cookie cutter.
Page 647 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. That would be good, but we understand.
Mr. OLVER. Okay. I notice in the, in your long term Air National Guard FYDP for up in the part of the world that I come from, the list for yours is constructed in a little bit different way. I see in the case of the Air National Guard—the Air Reserve, it's by year for all facilities. The piece of it that I have is only a piece for a group of states from Idaho to Maryland, the one page that I have, but it includes Massachusetts which, of course, is why I'm asking the question.
It still carries the replacement of the dining hall which the Chairman was kind enough to move up from the 2000 to the 1998 and that was done in the 1998 program, so that comes off.
I notice there's a thing here, a location, relocate taxiway. This sort of fits with a program of upgrading the FAA bid on civilian monies, an intersection strengthening and reconstruction at that Barnes Air Guard Base last year. It was a bit over $1 million—well, it's in construction now. It's expected to be going forward or thereabouts, which was viewed as a 1–2 punch with this relocation of taxiway which they feel is very important because of it being the taxiway as it presently functions, taxis right through the National Guard's facilities and right through and among its planes and its hangers and so forth. They want to move the taxiway so that commercial traffic using the same facility can skirt around that. And this a two-piece, one being done with the airport and by FAA monies under the Airport Improvement Program under transportation. Then this one would be done here.
Page 648 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Is that—has that been designed?
Gen. WEAVER. No sir, the airport will design that.
Mr. OLVER. The airport will design that. They will do the design and they will pay for the design, is that how that works? You will pay for it?
Gen. WEAVER. You pay for the design and they'll do the design.
Mr. OLVER. I see, so that comes out of design appropriated money here before one does this.
How long does the design of a taxiway take?
Gen. WEAVER. My information says six months.
Mr. OLVER. That's all my questions.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you. I only have one more question and then I think we're about ready to close the hearing.
LINE ITEM VETO
As you know, we have completed override of the line item veto package of the 38 projects. Thirteen of those projects, I believe, involved in the Air Force and the Air Reserve.
Page 649 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Now that that's been done and the funding issue has been resolved on it, are you going to be able to execute those projects?
Maj. Gen. LUPIA. Yes, absolutely, without a doubt. I've asked for monthly reviews to be done by my Division Chiefs and I will do quarterly reviews to insure that by the 30th of September this year, those 13 projects will be awarded; contract award, which is obligation of the funds, by the 30th of September this year.
Mr. PACKARD. That's very good. Any other questions? Mr. Olver?
Mr. OLVER. No, I'm done, I thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. PACKARD. We appreciate very much the chance to visit with you. I don't know whether this will be our last chance or not. I don't know whether I'll be here or you'll be here.
Mr. COLEMAN. I'm not going to be here. This is my last——
Mr. PACKARD. That's been announced. I wasn't going to mention that. You mentioned it to me, but I wasn't going to mention it until you—because I didn't know whether it was public or not.
Mr. COLEMAN. It is public. I thank you for your support of our efforts over the four years that I've been here.
Page 650 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. You've made a great contribution to not only the Air Force and the Air Reserve and Air Guard, but also to the country. We appreciate all that you've done.
Mr. COLEMAN. Thank you very much.
Mr. PACKARD. Are you returning to the private sector?
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes sir.
Mr. PACKARD. Congratulations. We feel and I'm sure your staff will be delighted at this. I've got about 15, 16, 15 pages I think of rather specific issues on specific bases that our staff would like to get some information. If they'll respond to that.
Mr. COLEMAN. Sure, we appreciate that.
Mr. PACKARD. And any other questions we might submit for the record, we'd appreciate a response.
Mr. COLEMAN. Yes sir.
Mr. PACKARD. With that——
Mr. OLVER. May I make one comment?
Page 651 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. Of course.
Mr. OLVER. Usually, when we return to the private sector, there's condolences given, although it may be congratulations.
Mr. PACKARD. It is congratulations. It will be for me, too, when that time comes. Most of us serve out of duty, almost as it were.
Again, it's a pleasure to have you with us this morning and we appreciate all that you've done in terms of your testimony, your questions and answers and with that we'll close the hearing.
Mr. COLEMAN. Thank you very much.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you.
[CLERK'S NOTE.—Questions for the record submitted by Chairman Packard.]
SUPPLEMENTAL REQUEST
Question. The Committee will be moving quickly to mark up a fiscal year 1998 supplemental appropriation bill, including funds for the Department of Defense. We have not yet received an official request for additional military construction funds, but we understand that the Air Force may be seeking funds for storm damage repairs. Is there anything you can tell us today about the Air Force's request?
Page 652 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. With respect to the Military Family Housing Appropriation, Typhoon PAKA damaged Andersen AFB Guam's Furnishing Management Office's (FMO's) roof and loaner furniture which was stored inside. If not replaced, the base will not have loaner furniture for members doing Permanent Change of Station to Andersen AFB which will adversely impact quality of life. The FMO's office equipment and office furniture were also damaged. Additionally, Typhoon PAKA destroyed bus-stop shelters which are planned to be replaced with typhoon-proof shelters to avoid the hazard of wind-blown bus-stop shelters. Storm damage related to EL Nino which was which was incurred at Vandenburg AFB CA is also specified.
With respect to other appropriations, associated storm-related requirements will be addressed separately.
Family Housing General Reduction
Question. The Construction Annex to the budget request—that is, the ''C–1'' document—contains an entry ''General Reduction, minus $7,584,000'' in the Air Force's Family Housing program. Please explain this entry.
Answer. The $7,584,000 General Reduction appearing on the C–1 is attributable to the presumed availability of prior year unobligated balances which were directed by OSD to be used to fund FY99 authorized projects. These balances, however, are vital for completion of prior year Military Family Housing Construction projects as they are reserved for contingencies and Supervision, Inspection and Overhead (SIOH). Construction costs are obligated at contract award with contingency and SIOH funds held in an unobligated status to meet unforeseen conditions and contract claims.
Page 653 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Is this unobligated balance currently available to pay the costs of storm damage that will be requested in any supplemental for fiscal year 1998?
Answer. No. These funds ($7,584,000) were directed by OSD to be used to fund FY99 authorized projects.
Family Housing Privatization
THROUGH THE FAMILY HOUSING IMPROVEMENT FUND [''PUBLIC-PRIVATE VENTURE'' PROGRAM, OR ''PPV'']
Question. The Committee has received the notification for the Army's family housing privatization project at Fort Carson, and it is under review. The Navy has executed two projects in Texas and Washington under somewhat different authorities. We will be going into detail about the ongoing privatization program when we have our hearing with Under Secretary Goodman on March 12. I have several questions that I will ask you to answer from the Air Force's perspective. Does the Air Force anticipate that there will be any significant financial savings from privatization as compared with the traditional program?
Answer. The Air Force does not anticipate savings from privatization. However privatization does allow us to leverage our MILCON dollars to revitalize a large number of housing units at a faster pace than the traditional MILCON program.
Question. To what extent is privatization becoming a substitute for the traditional family housing program, rather than the supplemental program that Congress originally intended?
Page 654 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The Air Force does not see privatization becoming a substitute for the traditional family housing MILCON program but rather as another tool that can be used with our traditional approaches to accomplish family housing requirements. We intend to use privatization to the maximum extent possible to leverage limited funds to accelerate revitalization of our housing inventory.
Question. Is it correct that the cost of the family housing program is being shifted from this bill to the housing allowances subaccounts within the military personnel accounts in the National Security appropriations bill? Is this a ''zero-sum'' game, that is, will there be any savings or is it just a shift of costs? Is there any assumption about the future funding levels for housing allowances?
Answer. It is correct that the cost of the privatized family housing units is being shifted from this bill to the housing allowances sub-accounts within the military personnel accounts in the National Security appropriations bill. However, in order for privatization to achieve the acceleration of housing revitalization programs, funds will be retained in the housing investment accounts. Defense Planning requires that savings realized from leveraging resources with the private sector should be reinvested in housing projects instead of reducing programmed housing resources. Accordingly, as a result of privatization initiatives, Air Force will reinvest any cost avoidance savings realized in the Military Family Housing (MFH) Operations and Maintenance (O&M) appropriation into MFH accounts to expedite revitalization of the Air Force MFH inventory.
This is not a ''zero-sum'' game. Instead of transferring savings to the housing allowances sub-accounts, the savings will be retained within MFH accounts while the housing costs associated with the privatized units will shift from MFH O&M to the Air Force military pay account. The payoff to this initiative is that the Air Force will be able to accelerate the revitalization of the housing units. Privatization will allow us to leverage the funds in our investment programs to accomplish this acceleration.
Page 655 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The only assumption about the future funding levels for housing allowances is that they are a ''must pay'' which will be funded at a rate to cover the new BAH entitlement.
Question. Is the Air Force holding up the execution of family housing projects for which funds have been appropriated, pending privatization efforts? If so, which projects are being held up, and what is the total dollar amount being withheld from obligation? If so, are these funds being withheld to meet OMB scoring costs on mortgage guarantees to developers against base closure, downsizing, or extended deployments?
Answer. MILCON dollars are being used to cover the required government upfront investment for some of the Air Force privatization projects. These upfront costs cover the ''scored'' amount of government loans, loan guarantees, differential payments or other authorities used in the deal. The Air Force is closely monitoring these privatization efforts and is making sure that they are executed responsibly or in the case that privatization does not work, that we are configured to execute the original MILCON as expeditiously as possible.
Active privatization projects which include prior year MILCON are—
Base and dedicated MILCON:
Lackland—$17.7M ($6.2M FY96 and $11.5M FY97);
Robins—$12.0M ($5.2M FY97 and $6.8M FY98); and
Page 656 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Kirtland—$26.4M ($5.5M FY97 and $20.9M FY98.
Total Prior Year MILCON: $28.4M.
Total MILCON (Add FY98): $56.1M.
Question. The Army is proceeding very aggressively to execute ''whole installation'' type projects. The Navy policy envisions a ''regional scope.'' What is the Air Force policy with regard to privatizing all family housing in a large geographic area?
Answer. The Air Force is pursuing ''whole installation'' concepts in two of its FY99 deals: Mt Home and Kirtland. For FY00, we are looking at whole base deals at Dover and Hanscom. As we are developing the family housing master plan, we will plan to ''lay in'' whole base and possibly multi-base deals where it makes sense. However, we still have a lot to learn on single base deals and are focusing on getting that right first.
Question. Under current authorities, family housing privatization involves government contribution of land, facilities, infrastructure, mortgage guarantees, and differential lease payments to developers and financiers. Wouldn't it be prudent to gain some experience with how well this program works, before making such a large commitment to turn over so many assets for a fifty year term?
Answer. The Air Force is pursuing privatization at a comfortable pace with 12 initiatives currently under consideration and development. Privatization is very new and an entirely different approach to facility acquisition than the ''traditional methods''. The Air Force is building expertise over time. Our measured approach will allow us to build on success.
Page 657 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. It took us many, many years to build up these family housing assets. Tell us about some of the steps the Air Force is taking to protect its investments under its program.
Answer. The Air Force is working hard to make sure its investments in these deals are protected in both the short and long term. For the short term, we are taking actions such as requiring the developer to have significant financial investment and not providing financing until construction and/or renovation is completed to make sure the offer provides a good initial product. In the long term, we are using detailed ground leases and operating agreements to insure proper offer treatment of the investment.
Question. Provide for the record a list of the Air Force locations that are under consideration for such projects, including the number of units in the current inventory at each locations, as well as some indication of the value of the total government contribution at each location.
Answer.
The available MILCON funds may have to be supplemented with other government contributions in the form of leased or conveyed land, conveyed housing units or other facilities, subsidies and other incentives. Each location's funding availability and other circumstances will determine the mix and value of government contribution required for each location's privatization initiative.
Page 658 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Describe for us the reasons privatization probably won't work at some of the places that the Air Force has reviewed.
Answer. In some cases, the assets that we bring to the deal do not provide a sufficient funds stream to sustain the deal. Examples include housing allowances below market rent or existing units that are in need of a major renovation. In some cases, our deals have been limited in size by available MILCON funding for upfront investment resulting in too little economy of scale of drive significant efficiencies.
Overseas Housing Authority
Question. Is the Air Force interested in a legislative proposal for the establishment of an ''Overseas Housing Authority'' as a ''Non-Appropriated Fund Instrumentality,'' which the Army is pursuing, and which is now under review at the Office of Management and Budget? If not, why not? Is it a question of cost per housing unit? Are the Air Force's overseas housing needs different than the Army's needs?
Answer. The Air Force does not object to the Army's proposal to test the concept and feasibility at Army overseas locations but would like to wait and see the Army's result with respect to budget neutrality (MILPERS increases offset by military family housing operations and maintenance savings) and cost effectiveness before starting to test the authority.
The whole focus of the Air Force Housing program is to provide quality housing for our people. While the Army's initiative may prove to be a viable alternative for future consideration, we are currently taking a different approach overseas as evidenced by our build-lease efforts at Aviano AB, Italy (where we have no base housing) and RAF Lakenheath, United Kingdom (where we have the largest deficit of adequate housing in the Air Force: more than 1,800). Build-lease is privatization; it allows us to quickly provide over 1,000 units of quality housing for our personnel and their families at an affordable price at two key forward deployed locations. It is not strictly a question of cost per housing unit, although cost is always a factor. Quality housing at an affordable cost is our goal.
Page 659 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
We believe the housing needs are essentially the same for both Services; however we anticipate being in the housing business well into the future. We are convinced the future of Air Force housing involves an optimum mix of Air Force owned housing and privatized housing with the goal of providing quality housing for our people at an affordable cost.
Cost of Base Closure
Question. When this Subcommittee took on the cost of base realignment and closure, we were assured that these resources would be returned to the military construction and family housing programs upon completion of BRAC. How has the Air Force benefited from this program?
Answer. The BRAC program has not been completed however savings in the form of cost avoidance continues to flow/benefit the overall Air Force TOA.
Line Item Veto
Question. The President's use of line item veto on last year's bill took a total of thirteen projects for the Air Force and the Air Force Reserve. The House overrode this veto on February 5, and the Senate followed suit on February 25. Can you assure us that these projects will be executed promptly, now that funding is resolved?
Answer. Yes, the Air Force will execute these thirteen projects this fiscal year (FY98).
Page 660 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Aviano, Italy
Question. Bring us up to date with the current status of the Air Force beddown at Aviano, Italy, which has a total facilities cost of $404,000,000 from all sources.
Answer. Construction related to the F–16 beddown is scheduled to be completed in 2002. NATO approved an amendment to the Aviano Capability Package in February 1998 for 14 additional projects at $83M which includes critical facilities such as munitions storage, jet fuel storage, airfield lighting restoration, and passenger/freight terminal. A major portion of this program will be funded by NATO in FY98/99/00. It is critical to maintain a sufficient level of NATO funding in order to continue the current momentum on this program.
Question. When will this effort be completed?
Answer. With the exception of one MILCON project, all Aviano Beddown projects will be completed by 2002. The remaining MILCON project, Radar Approach Control Facility ($3.5M), will be submitted by the command for funding in a future MILCON program. A precautionary prefinancing statement will be submitted to NATO.
Alabama—Maxwell AFB
OTS STUDENT DORMITORIES ($12,765,000)
Page 661 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
ALABAMA-MAXWELL AFB: OTS DINING FACILITY ($4,796,000)
Question. What is the total construction program for meeting all Officer Training School requirements at Maxwell AFB, by fiscal year programmed?
Answer. The Officer Training School MILCON program is as follows:
FIRE TRAINING FACILITY ($1,837,000)
Question. Will this project meet all fire training requirements at this location?
Answer. This project constructs the Air Force standardized crash fire rescue training facility, which provides all aircraft fire rescue training required for certification on the installation. This project is not intended to support structural firefighter training, hazardous material training, confined space rescue training, or high-angle rescue training requirements.
Alaska—Eielson AFB
CONSOLIDATED MUNITION FACILITY ($4,352,000)
Question. Is it correct that the unit cost for this project is only $63 per square foot, when converted from metric to standard and adjusted for the area cost factor [$2,950/27/1.73]?
Page 662 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The unit cost for the Eielson AFB munitions facility is $273 per square foot. Using the OSD formulation factor from square meters to square feet is 10.76. Adjusted for the area cost factor (1.73), the standard DoD unit cost for this type facility would have been $158 per square foot.
Question. Does this project provide a permanent or a temporary facility?
Answer. The Consolidated Munition Facility project at Eielson AFB, Alaska is a permanent facility.
Question. What is the estimated design life of this one step turnkey facility?
Answer. The munitions facility is designed as permanent construction with a 25-year life before major repairs are needed.
California—Edwards AFB
Question. This facility provides all of the general maintenance and repair operations for aircraft assigned to the Flight Test Center. How will the Center conduct its test programs while this renovation is being performed?
Answer. The design process currently underway for this project incorporates phased construction with minimum impact to the operations within this facility. The construction will create constraints/impact/workarounds, but will not take the hangar totally out of use.
Page 663 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
California—Vandenberg AFB
SPACE IQT ACADEMIC FACILITY ($9,209,000)
Question. It is correct that this project is required due to unit and mission relocations from Peterson AFB and Falcon AFS?
Answer. This project is required for the permanent beddown of the Space Initial Qualification Training Program which moved from leased space in Colorado Springs, CO and relocatable facilities at Falcon AFS to Vandenberg AFB.
Question. Does this project replace the previously occupied space in kind, foot for foot?
Answer. The project scope is not based on previously leased space (7,992 SM in Colorado Springs) nor temporary relocatable facility space (2,100 SM at Falcon AFS) when the Space IQT mission was still located in the Colorado Springs area. The project scope (3,800 SM) is designed to meet the current Space Initial Qualification student load training requirements.
Question. How is the previously occupied space being used now?
Answer. Except for 502 SM remaining to support training which did not relocate to Vandenberg, the leased space (7,992 SM) in Colorado Springs was terminated. The relocatable facilities (2,100 SM) on Falcon AFS, which were used for a portion of the Space IQT mission, currently house DoD satellite operations support functions.
Page 664 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
ADD/ALTER MISSILE MAINTENANCE FACILITY ($9,500,000)
Question. What is the current estimate for how far into the future it will be necessary to provide Minuteman ICBM Follow-On Test and Evaluation activities that require this project? Is the building being planned to outlast the program.
Answer. The Minuteman ICBM weapon system is identified for sustainment through 2020 by the Air Force Long Range Plan, 27 Mar 97. The Minuteman ICBM reliability is verified through Follow-On Test and Evaluation functions performed in this facility. This project renovates the existing missile maintenance facility and is expected to extend the life of the facility until 2020.
Colorado—Falcon AFB
OPERATIONAL SUPPORT FACILITY ($9,601,000)
Question. Does this project include the cost of demolishing the current temporary facility, which is actually 118 trailers bolted together?
Answer. This project includes the cost associated with demolishing 51 (3534SM) of the 118 (8178SM) trailers. The remaining trailers will be demolished after construction of a future logistics support facility.
Colorado—USA Academy
Page 665 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
ADD/ALTER PREP SCHOOL BUILDING ($4,413,000)
Question. Provide for the record a table that will show the enrollment at the Academy and at the Prep School for each of the least ten years, and showing how many of each year's Prep School graduates move into the following year's student body at the Academy.
Answer.
District of Columbia
BOLLING AFB: HONOR GUARD TECHNICAL SCHOOL ($2,948,000)
Question. Describe the course of study for the newly established technical school for honor guard units.
Answer. The course of study varies to suit the needs for honor guard units. Base level honor guards are primarily administered a 2 week (80 hrs) course to learn basic protocol, various ceremonies, fundamental drills and uniform care/maintenance. Physical conditioning is also required throughout the course of study. New members assigned to the Air Force Honor Guard are required to complete the Basic Ceremonial Guardsman Course (9 weeks, 360 hours) consisting of basic orientation, skills training, academics to include history, protocols, customs and courtesies, drills, manual of arms, ceremonies, and final inspection/transition.
Page 666 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Why couldn't this be done in another, less expensive location, rather than bringing 600 students per year to Washington?
Answer. The Honor Guard School uses personnel from the air Force Honor Guard for its core training cadre. Centralizing all honor guard training at Bolling efficiently combines the need to train ''Total Force'' personnel worldwide while satisfying the extensive ceremonial requirements of the National Capital Region.
Florida—Eglin AFB
DORMITORY ($7,866,000)
Question. This project includes the cost of demolition of two buildings, totaling 4,550 square meters. Are these two buildings the existing modular dorms with central latrines?
Answer. Yes.
Question. Is this demolition in the footprint of the new construction?
Answer. Yes.
SANTA ROSA ISLAND TEST SITES ($12,571,000)
Page 667 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. What makes this location uniquely capable to test against land, sea, and air targets/threats?
Answer. Because of the geographic position and layout of Santa Rosa Island in relation to the Eglin AFB Range and the Gulf Test range, these test sites provide simultaneous tracking of an airborne weapon over land-sea scenario. These test sites provide munitions and Command, Control, Communications, Computer, and Information (C4I) programs the unique capability to test against land, sea, and air targets, and threats in a single mission, thus reducing test and test-team deployment costs. Emerging weapons technologies found in long-range standoff munitions such as Joint Air-to-Surface Stand-off Missile (JASSM), Joint Direct-Attack Munitions (JDAM), Precision-Guided Munition (PGM) and air-to-air technologies in Air Intercept Missile (AIM–9X) will benefit from this capability.
Florida—Eglin 9
CONTROL TOWER ($2,014,000)
Question. When was it determine that existing control tower is ''operationally unsafe'', and why is 1999 the right year for replacement?
Answer. A HQ USAF Flight Standards Agency Report (28 Sep 95) identified a potential flight safety issue (major blind spots and a hangar obstructing vision of the approach zone), and fire and life-safety protection deficiencies. FY99 is the earliest year we can satisfy this requirement.
Page 668 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
FIRE TRAINING FACILITY ($1,823,000)
Question. Will this project meet all fire training requirements at this location?
Answer. This project constructs the Air Force standardized crash fire rescue training facility, which provides all aircraft fire rescue training required for certification on the installation. This project is not intended to support structural firefighter training, hazardous material training, confined space rescue training, or high-angle rescue training requirements.
Florida—MacDill AFB
KC–135 SIMULATOR FACILITY ($2,514,000)
Question. This facility will house a flight simulator device valued at $25,000,000, to be provided from other appropriations. Has this procurement been timed to correspond with the availability of this facility?
Answer. Yes. The modifications to the flight simulator at MacDill are timed to correspond with the construction of the KC–135 simulator facility. Both are scheduled for completion in 4Q FY 99.
Question. How many identical KC–135 full motion simulator devices does the Air Force have right now, and where are they?
Page 669 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. There are four KC–135 full motion simulator devices—one each at Altus AFB OK, Fairchild AFB WA, Grand Forks AFB NC, and Tulsa IAP OK.
FIRE TRAINING FACILITY ($2,494,000)
Question. Will this project meet all fire training requirements at this location?
Answer. This project constructs the Air Force standardized crash fire rescue training facility, which provides all aircraft fire rescue training required for certification on the installation. This project is not intended to support structural firefighter training, hazardous material training, confined space rescue training, or high angle rescue training requirements.
Georgia—Robins AFB
DEPOT PLANT SERVICES FACILITY ($11,894,000)
Question. Will this facility house Capital Working Fund activities? If so, will the rates charged users be reduced upon completion of this project, to reflect consolidation and streamlining?
Answer. The facility will house depot maintenance activities of the Air Force Working Capital Fund (WCF). Savings derived from reductions in inventories, energy consumption, and overtime will be passed on to WCF customers.
Page 670 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Hawaii—Hickam AFB
REPAIR AIRFIELD PAVEMENT ($5,890,000)
Question. The form 1390 indicates that a future project is planned, to ''repair airfield pavement'' at a cost of $7,735,000. How does the project relate to this project, and when is it programmed?
Answer. The repair of the aircraft parking apron at Hickam AFB is the final phase to replace failed airfield pavement. This project repairs 98,000 square meters of pavement ($7.7M), and is currently planned for the FY02 MILCON program. The FY02 project replaces failed pavement similar to that being repaired by this FY99 MILCON request.
Idaho—Mountain Home AFB
LAND ACQUISITION ($1,000,000)
Question. Does the Department of Defense still have moratorium on land acquisition in effect? If so, is it correct that this particular land acquisition is exempted from the moratorium because the acquisition will be performed by the Bureau of Land Management?
Answer. No. An exemption to the moratorium is required to add real estate to Department of Defense accounts. This action is not an acquisition of private land, but a transfer of US government owned land managed by the Bureau of Land Management. This project will reimburse ranchers for grazing rights and transfer land management responsibilities to the Air Force.
Page 671 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. What legislation must be enacted to accomplish this acquisition?
Answer. Land withdrawal legislation must be enacted. The Air Force plans to construct a 12,000-acre tactical range on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) withdrawn land in the southwest Idaho under the provisions of the Federal Land Policy Management Act of 1976 (43 U.S.C. 1701 and following sections) and the Engle Act (43 U.S.C. 155 and following sections). The proposal includes one 640-acre no drop simulated target area; four 5-acre simulated target areas; ten 1-acre emitter sites; and twenty 1/4 acre emitter sites and modifications. The proposed land withdrawal requires the purchase of 12,000 acres of grazing with an estimated cost of $1M and is identified in the FY99 Air Force Military Construction Program.
DORMITORY ($8,897,000)
Question. This project includes the cost of demolition of one 54 room wooden dormitory. Describe this dormitory, and is it currently in use?
Answer. This 54-room, two-story dormitory is substandard. It was built in 1954 with interior corridors and constructed with wood frames and aluminum exterior siding. There is no bathroom exhaust and the ventilation is inadequate. Electrical systems are inadequate for loading and do not meet current electrical and safety code requirements. The original evaporative cooling units (swamp coolers) and inefficient high-temperature radiant heat systems are at the end of their useful life and energy wasteful. The dormitory has damaged walls and cracked joints and the roof system is failing.
Page 672 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The dormitory is currently still in use.
RANGE IMPROVEMENTS ($2,400,000)
Question. By what date must the land acquisition be accomplished in order to execute this project during fiscal year 1999?
Answer. Land acquisition is required by 1 July 1999 to support the Idaho Range project.
Question. Provide for the record the entire military construction funding requirement for land acquisition and range improvements, by fiscal year.
Answer. The construction funding needed for the Idaho range improvements is:
Maryland—Andrews AFB
CHILD DEVELOPMENT CENTER ($4,448,000)
Question. Andrews AFB currently has a waiting list exceeding 300 children, the largest in the Air Force. Over 1,200 children are eligible for child care services at Andrews AFB. Submit for the record a copy of DoD Directive 6060.2, which limits the capacity of child development facilities to 305 children, which is the capacity provided by this project.
Page 673 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The current edition of the DoD Directive 6060.2 does not restrict the size of military child development centers. This restriction was inadvertently left out of the revision of the 1989 version which did include this requirement. The DoD Child Development Program standards, which are used by DoD to inspect military child development programs, do restrict the size of centers to 305 maximum capacity. A copy is attached.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Question. Did the Air Force seek a waiver to this directive?
Answer. The Air Force has not sought a waiver to exceed 305 maximum capacity for child development centers. We support this size limit. For child abuse protection reasons, child development centers must have a single point of entry. This requirement precludes multiple points of entry that would require staffing of multiple desks and shortens the distance from the entrance to the individual rooms.
Question. Will the fiscal year 2003 project also be sized for 305 children?
Answer. Any future child development center project for Andrews will be sized based on the need at the time.
Mississippi—Keesler AFB
TRAINING SUPPORT FACILITY ($5,756,000)
Page 674 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Describe the economies that should result from the consolidation of student support operations in a central facility.
Answer. The student operations facility is part of the student campus being developed at Keesler AFB to replace existing deteriorated student dorms and support activities. Student support functions are currently scattered among existing dormitories (in an old dining area space) and will be demolished as new dormitories are constructed. A new central campus support facility designed for administrative functions is required to replace the demolished space. Student in- and out-processing will be more efficient; personnel records management centralized and easily accessible; student processing and conference capabilities consolidated; and overall information transfer and communication enhanced as a result of this project.
STUDENT DORMITORIES ($29,770,000)
Question. How far will these new student dormitories be located from the Training Support Facility, and how far will they be from main base operations?
Answer. The dormitories will be collocated with the training support facility as part of the student campus adjacent to the student academic complex. The campus area is located approximately one mile from the center of main base operations.
Nevada—Indian Springs Field
Page 675 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. The C–17 program is in the midst of a seven year, $16.3 billion multiyear contract. What is the status of the C–17 multiyear contract?
Answer. The C–17 program has delivered 38 production aircraft, and the last 26 have been delivered early (average 27 days) with excellent quality. The last aircraft delivered (P38) was 46 days early. With respect to the Multi-Year Procurement (MYP) contract, the FY97 and FY98 aircraft have been fully funded as well as the advance buy for the FY99 aircraft. The first MYP aircraft (P41) is expected to be delivered prior to the 31 Aug 98 contract delivery date. The last MYP (P120) aircraft contract delivery date is 30 Nov 04.
UAV LOGISTICS AND TRAINING FACILITY ($3,965,000)
UAV–SQ OPS/AMU FACILITY ($7,059,000)
UAV–COMM MAINT FAC/UTILITIES ($3,989,000)
Question. With the Air Force's considerable experience at managing large construction programs at rather remote installations, how confident are you that all of these projects at Indian Springs can be awarded during fiscal 1999, that bids will be competitive, and that each project will be delivered at full scope and within cost?
Answer. Projects are currently on schedule and reflect a first quarter FY99 award. Competitive bids have been received at Indian Springs for an FY97 UAV–Squad Ops/Hangar project. Current designs provide full scope as identified in program documents and are within programmed amounts.
Page 676 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. What is the future construction program for Predator beddown at Indian Springs?
Answer. There are two future year projects, a dormitory ($10.8M) and a dining facility ($3.5M), identified to support the Predator beddown at Indian Springs. Because most of the community activities supporting Indian Springs are located at Nellis AFB, the dormitory will be constructed there. Neither project is in the current FYDP.
Nevada—Nellis AFB
DORMITORY ($6,378,000)
Question. What is the estimate of savings in design costs by accomplishing this project by one step turn key procedures?
Answer. We cannot determine design cost savings, if any, at this time. The contractor is required to separate out the cost of design in his proposal. Therefore, at construction contract award we will know the total design cost.
New Jersey—McGuire AFB
DINING FACILITY ($6,044,000)
Question. The form 1391 states that the requirement is 1,950 square meters, and the existing dining facilities to be demolished offer a substandard 2,817 square meters. Will this net reduction of nearly one-third in size be missed?
Page 677 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. Constructing one-third less dining facility space than currently exists will provide an adequately sized and configured dining facility to support the personnel at McGuire AFB.
New Mexico—Kirtland AFB
FIRE TRAINING FACILITY ($1,774,000)
Question. Will this project meet all fire training requirements at this location?
Answer. This project constructs the Air Force standardized crash fire rescue training facility, which provides all aircraft fire rescue training required for certification on the installation. This project is not intended to support structural firefighter training, hazardous material training, confined space resume training, or high angle rescue training requirements.
North Dakota—Grand Forks AFB
FIRE TRAINING FACILITY ($2,686,000)
Question. Will this project meet all fire training requirements at this location?
Page 678 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. This project constructs the Air Force standardized crash fire rescue training facility, which provides all aircraft fire rescue training required for certification on the installation. The project is not intended to support structural firefighter training, hazardous material training, confined space rescue training, or high-angle rescue training requirements.
Ohio—Wright-Patterson AFB
ACQUISITION MANAGEMENT COMPLEX ($22,000,000)
Question. The form 1390 refers to this project as ''phase 4A''. What further work is planned, when is it programmed, and at what cost?
Answer. The Acquisition Management Complex, Phase 4B, ($16.0M) is the only project identified for a future year construction program (FY03).
Oklahoma—Tinker AFB
COMBAT COMM SQ OPS FACILITY ($5,085,000)
Question. Describe in some detail what a ''squadron operations facility'' includes, and how this will differ from currently used facilities.
Answer. The Combat Communications Squadron is composed of two major communication system sections, (airfield support systems and network systems, such as satellite communications.) the squadron also has organic vehicle, power production, and air conditioning maintenance functions; a command and control element; and specialized security and training sections.
Page 679 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The existing Combat Communications squadron is located in several substanard facilities which do not meet current fire of physical safety considerations. Alignment of command and control, maintenance, and operations to new adjacent functional areas eliminates exposure to unsafe, unsecure conditions, and optimizes support systems.
DORMITORY ($9,100,000)
Question. Another dormitory is programmed at Tinker AFB for fiscal year 2000. Will the fiscal year 1999 project replace the worst existing barracks at Tinker AFB? If not, why were these barracks selected for replacement this year?
Answer. No, the fiscal year 1999 dormitory construction project will not replace any existing dormitories at Tinker AFB. The fiscal year 1999 project constructs a new 144-room enlisted dormitory to reduce the 858-room deficit at Tinker AFB—it adds new rooms to the existing inventory.
Question. Submit for the record a list of the planned projects to correct all existing barracks deficiencies at Tinker AFB, by fiscal year programmed.
Answer. The existing dormitory deficiency at Tinker AFB is a shortage or lack of enlisted dormitory rooms. The following table describes the planned projects to correct the 858-room deficit at Tinker AFB:
Page 680 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Oklahoma—Vance AFB:
FIRE TRAINING FACILITY ($1,823,000)
Question. Will this project meet all fire training requirements at this location?
Answer. This project constructs the Air Force standardized crash fire rescue training facility, which provides all aircraft fire rescue training required for certification on the installation. This project is not intended to support structural firefighter training, hazardous material training, confined space rescue training, or high-angle rescue training requirements.
South Carolina—Charleston AFB
DINING FACILITY ($5,221,000)
Question. This project is justified, in part, by the fact that the dormitory area, which has developed through revitalization and construction over the past several years, is no longer in close proximity to the existing dining facility. Why wasn't this dining facility programmed as part of a ''whole barracks complex revitalization'' type of project, rather than a single stand-alone project?
Answer. Charleston Air Force Base's plan to construct and revitalize the dormitories included constructing a new dining facility within the new dorm campus. The goal was to provide adequate dormitories first, then follow with construction of a new dining hall within the dorm campus. It is not typical to program dormitories and dining facilities in a single MILCON project.
Page 681 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
C–17 LIFE SUPPORT FACILITY ($4,701,000)
C–17 SQ OPS/AMU FACILITY ($6,769,000)
C–17 SQ OPS/AMU FACILITY ($7,639,000)
Question. Is it correct that none of these three projects, totaling $19,109,000, would be required this year if it were not for the beddown of the C–17 at Charleston AFB?
Answer. These projects are required in the FY99 MILCON program to support the beddown of the C–17 aircraft at Charleston AFB.
Question. With the Air Force's considerable experience at multiple construction projects at a single installation in a single year, is there a plan to execute these three projects as a ''bundled'' or ''packaged'' bid in order to increase competition?
Answer. As construction agent for the Air Force, the Navy will combine the two FY99 C–17 Sq Ops/AMU projects into a single contract solicitation due to site proximity and likeness of work. The C–17 Life Support Facility project will be bid separately because it is a different type of structure and is located over a mile away from the Sq Ops/AMU facilities. The life support facility size and cost also make this construction ideal for small to medium size contractors to bid.
Page 682 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. What is the future construction program for C–17 beddown at Charleston AFB?
Answer. The final C–17 beddown projects at Charles AFB are a C–17 flight simulator facility and a corrosion control facility. Both projects will be submitted by the command in a future year construction program.
Texas—Lackland AFB
OPERATIONS FACILITY ($8,130,000)
Question. This project will provide a facility for Air Force, Navy, Army, and Marine cryptological elements. Why is it in the Air Force program rather than another service, or the Defense-wide account?
Answer. As the host service for the Median Regional Signal Intelligence Operations Center, the Air Force is responsible for programming and executing the MILCON program. Funds were transferred to the Air Force from Defense-wide accounts ($8.13M) for this project.
DORMITORY ($6,800,000)
Question. There are additional dormitory projects in fiscal year 2000, and in the out years. Is this about the maximum rate of dormitory replacement that can be accomplished at Lackland AFB without disrupting operations, roughly $7,000,000 of dormitory work per year?
Page 683 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The fiscal year 1999 and fiscal year 2000 dormitory projects at Lackland AFB do not replace any existing dormitories, but rather add new dormitories to reduce the overall deficit of dormitory rooms for our permanent party enlisted airmen. These projects will not disrupt any mission operations, nor do they represent any maximum rate of dormitory work per year.
Texas—Randolph AFB
BASE OPERATIONS FACILITY ($3,166,000)
Question. Describe in some detail why a ''temporary facility'' is required within the cost of this project. Is this due to a severely constrained construction site, or other factors?
Answer. The current base operations facility will be demolished to allow construction of the new facility on the same site. The temporary facility is needed primarily for unique communication and weather requirements supporting base operations.
Question. The existing facility is falling apart, largely because it is constructed on expansive clay soils, but it is eligible for listing on the National register of Historic Places. What challenges has this presented in programming demolition?
Answer. The demolition and replacement of this facility have been coordinated with the State Historic Preservation Office. The new facility is being designed to closely resemble the architectural style of the facility being demolished.
Page 684 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Submit for the record the ''certificate of exception'' that has been prepared.
Answer. The ''Exception to the Requirement for Economic Analysis (EA) for Military Construction Program (MCP) Project at Randolph AFB's Base Operations Facility'' is attached.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Washington—Fairchild AFB
KC–135 SQ OPS/AMU FACILITY ($7,620,000)
Question. This is the fourth squadron operations/aircraft maintenance unit to collocate aircraft operators with aircraft maintainers at Fairchild AFB. Will this complete the requirement for such facilities for support of the 59 KC–135 aircraft assigned to Fairchild AFB?
Answer. The fourth Sq Ops/AMU facility completes the requirement for KC–135 squadron operations/maintenance collocation at Fairchild AFB.
Question. Current operations are dispersed among five facilities, but only two of these are substandard and will be demolished as part of this project. How much space will be vacated, and what is the planned re-use of such space at the other three facilities?
Page 685 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. After the KC–135 Squad Ops/AMU facility is completed, one of the remaining facilities (3,175 square meters) will be sued for a field training detachment and precision measurement equipment lab; a second facility (4,000 square meters) will be used primarily for base communications; the third facility (131 square meters) is scheduled for demolition in the FY00 operations and maintenance program.
Washington—McChord AFB
C–17 ADAL AIRCRAFT MAINT SHOP ($2,321,000)
C–17 RAMP/HYDRANT FUEL SYS ($18,025,000)
C–17 ALTER MAINTENANCE HANGARS ($6,427,000)
ADAL SIMULATOR FACILITY ($1,823,000)
C–17 REPAIR BASE ROADS ($2,224,000)
C–17 ADD/ALTER AGE MAINT FACILITY ($2,110,000)
C–17 FLIGHTLINE SUPPORT FACILITY ($4,029,000)
C–17 SHORTFIELD ASSAULT STRIP ($2,321,000)
Page 686 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
C–17 ALTER COMPOSITE SHOP ($1,630,000)
C–17 SQ OPS/AMU FACILITY ($6,524,000)
LIFE SUPPORT EQUIPMENT FACILITY ($4,413,000)
Question. Is it correct that none of these eleven projects, totaling $51,847,000, would be required this year if it were not for the beddown of the C–17 at McChord AFB?
Answer. These eleven projects ($51,847,000) are required in the FY99 MILCON for the beddown of the C–17 aircraft at McChord AFB.
Question. With the Air Force's considerable experience at managing large construction programs at single installations, how confident are you that all eleven of these projects at McChord AFB can be awarded during fiscal 1999, that bids will be competitive, and that each project will be delivered at full scope and within cost?
Answer. Based on our experience with previous C–17 MILCON projects and the current status of the FY99 C–17 design program, we are very confident all eleven projects in the FY99 program at McChord AFB will be awarded during FY99, and the program delivered at full scope and within cost. The FY99 C–17 construction program for McChord will be ready to advertise before the first quarter FY99.
Question. What is the future construction program for C–17 beddown at McChord AFB?
Page 687 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. Future C–17 beddown projects at McChord AFB include a third ($8,100,000) and fourth ($7,100,000) Sq Ops/AMU, and two projects to extend nosedocks ($2,050,000 and $3,700,000). The $8,100,000 SQ OPS/AMU project is included in the current FYDP.
Germany—Spangdahlem AB
DORMITORY ($9,501,000)
Question. Why are these two projects not eligible for NATO or host nation funding? Have precautionary prefinancing statements been submitted to NATO nonetheless?
Answer. The consolidated air control squadron operations facility project is not currently NATO eligible because the US is the only ally in NATO that uses ground-based, forward air control. It is extremely unlikely NATO will support this mission, however a precautionary prefinancing statement is being submitted.
Dormitory construction is not NATO eligible. NATO supports operational infrastructure at a minimum military requirement level for member nations. NATO does not fund non-operational requirements such as dormitories. Precautionary prefinancing statements for dormitories have not been submitted to NATO because they do not have a reasonable potential to become NATO eligible.
Korea—Kusan AB
Page 688 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
DORMITORY ($5,958,000)
Question. Describe in some detail the readiness and force protection concerns at this location, and how this project will address those concerns.
Answer. Housing our unaccompanied force on-base in Korea is a major readiness and force protection concern for the Air Force. We believe our mission readiness is protected and enhanced by having our airmen live on-base, within a safe community. Force readiness is a serious concern anywhere in the world for the U.S. military, but especially so when our mission and airmen are in close proximity to potentially hostile threats or forces. The safety and protection of these airmen is paramount.
In addition, the off-base accommodations in Korea are unacceptable and inappropriate for U.S. military personnel, further exacerbating our force protection and safety concerns. The off-base quarters are generally in high-density, crowded areas making protection from terrorist or criminal activities difficult, if not impossible. The off-base quarters are not located in areas near the base, reducing the timeliness of emergency responses to and from the base and making communication by commanders and base authorities difficult. Off-base quarters are substandard—the facilities lack potable water and safe heating systems.
This project will replace the last central latrine dormitories at Kunsan Air Base, allowing the base and the Air Force to achieve a monumental quality of life milestone and provide 122 private rooms on-base for assigned enlisted personnel. The central latrine dormitories were constructed in 1961 and are no longer suitable for permanent party unaccompanied enlisted housing. The infrastructure is well beyond reasonable and economic repair; occupants are not assured of reliable water, sewage, heating or cooling in their on-base quarters—their homes. Kunsan will still have a 213-room dormitory deficit after completion of the fiscal year 1999 dormitory.
Page 689 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. What is the design life of this dormitory project?
Answer. The facility is designed as permanent construction with a 25-year life before major repairs are needed.
Question. Are there any Republic of Korea funded dormitory projects at Kunsan?
Answer. Yes, there have been three recent dormitory projects at Kunsan Air Base funded by the Republic of Korea (ROK). One additional dormitory project is planned for host nation funds in the future.
Question. Outline the remaining dormitory program at Kunsan, beyond this U.S. funded project.
Answer. The following table depicts the remaining dormitory construction program at Kunsan Air Base beyond the fiscal year 1999 U.S. funded project. The table below includes planned projects for both U.S. MILCON funds and host nation (Republic of Korea) funds. Both projects provide new construction to buyout the room deficit at Kunsan. These projects enhance readiness and force protection and are required to provide our enlisted personnel safe, adequate on-base housing at one person per room.
Page 690 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Is there any plan to leave Kunsan within a ten-year timeframe?
Answer. There are no current plans for USAF units to leave Korea during the next ten years. Continuing tensions on the Korean peninsula and US military strategy require the stationing of USAF forces Korea. North Korea still possesses a highly unpredictable threat and the continued forward positioning of North Korea's offensive capabilities on the South Korean border remains a source of concern. The credibility of US commitment to deter aggression is evidenced by the stationing of US forces and equipment in this region.
Korea—Osan AB
DORMITORY ($7,496,000)
Question. Describe in some detail the readiness and force protection concerns at this location, and who this project will address those concerns.
Answer. Housing our unaccompanied force on-base in Korea is a major readiness and force protection concern for the Air Force. We believe our mission readiness is protected and enhanced by having our airmen live on-base, within a safe community. Force readiness is a serious concern anywhere in the world for the U.S. military, but especially so when our mission and airmen are in close proximity to potentially hostile threats or forces. The safety and protection of these airmen is paramount.
In addition, the off-base accommodations in Korea are unacceptable and inappropriate for U.S. military personnel, further exacerbating our force protection and safety concerns. The off-base quarters are generally in high-density, crowded areas making protection from terrorist or criminal activities difficult, if not impossible. Multi-occupant apartment buildings usually have no in-place security measures and provide open access to the general public. One of the most common types of off-base quarters near Osan Air Base also serve as hotels. The off-base quarters are substandard and lack potable water and safe heating systems.
Page 691 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Osan Air Base has the largest deficit of on-base enlisted dormitory rooms of any Air Force location is the world. The fiscal year 1999 MILCON project and the two Korean-funded projects in calendar year 1998 and 1999 are all focused on reducing this significant shortfall. Each project constructs a 156-room dormitory and will collectively reduce the deficit from 1,485 rooms to 1,017 rooms—still leaving a significant deficit.
This project is a crucial part of a multi-year construction requirement to provide our unaccompanied enlisted personnel stationed at Osan Air Base with safe, adequate on-base housing. Housing our unaccompanied military members on-base improves the readiness of our forces in Korea and provides the force protection that the Air Force, Congress, and the American public demand.
Question. What is the design life of this dormitory project?
Answer. The facility is designed as permanent construction with a 25-year life before major repairs are needed.
Question. Why is this project required at this location, in addition to two other force protection/deficit dormitory projects funded at Osan by the Republic of Korea at $22,000,000?
Answer. This 156-room enlisted dormitory project is a crucial part of a multi-year construction requirement to provide our unaccompanied enlisted personnel stationed at Osan Air Base with safe, adequate on-base housing. Housing our unaccompanied military members on-base improves the readiness of our forces in Korea and provides the force protection that the Air Force, Congress, and the American public demand.
Page 692 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Osan Air Base has the largest shortage of on-base enlisted dormitory rooms of any Air Force location in the world. the fiscal year 1999 MILCON project and the two Korean-funded projects in calendar year 1998 and 1999 are all focused on reducing this significant shortfall. Each of these three projects constructs a 156-room dormitory and will collectively reduce the deficit from 1,485 rooms to 1,017 rooms—still leaving a significant deficit. All dormitory requirements and construction projects at Osan have been validated by the Air Force Dormitory Master Plan completed in August 1997. Our force structure at this primary overseas installation has stabilized.
Without Congressional support of the fiscal year 1999 MILCON project, we deny our airmen the adequate force protection, privacy, and quality of life they deserve. Sole reliance on Republic of Korea funding to buyout the dormitory deficit would take over 10 years—this is an unacceptable timeline. A prudent, and systematic investment plan, in concert with annual host nation funding, has been developed to resolve this shortfall at Osan in a reasonable timeframe.
Question. Outline the remaining dormitory program at Osan, beyond this U.S. funded project and the two Korea funded projects.
Answer. The following table depicts the remaining dormitory construction program at Osan Air Force Base beyond the fiscal year 1999 U.S. funded project and the two Korea funded projects. The table below includes planned projects for both U.S. MILCON funds and host nation (Republic of Korea) funds. All projects listed below provide new construction to buyout the significant room deficit at Osan Air Base, Korea. These projects enhance readiness and force protection and are required to provide our enlisted personnel safe, adequate on-base housing at one person per room.
Page 693 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Is there any plan to leave Osan within a ten-year timeframe?
Answer. There are no current plans for USAF units to leave Korea during the next ten years. Continuing tensions on the Korean peninsula and US military strategy require the stationing of USAF forces in Korea. North Korea still possesses a highly unpredictable threat and the continued forward positioning of North Korea's offensive capabilities on the South Korean border remains a source of concern. The credibility of US commitment to deter aggression is evidenced by the stationing of US forces and equipment in this region.
Turkey—Incirlik AB
CENTRAL SECURITY CONTROL FACILITY ($2,949,000)
Question. The personnel strength at Incirlik AB is programmed to come down from the current total of 3,541 to 2,723 at the end of fiscal year 2003, a reduction of nearly one-fourth. What particular concerns led to this project for ground defense of the base, in a semi-hardened facility that will be chemically and biologically protected?
Answer. The facility in question functions as the Base Defense Operations Center (BDOC) which is a command and control facility for base security and defense. It plans, directs, integrates and controls all base defense efforts. Although there is a projected reduction in force at Incirlik, this change will not reduce the force protection mission since the size of the base and number of critical resources will not change. The current BDOC is completely inadequate and does not meet operational base defense requirements for the following reasons:
Page 694 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
a. Due to limited space, there is no place for senior battle staff members to work when BDOC is activated, severely hampering mission accomplishment during emergency operations.
b. Due to limited space, key security force functions must be located up to 1/2 mile away, severely hampering dispatch of response forces during emergency operations.
c. Utilities are undersized and the existing armory portion is condemned. As always, command and control facilities are vulnerable to attack by weapons of mass destruction such as chemical, biological, or radiological ballistic or hand delivered weapons. Protection from these weapons systems can only enhance the overall force protection for the installation.
Question. What does the threat analysis show, as to the relative threat presented today by terrorist, Kurdish, and Iraqi threats?
Answer. Turkey continues its vigorous pursuit of several violent leftist and Islamic extremist groups, especially the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP/C), which are responsible for terrorism in Turkey. The PKK launches hundreds of attacks each year in Turkey, including indiscriminate bombings in areas frequented by Turkish and foreign civilians, as part of its campaign to establish a breakaway state in southeastern Turkey. For example, the group set off a bomb outside a cafe/grocery store in Izmir on 17 Sep 95, killing five and wounding 29. The PKK also continues its attempt to drive foreign tourists away from Turkey by attacking tourist sites. Moreover, the PKK continues to expand its activities in Western Europe, especially in Germany, where its members frequently extort money from Kurdish immigrants and attack ethnic Turks and Turkish commercial establishments. A successor to the Marxist/Leninist Devrimci Sol (Dev Sol) known as the DHKP/C and several Islamic extremist groups are active. Dev Sol was responsible for several anti-US attacks of the 1991 war, which resulted in the deaths of US persons. The DHKP/C continues to collect information on US citizens. The group's actions include taking over a restaurant in Istanbul, holding several civilians including three US tourists hostage. All of the hostages eventually were released unharmed. In early January 1998, DHKP/C terrorists were captured while planning to attack Incirlik AB with stand-off weapons. Loosely organized Islamic extremist groups, such as the Islamic Movement Organization and IBDA–C, continue to launch attacks against targets associated with Turkish official facilities and functions and may have been responsible for the attempted assassination of a prominent Jewish community leader in Ankara. Finally, Iraqi sponsored terrorist groups have the capability to conduct operations in Turkey against US interests.
Page 695 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Are Turkish military forces taking steps to increase perimeter security as U.S. forces draw down?
Answer. The Turkish Air Force (TAF) is continuing their effort to enhance perimeter security at Incirlik Air Base, but there is still much to be done. A new NATO perimeter fence is being installed and is approximately 90% complete. A recent security assessment of this fence by Air Force Office of Special Investigations personnel revealed numerous deficiencies that the 39th Wing Commander is addressing with the Turkish Installation Commander. Additionally, the TAF is replacing its conscript guard force with a professionally trained force—this effort has been in progress for more than a year and is not yet complete. To compliment the new security force, they are acquiring up-to-date security aids such as night vision devices, off-road vehicles, and hardening guard towers. The perimeter exterior is the responsibility of the Turkish Jandarma and the Turkish National Police. These agencies will respond to incidents along the fenceline.
Question. Why is this project not eligible for NATO funding? Has a precautionary prefinancing statement been submitted to NATO nonetheless?
Answer. This project is not eligible for NATO funding because, under NATO rules, security is a user-nation responsibility. Funding for facilities tied to security are not supported by NATO. However, a precautionary prefinancing statement will be submitted in the event the NATO criteria change.
United Kingdom
Page 696 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
RAF LAKENHEATH: DORMITORIES $15,838,000
RAF MILDENHALL: DORMITORIES $10,926,000
Question. Why are these two projects not eligible for NATO or host nation funding? Have precautionary prefinancing statements been submitted to NATO nonetheless?
Answer. Dormitory construction is not NATO eligible. NATO supports operational infrastructure at a minimum military requirement level for member nations. NATO does not fund non-operational requirements such as dormitories.
Precautionary prefinancing statements have not been submitted to NATO because these projects do not have a reasonable potential to become NATO eligible.
KC–135 SQ OPS/AMU FACILITY ($14,034,000)
Question. This project will collocate flyers and maintainers of aircraft at RAF Mildenhall. Will this complete the requirement for such facilities for support of the KC–135 aircraft assigned to RAF Mildenhall, and for the European Tanker Task Force?
Answer. This project nearly completes the requirement to collocate flyers and maintainers of KC–135 aircraft at RAF Mildenhall. An additional project required by the KC–135 mission is a flight simulator facility ($2.25M) programmed for future years. The flight simulator facility will provide an in-theater location for standard annual flying proficiency training, currently unavailable for KC–135 aircrews in USAFE.
Page 697 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Why is this project not eligible for NATO funding? Has a precautionary prefinancing statement been submitted to NATO nonetheless?
Answer. Air refueling missions are currently not eligible for NATO funding because NATO has been a fight-in-place theater in the past. Few member nations had the capability or requirement for air-to-air refueling; therefore, NATO chose not to support refueling missions for common funding. Under NATO's new mobility concept, air-to-air refueling requirements may become eligible for NATO funding in the future. A precautionary prefinancing statement is being submitted.
Worldwide Various Minor Construction
UNSPECIFIED MINOR CONSTRUCTION ($7,135,000)
Question. Provide for the record a ten year history of amounts that have been requested and appropriated for unspecified minor construction.
Answer. The active Air Force information follows:
Worldwide Various Planning and Design
PLANNING AND DESIGN ($35,592,000)
Page 698 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Will this funding level meet the known requirements for the fiscal year 1999 program, including the necessary work on projects programmed for fiscal years 2000 and 2001?
Answer. Yes, the funding level will meet known active Air Force MILCON project requirements.
PLANNING AND BUDGETING PROCESS
Question. Provide for the record the titles of those who served on the Military Construction Integrated Process Team in the planning and budgeting process that resulted in the fiscal year 1999 budget request.
Answer. The attached list identifies the organizations represented on the MILCON Integrated Process Team during development of the FY99 MILCON budget request. The representatives from these offices were program managers or program analysts unless otherwise indicated on the attachment.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Question. Describe in some detail the ''proven weighting matrix'' that was used in developing the budget.
Answer. The attached papers provide the details of the MILCON weighted scoring matrix used to produce the integrated MILCON priority list.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Page 699 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Provide for the record the list of all projects requested for the Air Force, the Air National Guard, and the Air Force Reserve, in the integrated priority order that was determined by the planning and budgeting process.
Answer. The FY99 MILCON project list, in integrated priority order, is attached.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Question. How many projects, with what total dollar value, were contained on the entire prioritized unconstrained list of all construction requirements?
Answer. The FY99 unconstrained, prioritized MILCON project list contained 231 projects with an estimated cost of $1.4B.
BARRACKS
Question. Provide for the record a chart that will show the Air Force's barracks construction program at the time the ''one plus one'' standard was approved, and the current program through completion, broken out by locations in the U.S., in Europe, and at other overseas locations.
Answer. The Air Force did not have a line-item dormitory construction program built at the time ''one plus one'' was approved in 1995. The Air Force plan in 1995 was based on a headquarters-level requirements analysis; it did not contain specific construction requirements. In 1995, the Air Force plan estimated that we would complete ''one plus one'' implementation worldwide (including host-nation funding) by the year 2019. After completion of the Dormitory Master Plan in August 1997, Air Force requirements have become better quantified. The Air Force goal is to buyout our permanent party central latrine dormitories by fiscal year 1999; the deficit and our most critical existing dormitories by fiscal year 2009. The following tables depict the Air Force's dormitory MILCON programs to buyout the deficit and replace our most critical dormitories starting with fiscal year 1996, the first year of ''one-plus-one'' dormitory construction. The fiscal year 1996 through fiscal year 1998 programs indicate appropriated MILCON projects. The fiscal year 1999 program depicts the Air Force's dormitory MILCON requirements included in the President's Budget. Beyond fiscal year 1999 are the projected dormitory MILCON projects outlined in the Air Force Dormitory Master Plan.
Page 700 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Projects with an asterisk (*) indicate Student or Recruit dormitories that are built to the ''Pipeline'' or Basic Military Training Student (BMTS) Construction Standard respectively. These dormitories are not built to the ''one-plus-one'' standard, which applies only to our permanent party airmen.
Dormitory Master Plan
Question. Submit for the record the executive summary and ''Appendix A'' of the Air Force Dormitory Master Plan dated August 1997.
Answer. The Executive Summary and ''Appendix A'' of the Air Force Dormitory Master Plan, dated August 1997, are attached per your request. Please note that all project costs shown in ''Appendix A'' are initial planning estimates only and are expressed in FY98 dollars. Costs shown are for to-level planning purposes and do not include project-specific site requirements such as additional infrastructure or unique site improvements.
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Family Housing Inventory
Question. Provide for the record a chart that will show the average number of family housing units supported for fiscal years 1996, 1997, and 1998, and those expected to be supported in fiscal year 1999, broken out into government owned (U.S. and foreign), leased (U.S. and foreign), and privatized under Public-Private Ventures.
Page 701 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer.
Privatization of Utility Systems
Question. Describe in some detail the Air Force's ongoing efforts to get out of the business of owning, operating, and maintaining utility systems where it makes good sense.
Answer. The Air Force was diligently pursuing the utility privatization concept and had an ongoing privatization program in place prior to issuance of the Defense Reform Initiative Directive on utilities privatization. We initiated 4 pilot projects last spring to test, evaluate and formalize a viable privatization process. These analyses are well underway:
The Air Force has 22 systems already privatized, and has identified over 240 systems at 88 bases as candidates for privatization that will be examined through FY06. We have also published a utilities privatization policy and guidance manual consolidating strategy, policy, roles and presenting the privatization process.
Question. Will these efforts eventually expand beyond water, wastewater, electric, and gas—to include telephone?
Answer. In addition to authority to convey water, wastewater, electric, and natural gas systems, the current authority also permits the Services to convey systems for the generation or supply of steam, hot water, and chilled water. The Air Force possesses many of these utility systems and intends to look at the potential of these systems for privatization, outsourcing or energy performance contracts. Telephone systems are not being examined for privatization at this time.
Page 702 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Are you seeking any legislative language to change existing authority?
Answer. At this time, we are not seeking any legislative language to change the recently approved conveyance authority.
Question. Can you document any savings or avoided costs, in net present value—or are costs merely being amortized through future rate payments?
Answer. It is premature to identify or document savings as the initiative is still in its infancy with only pilot project studies underway. As required by the conveyance authority, an economic analysis assessing economic viability will be conducted for each privatization initiative. Only if privatization is more economical than the status quo operation of the system will privatization be accomplished.
Public-Private Ventures in Family Housing
Question. Under current law, can the Air Force transfer Family Housing funds to the Military Personnel accounts? If not, what execution difficulties can you anticipate?
Answer. Current law only authorizes transfers of housing funds to the Family Housing Improvement Funds administered by the DOD Housing Revitalization Support Office. We do not anticipate execution difficulties as privatization initiatives are planned well enough in advance that funding can be programmed in the appropriate budget cycle to meet requirements in the Military Personnel accounts.
Page 703 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. In the preparation of this year's budget materials, have there been ''transfers in the estimates'' for fiscal year 1999, moving funds out of the family housing account and into the military personnel account?
Answer. No, there have been no transfers in estimates for fiscal year 1999. Air Force MFH Operations and Maintenance (O&M) funds have been retained in the MFH O&M account to continue funding key maintenance tasks to reduce our backlog of deferred maintenance.
Question. Submit for the record the FY 99–03 Defense Planning Guidance requirement with regard to using privatization as a tool to meet family housing needs.
Answer. The FY99–03 Defense Planning Guidance requires: ''The Military Departments will program to revitalize, divest through privatization, or demolish inadequate family housing by or before 2010,'' In addition: ''Components should . . . continue to leverage appropriated funds with private capital. Savings realized from leveraging resources with the private sector should be reinvested in housing projects instead of reducing programmed housing resources.''
Question. Current statutory authorities expire in February of 2001. Are Air Force efforts being paced with this ''sunset'' date in mind?
Answer. The Air Force has taken a measured approach to family housing privatization which will allow us to build solely on success. With increased experienced afforded by time, we expect to become more familiar and comfortable with authority application and may extend or increase as appropriate. Even with our moderate approach to housing privatization, the Air Force is pursuing 12 privatization initiatives through FY00. The Air Force is receptive to the extension of privatization authorities and is considering a FY00 legislative initiative to seek authority extension.
Page 704 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Child Development Centers Privatization Efforts
Question. The Navy and the Defense Logistics Agency are the executive agents for privatizing and outsourcing child development center services. What is the Air Force's involvement in following their lead, and in reviewing their findings and recommendations?
Answer. The Air Force is closely following the Navy's efforts as well as those of the Defense Logistics Agency to privatize and outsource child development center services and has reviewed all of the attempts that have been made since the 1980s. We have also provided information to the Rand Corporation which is reviewing all outsourcing efforts for DoD and the services. In addition, we recently hired a private contractor to study the feasibility of outsourcing the management and/or construction of a new facility at one of our bases. The contractor concluded that the most cost effective approach was for the Air Force to build and operate the center.
We will continue to monitor the Navy's efforts to see if any favorable results can be applied at those Air Force bases in large metropolitan areas where the private sector can meet our needs.
C–17 Depot Facilities
Question. Depot facilities at Kelly AFB were modified at a cost of $13.1 million, and Kelly AFB has now been realigned. What is the current plan for maintaining C–17s, and what is the timetable for determining a new location for this work?
Page 705 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. The Air Force recently awarded a contract for maintenance and repair support for the C–17 under a concept known as Flexible Sustainment. At the present time, the C–17 steady state workload is unknown, since the fleet is still increasing and maturing. The Air Force plans to review the C–17 flexible sustainment strategy with intent to make long term depot support decisions in 2003, approximately two years before the end of production.
BRAC Environmental Restoration
Question. Upon completion of the current Base Realignment and Closure program in the year 2001, under which account does the Air Force's Future Year Defense Program envision funding on-going environmental restoration for those locations?
Answer. On-going actions for environmental compliance will be funded in the Air Force Operations and Maintenance Account—Appropriation 3400. Actions for environmental installation restoration will be funded from the Air Force Environmental Restoration Fund—Appropriation 0603.
Aviano, Italy and Lakenheath, United Kingdom: Build-Lease
Question. Describe in some detail the build-lease proposal the Air Force is developing at Aviano and Lakenheath in order to drive down the largest family housing deficit in the Air Force, including the estimated cost and the timetable for execution.
Page 706 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. Aviano AB has no accompanied housing assets and supplements its housing needs through the Government Rental Housing Program which provides approximately 625 houses. Aviano AB's current Housing Market Analysis reflects a projected 533 housing unit deficit. RAF Lakenheath's projected housing deficit of 1882 houses is the largest in the Air Force. Both installations have seen recent mission changes with dramatic manpower increases but local housing markets which have not kept pace with the demand.
To address this shortage, USAFE, using build-lease authority, issued Requests for Proposal (RFP) to construct new housing units at various off-base locations by private developers. The new housing units will then be leased by the Air Force for 10 years with two 5-year renewal options. Developers will construct ''Italian and British-style'' houses while satisfying RFP amenity requirements. The result is housing appealing to both host nation and US families.
USAFE completed source selection at Aviano AB in Dec 97 and tentatively selected six offerors (four Italian and two American firms) to build 530 housing units on 16 separate estates in towns within a 35 minute commute from the base. Aviano AB estates range in size from 12 to 75 units with the average estate size being 33 units. Approximately 92% of the development will be townhouses with the remaining 8% being apartments (29% will be four-bedroom units, 52% three-bedroom units, and 19% two bedroom units). Over 55% of the units are within a 15 minute commute of the base, 33% are within a 25 minute commute, and 12% are within a 35 minute commute.
Source selection for RAF Lakenheath was completed in Jan 98. USAFE tentatively selected four offerors (three British and one joint US-British consortium) to build 518 housing units on 7 separate estates in towns within a 30 minute commute from the base. Estate sizes range from 11 to 125 units with the average estate size being 74 units. Approximately 50% of the development will be single-family homes, 28% will be duplex townhouses, and the remaining 22% being quadplex townhouses (36% will be four-bedroom units, 62% will be three-bedroom units, and 2% are two bedroom units). Over 20% of the units are within a 15 minute commute but all are within a 30 minute commute of the base.
Page 707 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The cumulative Net Present Value (NPV) cost to obtain 530 build-lease housing units at Aviano AB for the initial ten year lease period is $99.5M (including utilities and maintenance). RAF Lakenheath's estimated cumulative NPV cost to obtain 518 build-lease housing units for the initial ten year lease period is $91.8M (including utilities and maintenance). ''All-up'' costs are under the statutory cap applicable to 10 USC 2828 leases.
Execution schedules are contingent upon obtaining congressional approval to enter into the build-lease agreements. Final proposals were presented to The Civil Engineer, U.S. Air Force; the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Air Force, Installations (SAF/MII); and congressional staffers on 26 Feb 98. Formal SAF/MII approval and Congressional notification processes are expected in Mar 98. Project awards could begin as early as Apr 98 with occupancy estimated to start in the second quarter of FY99 with completion by the second quarter of FY00.
BRAC Environmental Restoration
Question. Is there a current estimate of the annual funding requirement beginning in fiscal year 2002?
Answer. The current funding estimate for Air Force BRAC environmental compliance/restoration is $101.6M for FY 2002, and $88.2M for FY 2003.
NATO Precautionary Prefinancing
Question. Submit for the record a copy of the precautionary prefinancing statements that have been submitted to the NATO infrastructure committees for each European project for which funds were appropriated for fiscal year 1998, and for each such project requested for fiscal year 1999. Provide an explanation for any project for which statements have not been submitted.
Page 708 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer.
Georgia—Robins AFB
B–1 WEAPONS RELEASE SYSTEMS AND LOAD CREW TRAINING FACILITY $3,250,000
Question. Provide for the record the entire program of construction requirements for beddown of the B–1 at Robins AFB, by fiscal year.
Answer. The following chart identifies the entire Air National Guard military construction program for the beddown of the B–1 at Robins AFB, GA. For projects in fiscal years 1994–1998, the appropriation amount is shown. Projects in fiscal years 1999–2004 reflect the programmed amount.
Question. Is the cost for demolition of the current facility, building 270, included in the cost of this project? Why, or why not—doesn't the building belong to the Air Force, not the Air National Guard?
Answer. The cost for demolishing building 270 is included in the cost estimate for this project. The Active Air Force host wing had scheduled this building for demolition prior to the Air National Guard (ANG) unit moving into it as an interim workaround. The host had already programmed operations and maintenance funds to dispose of this building and was ready to execute the project at the time of the ANG use. As a result, it was locally agreed that the ANG would demolish this building (to include funding the disposal) after moving out of it.
Page 709 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. Is building 270 in the footprint of this project?
Answer. Building 270 is not in the footprint of the proposed construction. It is located on the other side of the base and thus provides an ineffective and inefficient workaround for Air National Guard maintenance personnel.
Michigan—Alphena County Regional Airport
SANITARY SEWER LINES $3,900,000
Question. This project will connect the on-base sanitary sewer system to the county-owned sewage treatment plant, with estimated savings in manpower and operating costs of $250,000 per year. The county will take over the entire on-base and off-base system after this project is completed. Outline for us the history of this example of utilities privatization, including the analysis of annual costs before and after privatization.
Answer. Besides being almost 25 years old, the existing wastewater treatment plant is significantly undersized and violates Federal and State environmental compliance requirements. The State had issued a temporary operating permit contingent on completion of a permanent fix. New construction was the only option that would meet all operational and environmental requirements. The cost to replace the plant is estimated to be $2.5 million. Currently, the base expends $170,000 a year in operating costs and $100,000 annually in manpower costs (two personnel). No maintenance is being accomplished creating close to $900,000 in deferred requirements. By hooking into the off-base wastewater treatment system owned by the city, the annual costs to the base are expected to be $20,000, resulting in savings of $250,000 per year.
Page 710 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Michigan—Selfridge Air National Guard Base
REPLACE CONTROL TOWER AND RAPCON CENTER $5,200,000
Question. Describe for us in some detail the operations of a ''RAPCON'' center, and why it is desirable that the center should be collocated with the control tower.
Answer. RAPCON is the acronym for Radar Approach Control. This function is conducted in an air traffic control facility using radar and non-radar capabilities to provide approach control services to aircraft arriving, departing, or transiting airspace controlled by the facility. RAPCON is required for all Instrument Flight Rule (IFR) operations within that airspace. Collocation of RAPCON with the control tower is desirable and improves mission effectiveness and efficiencies.
Question. Does Selfridge have any civilian aircraft traffic?
Answer. Selfridge Air National Guard Base is fee property owned by the Air Force and licensed to the Michigan Air National Guard. Permanently based there are Air National Guard F–16 and C–130 aircraft, and Air Force Reserve KC–135 aircraft. It has no civilian aircraft traffic.
North Dakota—Hector Field
Page 711 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
REGIONAL FIRE TRAINING FACILITY $800,000
Question. Will this project meet all military fire training requirements at this location?
Answer. This project constructs the Air Force standardized crash fire rescue training facility, which provides all aircraft fire rescue training required for firefighters being trained at this facility. This project is not intended to support structural firefighter training, hazardous material training, confined space rescue training, or high-angle rescue training requirements.
Question. Will this project meet all environmental requirements?
Answer. The project meets all Federal and State environmental requirements. Unlike hydrocarbon liquid fuel training pits, this facility uses state-of-the-art technology that eliminates ground and groundwater pollution and produces little to no smoke pollution.
Question. Upon completion of this project, what fire training facilities will be decommissioned?
Answer. To meet Federal and State environmental statutes and regulations, the Air National Guard has already abandoned and closed most of its hydrocarbon liquid fuel training pits. The fire training pit at Portland International Airport, Oregon will be closed in the near future.
Page 712 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Question. How large a region will be served by this facility?
Answer. Besides training Air National Guard (ANG) firefighters in North Dakota, this facility will provide required annual training for ANG units in South Dakota, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Nevada, and Oregon. Located with the Regional Home Station Training Site, this facility will be utilized by firefighters deploying with their civil engineer units. The facility will also provide live fire testing during units' Air Force Operational Readiness Inspections.
Wisconsin—Volk Field
UPGRADE RUNWAY AND TAXIWAY $9,600,000
Question. Is it correct that Volk Field is not a joint use (civilian/military) airfield, and that this project meets a strict military requirement?
Answer. Volk Field is fee property owned by the Air Force and licensed to the Wisconsin Air National Guard. It is not a joint use civilian/military airfield and does not service any civilian aircraft traffic. Volk Field is one of the Air National Guard's Combat components, it provides a valuable training environment. As such, the Upgrade Runway and Taxiway project only supports a military requirement.
Alabama—Maxwell AFB
Page 713 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
CONSOLIDATED AIRCRAFT MAINTENANCE FACILITY $5,200,000
Question. The Future Years Defense Program for the Air Force Reserve includes twenty-one military construction projects for fiscal years 2000 and 2003. Describe for us why this Maxwell AFB project is the highest priority for funding in fiscal year 1999.
Answer. The project consolidates dispersed Air Force Reserve (AFR) aircraft maintenance functions into one location. Existing facilities have outdated mechanical, electrical, ventilation and fire protection systems, and require frequent maintenance and repairs. Without the project, the unit will have to continue working in antiquated, 50 year old facilities.
Question. Was the Air Force Reserve treated fairly by the Military Construction Integrated Process Team in the planning and budgeting process that resulted in the fiscal year 1999 budget request, or does the Reserve get outvoted by higher Air Force budget priorities and stiffer competition in Total Force prioritization of projects?
Answer. The Air Force Reserve (AFR) is an active participant in the Air Force Military Construction (MILCON) prioritization process. The AFR has a voting member at each level of the Air Force Board Structure; from the MILCON integrated process team (IPT) up through the Air Force Council.
The Air Force apportions its MILCON funds into two broad categories. First, certain projects or programs are considered ''must pay'' and command a significant share of the available MILCON. These projects are required for legal or treaty requirements, have Congressional interest, are directed by the SECAF or CSAF, or address fact-of-life issues. The remaining funds are apportioned by the MILCON IPT and approved by higher levels of the Air Force's corporate structure. The AFR, like all Air Force Major Commands (MAJCOMs), submits its total, unconstrained MILCON requirements to the MILCON IPT. The MILCON IPT, as objectively as possible, evaluates each project based on data and justification submitted by the MAJCOMs via DD Forms 1391. The IPT evaluation process employs a scoring matrix against which each project is judged. The scoring matrix gives relatively greater weight to certain criteria, such as force modernization and readiness/sustainability.
Page 714 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The AFR, as it happens, typically has few projects which qualify for either fenced monies or the high priority category of force modernization. We have completed most ''must pay'' environmental compliance projects and have very few new missions as compared to current (i.e., continuing) missions. Although we have lodging needs for our reservists, we have no permanent party dorms to qualify for monies fenced for that program. Thus, although the AFR is afforded the opportunity to present its current mission projects to the MILCON IPT, competition for these remaining unfenced funds is very stiff.
In an era of fewer resources and higher OPSTEMPO, we find that the same stresses which challenge the Air Force likewise challenge the Air Force Reserve. As a proud partner in the Total Force, we are capable of and willing to step up to the requirements levied upon us, and have always appreciated the support which Congress has given us to make that happen.
[CLERK'S NOTE.—End of questions for the record submitted by Chairman Packard.]
[CLERK'S NOTE.—Questions for the record submitted by Congressman Hobson.]
OHIO—WRIGHT-PATTERSON AFB: OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH CLINIC
Question. One project not included is the $3.7 million Occupational Health Clinic at Wright-Patterson. Construction of this new facility for the operations of Public Health, Occupational Medicine, and Bioenvironmental Engineering has been pending since 1987. When is it scheduled? Could it be accelerated into fiscal year 1999.
Page 715 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Answer. This project, currently estimated at $3.9M, is included in FY2000 in the DoD's Medical Military Construction Program and is planned to be submitted to Congress as part of the President's FY00/01 Biennial Budget. It was not included earlier due to higher priority projects. The project could be accelerated for an FY 1999 construction contract award.
Ohio—Wright-Patterson AFB: Air Force Museum
Question. I note that a $15 million addition to the Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson is programmed for fiscal year 2001. This important project has great public relations, recruiting, and archival benefit. How firm is this date?
Answer. Yes, the museum project is in the current FYDP at FY01, but it can be executed in FY01 or earlier. However, the Air Force will corporately reassess the FY01 MILCON program in the near future to develop a prioritized project list which meets its most urgent needs.
Wright-Patterson AFB—445th AFR Air Lift Wing
Question. The 445th Air Force Reserve Air Lift Wing has been selected by the Air Force to receive a simulator which will be used in training C–141 pilots. Installation will cost $1.6 million. However, the $1.6 million is neither in the budget or on the FYDP (Future Year Development Plan). Why? And, How can you help me help the Air Force Reserve?
Answer. The $1.6 million project to alter an existing hangar to house a C–141 simulator scheduled for July 1999 delivery is not in the Air Force Reserve's FY 1999 Budget Request or FYDP because the requirement was not known at the time of the budget submittal. When Congress inserted funds in the Air Force Reserve's FY 1998 program to purchase the simulator, it was assumed that existing space, with minor alterations, would be adequate. However, a facility survey, conducted after the FY 1999 budget request and FYDP was finalized by OSD, revealed the cost to alter Hangar 30152 would exceed both Operation and Maintenance and Unspecified Minor Construction limitations.
Page 716 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Had the Reserve known the scope of the facility alterations before the 30 September 1997 budget request and FYDP deadline to OSD, the project would have been submitted for consideration in the Air Force's integrated MILCON prioritization process to appear in the Reserve's FY 1999 budget request. Failing that, the Reserve would have included the project in the FYDP for FY 2000.
Due to the urgency of this project, the Air Force Reserve is trying to down scope the project to meet the $1.5 million limitation for Unspecified Minor Construction projects. If successful, the Reserve will use its limited FY 1999 Unspecified Minor Construction funds to alter Hangar 30152 to house the C–141 simulator. However, under this work around, necessary support functions such as offices, classrooms, and storage areas may have to be eliminated.
Springfield ANG Base—Civil Engineering Complex
Question. I understand that the Air Force recognizes the need to construct a Base Civil Engineering/Security Forces Complex for the Ohio Air National Guard 178th Wing at Springfield, Ohio. The $5 million project would correct safety, Americans with Disabilities Act, and quality of life deficiencies to meet mission requirements. Current facilities are temporary and substandard. Is this project designed? Is it in the five year plan.
Answer. The $5 million Base Engineer/Security Forces Complex project at Springfield-Beckley Municipal Airport is 35 percent design complete. This mission essential project is included in the Air National Guard's Future Year Defense Plan.
Page 717 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Springfield ANG Base—Munitions Storage Building
Question. Springfield would also like a Munitions storage building. However, this project cannot go forward until the City of Springfield, Ohio, provides additional land. Is this your understanding of the situation? How fast can this project move?
Answer. The current munitions maintenance and storage facilities at Springfield-Beckley Municipal Airport are antiquated and not adequately sized or configured. As such, they are not able to effectively support the 178th Fighter Wing's (178 FW) F–16 munitions requirements. A new munitions complex is estimated to cost $6 million and the Base Comprehensive Master Plan has identified a potential site on land owned by the City of Springfield. The city has yet to respond to a January 30, 1997 letter from the 178 FW requesting this area be added to the existing long-term Federal lease. Due to the real estate, weapons safety, and environmental timeliness involved, the project cannot be executed any earlier than fiscal year 2001.
[CLERK'S NOTE.—End of questions for the record submitted by Congressman Hobson.]
Thursday, February 26, 1998.
Statement of the Chairman
Mr. PACKARD. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. We will open this hearing and will be hearing from Members of Congress and from some other organizations—the National Military Family Association, the Fleet Reserve Association, and the Reserve Officers Association. We'll have several Members of Congress that will probably be at the beginning of our hearing.
Page 718 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
We want to welcome you here and we're looking forward to hearing what you have to say and what your requests are. This is the time when we do listen to the requests of several Members of the Congress.
Most of you know that the budget that has been submitted by the President has been significantly reduced from last year. It's about a 15-percent reduction from what we appropriated last year. We're concerned about that. We fully expect to perhaps increase the level of spending, but it depends a lot on what our allocation will be to this Subcommittee. But at any rate, we're looking forward to hearing what your concerns are with military facilities within your districts for Members of Congress and, of course, we're anxious to hear from the other organizations that I've just named.
Welcome, Mr. Olver, we appreciate your being here. Members of the Committee will arrive off and on during the morning, so we'll proceed with the hearing as scheduled and if, for any reason, the Members of Congress are delayed, we will move down to the organizations that are here.
We're very pleased to have Mr. Ed Whitfield with us, from Kentucky, and we'll have him as our first witness. He'll be followed by Mr. Bart Gordon, who I think is here.
STATEMENT OF HON. ED WHITFIELD, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF KENTUCKY
Mr. WHITFIELD. Chairman Packard, thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to be here and, Mr. Olver, I appreciate it very much. I'm delighted to hear that you're giving some consideration to trying to up funding because we feel like the military over the last eight or nine years has really been reduced in funding, but I would like to testify today in support of the FY 1999 military construction budget for the 101st Airborne Division, Air Assault, at Ft. Campbell, Kentucky.
Page 719 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I want to commend the entire Subcommittee for the support you continue to provide our soldiers, seamen, airmen and Marines throughout the United States, and I am especially grateful for your past support of the 101st Airborne Division, and certainly would like to invite all of you to visit Ft. Campbell and to observe first-hand how important your efforts have been to the 24,000 soldiers who are stationed there.
The President's FY 1999 military construction appropriations request contains $41 million for Phase I construction of a 336-person barracks complex for the 101st Division Support Command. The budget also recommends $15 million for an aircraft maintenance hangar for the 160th Special Operations Command co-located at Ft. Campbell and $5.435 million for the Kentucky National Guard Training Center in Greenville, Kentucky. Your strong support for these three budget requests would certainly be appreciated.
In addition to the $41 million for barracks construction, there are several other mission support and family housing projects I would like to see funded that were not included in the President's request. All of these projects, however, are included in the Army's five-year plan for construction at Ft. Campbell.
The number one priority of the Division is the construction of a new helicopter runway, parallel taxiway, refueling helipad and extension of existing aircraft parking aprons at the SABRE Army Heliport. The total cost of the project is $16.5 million and will include the necessary operational instrumentation and lighting, as well as the purchase of either a navigational easement or property in fee for the approach pattern.
Page 720 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The second request is for $14.5 million to construct a Military Operations Urban Terrain Training Center complex using the latest available technology in targetry, automated scoring systems, special effects, after-review video techniques, mock buildings and structures. The entire complex will include 33 buildings, 17 of which will be full-sized. These ''mock cities'', as you know, are being used throughout the military today and are a valuable multi-purpose training tool used by combat units throughout the services.
There are currently no existing facilities at Ft. Campbell to effectively simulate urban terrain combat operations. The new complex would provide training for all units of the 101st, the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, the 5th Special Forces, as well as National Guard and Reserve units.
The third request is your approval of funds to construct a vehicle maintenance facility for the 129th Corps Support Battalion totaling $13.2 million. This complex includes a vehicle maintenance shop, deployment storage, petroleum, oil and lubricant storage, sentry station, and hardstand for organizational vehicle parking. It would replace the eleven World War II buildings totaling 53,675 square feet which currently house these functions. The current structures are unsafe and totally inefficient from both an operational and environmental standpoint.
Finally, knowing of this Subcommittee's strong support for the well being of our soldiers and their families, I request your support for $10.2 million to complete the renovation of the final 26 company-grade family housing units at Werner Park and to begin a two-phase revitalization of the company-grade family housing complex at Gardner Hills. The first phase would provide for renovations and improvements to 70 of the 232 total units. $2.67 million is needed to complete the upgrades at Werner Park—last year $8.5 was requested, $6 was appropriated, so there is still $2.67 million to go—and then $7.53 million to complete Phase I of the Gardner Hills project.
Page 721 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, the projects listed here today and the order in which they were presented have the complete support of our new Commanding General at Ft. Campbell, Major General Robert Clark, as well as the complete support of the surrounding civilian communities.
I for one believe the President's military construction budget request is woefully inadequate in terms of meeting both the construction and family housing needs of our armed forces. I will continue to support your efforts to correct the funding deficiencies this budget fails to address, and I ask for your continued support of the 101st Airborne Division and Ft. Campbell throughout this process.
Mr. Hefner came in a little bit late and I certainly want to offer my special thanks for the many years that you've served in providing leadership in this Subcommittee for our military services, and I want to wish you the very best in your future endeavors.
Mr. Chairman, thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to be here this morning.
[Prepared statement of Hon. Ed Whitfield follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much. We want to welcome Mr. Hefner and Mr. Wamp and, of course, the Honorable Steny Hoyer, we're very delighted to have you here.
Page 722 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. HOYER. Delighted to be here.
Mr. PACKARD. Any questions of Mr. Whitfield?
Only one. Did I understand you to say that these are listed in the order of priority?
Mr. WHITFIELD. Yes, sir.
Mr. PACKARD. The way you presented them.
Mr. WHITFIELD. Yes, sir.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much.
Mr. WHITFIELD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. PACKARD. Mr. Bart Gordon from Tennessee is our next witness. By the way, for the benefit of those who are already here, I have reviewed your testimony and you need not read the entire testimony. If you would like to summarize, it would be appreciated.
STATEMENT OF HON. BART GORDON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TENNESSEE
Page 723 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. GORDON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and Ranking almost gone Member.
Mr. HOYER. He's here at markups, Bart.
Mr. GORDON. Yes, he's here. We're proud of you for a little bit longer, anyway.
Mr. Olver, Mr. Wamp, and I guess semi-Ex Officio Mr. Hoyer, this is my third year to be before you on this particular issue, so I will be brief. I will just remind you that here are my remarks.
In 1970, the old Sewart Air Force Base in my home county of Rutherford was closed. It was really the last of the base closings until this more recent series. Since that time, the property has been turned over to a local airport authority, to the National Guard, and to the Corps of Engineers.
The Guard has a training facility there, of which our brethren John Tanner and Bob Clement both trained there. They have horrible barracks facilities, of which I want to submit to you photographs, which I have done in the past.
[The information follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
These are 1942 era barracks that have asbestos floors, have 80-percent termite damage, and have 30-year-old plumbing, so it really is a problem there. They are so bad that most of the trainees—you know, obviously, they can't stay there—and so the Guard is having to pay for them staying in motels nearby. So, we're spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay for folks that can't stay in this dorm.
Page 724 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
This is a $3 million proposal. The dorm will be used not only for the Guard, but also Middle Tennessee State University has some training programs there as well as the Tennessee Police Institute. So, by renting the barracks out to these other individuals and groups when it is not being used by the Guard allows them to get the money then to take care of the maintenance. So I think it's very cost-effective because it will stand on its own, we won't have to be spending money to house these Guardsmen in other places, the National Guard—and I have a letter here that says this is their number one priority in Tennessee behind their leased facilities which they are required to address.
I also have a letter here from John Tanner and Bob Clement pleading for better accommodations, and I will submit that for the record and say once again, I think this is a cost-effective facility, something that needs to be done, and I hope that the good graces of this committee can smile on it this time.
[Prepared statement of Hon. Bart Gordon follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Maybe the third time will be the charm.
Any questions of Mr. Gordon?
Mr. HEFNER. Is this in the President's request?
Mr. GORDON. No.
Page 725 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. HEFNER. I remember it hasn't been too many years, we didn't have any outside witnesses come before this committee. It's always good to have the Members come and set their priorities. As you well know, with the agreements being reached on the budget and what have you, we have no idea how much money we're going to receive. We're going to have to come up with billpayers, unlike in years past.
We had an interesting meeting with some members of the Guard the other day, and I think you have a good case. Some of the people you mentioned as backup support, I'm not so sure about that, but we're going to try to do everything we can to support these projects. Three times is a long time to work at it.
Mr. GORDON. I fully recognize that you've got limited resources and, again, I come here hopefully with some bit of reasonableness knowing that, in that we're spending money—I mean, these things can be paid for by virtue of not having to pay outside hotels. And, again, we're not going to see any additional expense for the annual upkeep. So I think it really is a cost-effective, and I think that that's what we have to do. I mean, as Members, we have to recognize your position and try to bring you reasonable suggestions and projects, and I hope we've done this in that way.
Mr. WAMP. Mr. Chairman, I just want to add briefly, Mr. Gordon, what he's done is he's paying attention to congressional delegation, and he has been very patient. And this is only my second year on the Subcommittee, but last year he didn't go away pleased, but he didn't go away mad, and he's back here again this year with patience, and it's a virtue. And I just want to encourage our consideration of this particular request. Last year we had other requests of this Committee that I think took precedent, and in terms of the limited resources that we had, facing the veto, et cetera, et cetera. But I also want to point out that Ft. Campbell, being on the border of Tennessee and Kentucky, is also important, and I know that Representative Whitfield came in here just a moment ago with a list of items. This is a single request in Smyrna, and I hope we will give it favorable consideration this year. And I want to commend Representative Gordon for the way that he conducts himself and, frankly, from the Tennessee delegation's perspective, we really, really want to throw our weight behind this year.
Page 726 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. GORDON. Number one priority of the National Guard.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much for your testimony.
We're delighted to have two of our fine Members from New Jersey, Mr. Frank Pallone and Mr. Michael Pappas, and we'd like to have both of you come forward. And, again, we'd encourage you to summarize if you can.
STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK PALLONE, JR., A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY
Mr. PALLONE. Thank you, and thank you to the other Members of the Committee. Mr. Pappas and myself are pretty much arguing for the same thing here today, and I have a statement a full statement for the record which I would like to submit, and I'm just going to summarize it briefly.
Let me say we are basically talking about two bases that are in our district that basically we share. One is the Naval Weapons Station Earle and the other is Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, and we have several requests before the Subcommittee.
I just wanted to talk in detail with regard to Earle, about one of the projects. Earle is the only major surface fleet presence north of Norfolk, Virginia, and right now we have 36 percent of the East Coast's Naval Weapon Stations' explosive storage capacity. We're actually increasing ships. There's going to be another three AOE-class ships coming this summer that will be homeported, at Earle, bringing the total to four. And I'm not going to go into all the details about why Earle is so important. We know it is, the Navy knows it is. The main reason is we need a berthing pier replacement for Piers 2 and 3 at Earle in order to be able to accommodate this increased capacity, the new ships that are coming in as well as the old ones.
Page 727 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Right now, those piers were constructed in 1944 and they really haven't had any major renovation since then. We're asking essentially for $85 million in order to replace these piers. They are in very deteriorated condition, in desperate need of repairs. We talked about them before before the Members of the Subcommittee. I'm sure some of you are probably tired of me talking about it, but the need is there. It's an immediate need.
I'm just going to list the other requests for Earle. One is for an explosive truck holding yard, that's an $8 million project; security improvements which are $1.25 million, and other things that would improve the quality of life for the sailors at Earle which we detailed are about $3 million and, again, I'm not going to get into the details of that.
There is a Pier Club, there is a recreation center that's needed, and the Committee will go into these as we proceed over the next couple of months.
With regard to Fort Monmouth, again, Fort Monmouth is the headquarters of the Communications and Electronics Command, CECOM, worldwide. It's missions are very high-tech oriented to provide command, control, communication, computer and information technology for the battlefield, very important base with regard to the Persian Gulf and the things that we've been doing there and will continue to do there.
The most important priority there is the Software Engineering Center addition which would cost $14 million. Again, in order to keep up with the state-of-the-art in the communications field. That is really needed. It basically is additional computer labs and a number of other things.
Page 728 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I'm just going to list the other things that we would like to see. We need a transportation study because as a result of BRAC, all missions have been consolidated at the main post of Fort Monmouth, and traffic congestion has greatly increased. So we'd like to do a study about what could be done to improve the traffic situation there. I know that we have Barbara Freeholder and the Mayor of Eatontown who is here today with us, who have been concerned about that for sometime and talked about the transportation need; also walkway connectors to link the various facilities at CECOM. And I'm going to end with that and turn it over to my colleague who has been joining me on these issues. We have a committee that we work with at the base that Congressman Pappas and I co-chair.
[Prepared statement of Hon. Frank Pallone follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you.
Mr. Pappas?
STATEMENT OF HON. MICHAEL PAPPAS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY
Mr. PAPPAS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Hefner, and Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for hearing us. I want to echo everything that my colleague, Mr. Pallone, has said. And for your benefit, Mr. Chairman, the gentleman sitting behind me to my left, Mr. Ed Staminsky, the Mayor of Eatontown, is also a member of the county governing body of the county that had a community that was interested in that HUD and illegal immigrant displacement issue, so he knows who Ron Packard is.
Page 729 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I want to thank you folks for hearing us. I want to echo, as I said, what Mr. Pallone has spoken about. The work on Pier 2 I think is pretty significant in that this is, I believe, the only pier of its kind on the East Coast. The other piers are in good condition and are properly able to serve ships, but Pier 2 does need to be replaced.
The other projects that Mr. Pallone mentioned in reference to Earle I concur with, and urge your serious consideration.
With regard to Fort Monmouth, I serve on the Research and Development Subcommittee of National Security, so I'm keenly aware of its importance to our infrastructure and that it is really considered by many to be ground zero of our nation's intent to modernize for the battlefield of the 21st century.
The addition to the building at Fort Monmouth for the Software Engineering Center is important. Modernization for telecommunications infrastructure to the tune of $28.5 million is a request that has come before this Committee before, and just to elaborate a bit upon the need to improve the road system leading to the Fort, Mr. Pallone has requested, and I certainly concur with, funds for a study, but I'd go a step further. I had the engineer for the county in that area put together a proposal, and I would even request in excess of $500,000 to the tune of $5 million for all of the road improvements that he feels is necessary to minimize the impact on the quality of life for the military personnel that live in that area as well as the nonmilitary personnel. As we all know, quality of life issues are very important to our military, and I know that this Subcommittee has been paying particular attention to those quality of life issues as they relate to the ability that our services have to retain personnel, and I believe that that's very important.
Page 730 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
In our country, each of the 50 states benefits from our military's ability to do its job. New Jersey, because of its location geographically and some of the facilities that we have, and we've just spoken of two but there are others in our state that are each very, very unique, and we certainly hope that this Committee would favorably look upon the request that we're making, not just Mr. Pallone and I, but the others from our State's delegation because at times when we've looked at where the funding has gone, New Jersey, while we appreciate the support that you've given us, we think deserves a little bit more consideration based upon what has taken place elsewhere. I thank you for your consideration.
[Prepared statement of Hon. Michael Pappas follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much, Mr. Pallone and Mr. Pappas. And welcome to all of those who have accompanied you here from your state. Mr. Mayor, I want you to know that Mr. Pappas was probably the most active in getting the loophole closed on the illegal alien issue. We appreciated his efforts.
Any questions by members of the Committee?
Mr. HEFNER. No questions. I remember this from last year.
Mr. PACKARD. I have one. The $85 million request for the berthing pier, can that be phased? It will be very difficult to fund any project at the full $85 million level in one budget year.
Page 731 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PALLONE. I think the answer is yes. I mean, obviously, we'd prefer if we had it all up front, but I think the answer is yes. Clearly we could work something out.
Mr. PACKARD. Any other questions?
[No response.]
Mr. PACKARD. I didn't mention the arrival of Mr. Hobson, David Hobson. We deeply appreciate him being here again this morning.
If there's no further questions, thank you very much.
Mr. Beureuter is next on the agenda. I saw you come in. How are you, Doug, it's a pleasure to have you here from Nebraska. We're looking forward to and hope that you would summarize your statement. We all have your statement and it will be entered into the record.
STATEMENT OF HON. DOUG BEREUTER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEBRASKA
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Congressman Hefner, and Members of the Committee. It's a pleasure to address the Subcommittee this morning. I come here to express my support for two projects in my congressional district but actually serve the entire state, that were not included in the Administration's Military Construction Appropriations request for Fiscal Year 1999, but are nonetheless meritorious and deserving of the Subcommittee's attention.
Page 732 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
As you may remember, my colleagues, I was disappointed that these two projects were not included for the current fiscal year. These are very worthy Nebraska Army and Air National Guard projects that will significantly improve the operational readiness, cohesiveness, and morale of the National Guard units to our state. As you may recall, many worthy construction projects were not properly advanced last year by the National Guard Bureau.
I want to point out that these two projects are the first military construction projects on which I have made a request as the primary congressional sponsor since I entered Congress in 1979. So, if Mr. Wamp is right that patience is a virtue, then you can draw the conclusions on that.
Mr. PACKARD. You are a very virtuous man.
Mr. BEREUTER. That is to say, to my knowledge, I have not initiated a request for previous military construction projects during my entire congressional service. In short, I think I have great justification for some favorable consideration on these requests, but I know you have a tough job, as always.
The first of these projects is a joint Air-Army National Guard Medical Training Facility to replace an antiquated Korean War-era facility currently in use on the Lincoln Headquarters base for both elements of the Guard. The existing clinic is inaccessible, undersized, and housed in a converted warehouse with a high-lead-content water distribution system and asbestos. It is inadequate in size.
Page 733 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. Chairman, the existing center is ill-suited to the Guard's training mission and basic physical and dental care and lab work. There are not enough examination rooms, the clinic lab is little more than a small apartment-sized kitchen. The National Guard units are unable to use additional basic diagnostic equipment because of the lack of space.
Frankly, I am concerned about the health hazard the existing clinic itself poses to our National Guard personnel. Unless a new facility is constructed, training of Army and Air National Guard units will continue to suffer.
Currently the Air National Guard is flying many missions into Bosnia all the time with the tankers they have. They are constantly in the air, it seems, much more than when they had a RF4 responsibility.
I also think you've gotten, as taxpayers, more than your money's worth at this cobbled together kind of facility that they've been using for some 30-plus years.
The other project is a relatively small one, $1.1 million, but it is for a baffled rifle and pistol qualification range. The current one in use by the National Guard in the state was shut down a couple of years ago because they couldn't protect the civilians across the river. And so these units now are traveling to Fort Riley, Kansas, generally 75–200 miles away for personnel in the closest parts of Nebraska, or to the Hastings Training area, a distance of 90 miles from Lincoln, 200-plus miles from northeast Nebraska, and larger mileage away from some other parts of the state. So we're cutting into training time with this unproductive transit and it's expensive as well.
Page 734 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The new range will support all units of the Nebraska Army National Guard to accomplish necessary combat weapons training and qualification.
Mr. Chairman, while I recognize the budgetary constraints under which we operate, the projects I have just mentioned are important to the health, morale, and operational readiness of thousands of National Guard personnel.
I would also mention, Mr. Chairman, there are no Nebraska National Guard projects in the current budget request or the Fiscal Year 1997 program, so I don't think we can be accused of asking for more than our fair share. I would be happy to provide any additional information or try to respond to the questions of the Members of the Committee here today. Thank you.
[Prepared statement of Hon. Doug Bereuter follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you, Mr. Bereuter. You make a very persuasive statement. Is the Army and the Air Guard facilities one and the same?
Mr. BEREUTER. Yes. It would be divided on a 53–47 percent cost-share basis per square foot.
Mr. PACKARD. But they occupy the same facilities?
Mr. BEREUTER. They do.
Page 735 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. They would be using the same medical facilities jointly.
Mr. BEREUTER. Yes, they would, under a new proposal as well. So that does make it a little unique and you need coordination between those elements of the Guard.
Mr. PACKARD. Is your first and second request in order of their priority?
Mr. BEREUTER. They are, medical first, baffled rifle range second.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much. Any other questions by Members of the Committee?
Mr. HEFNER. No questions.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. May I say additionally that I visited Ford Island and Pearl Harbor shortly after your visit. I'm very much impressed with the plans for private-public construction there. I want to be helpful in that as part of my responsibility on the Asian Pacific Subcommittee. Call on me for help.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you. It was a very interesting proposal.
Page 736 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. BEREUTER. Yes, it is.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much.
Representative Darlene Hooley from Oregon. We appreciate your being here on schedule, and we have your statement and it will be entered into the record. If you would like to summarize, we'd appreciate it.
STATEMENT OF HON. DARLENE HOOLEY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF OREGON
Ms. HOOLEY. Thank you. I'm delighted to be here. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee. I appreciate the opportunity to be here today.
I represent the Fifth District in Oregon and, as many of you know, Oregon does not have an enormous number of military installations or defense manufacturing. However, we have some very high priority National Guard units stationed in Salem that serve as a critical force support unit during a presidential call-up.
Oregon has also suffered from a lot of natural disasters. Just in 1996 alone we had three major floods where we called for deployment of the Guards, and in that same year in August, with hot temperatures and dry conditions and high winds, we had wildfires that destroyed more than half a million acres of forest and grasslands in the state, again requiring Guard deployment.
Page 737 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
In addition, my district sits on a volcanic range that is now overdue to erupt in what may be one of the most powerful series of earthquakes or tsunamis in history. In 1993, Oregon had a couple of earthquakes.
So, despite these wideranging natural disasters that continue to plague our state, Oregon's emergency management system continues to operate out of inadequate facilities that contribute to inefficiency and delays. And although our emergency personnel, including Oregon Guardsmen—and by the way, I have to tell you, in my state, because of our disasters, everybody loves the Guard. I mean, they are sort of the saviors out there. They have worked admirably well even though they have had inadequate tools to do their job.
The reason I'm here today to talk about this project is the beauty of this project is it brings together the Oregon National Guard, it brings together the Oregon State Police and the Office of Emergency Management so that you have three groups dealing with disasters all in adequate facilities, housed under the same roof. What that will do is allow them to respond to any disaster in a much quicker order.
The center that we're talking about would also serve as the primary headquarters for the National Guard's 1249 Combat Engineer Battalion, which is Force Support Package 2 unit, the highest priority unit in the state. The current headquarters, which was built in 1958 for a unit half the size, is very inadequate. Its location provides no staging area for the battalion and is not coupled with the Department of State Police and the Office of Emergency Management.
If we could move the 1249 into this headquarters, the Guards would be able to close another aging armory ultimately saving some operation and maintenance funds. As I said, Oregon's emergency management is also in cramped space. Again, this proposal has been designed. It's 117,000 square feet. It's been included in the Defense Department's Future Year Defense Plan. Unfortunately, it has failed to move up in the Guard Bureau's queue for funding, although a number of other projects have been funded.
Page 738 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The reason this project is immediately important to the State of Oregon, first of all, the Army is currently preparing to incinerate chemical weapons stockpiles and, although we have an emergency preparedness program in development, this facility would aid in the implementation of the emergency plan to ensure public safety.
Second, as the West Coast continues to suffer the effects of extreme weather, we must be better prepared to deal with those disasters.
Finally, in the event of a military deployment, it is essential that the facility be equipped to appropriately prepare the 1249 Battalion for mobilization. Furthermore, this facility would allow Oregon's National Guard to fully implement the National Defense Panel's recommendation that the National Guard and the Army Reserve take the lead in preparing for an attack using weapons of mass destruction.
We're asking for $12.1 million to complete this project. Oregon's legislature has already appropriated their share, $3.5, and I emphasis again, the reason it's important this year is it allows us to have an opportunity to take three partners and put them together under one roof. And I am afraid if we don't fund it this year, we are going to lose that opportunity, so that's why it's important.
This project was included in last year's Senate bill, we were not able to get it marked up in the House bill, but I hope you will be able to include it this year.
Again, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate your time and your listening to me, and I would be happy to answer any questions that you might have.
Page 739 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
[Prepared statement of Hon. Darlene Hooley follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much, Ms. Hooley. Are there any questions?
Mr. OLVER. I have one.
Mr. PACKARD. Mr. Olver.
Mr. OLVER. The 1249 Battalion, that's an Army Guard?
Ms. HOOLEY. Yes.
Mr. OLVER. As is the 41st Enhanced Infantry Brigade is Army.
Ms. HOOLEY. Yes.
Mr. OLVER. And it is a statewide National Guard headquarters, so it would be the headquarters function for both the—it is only Guard—this is only Guard function.
Ms. HOOLEY. Right.
Page 740 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. OLVER. But Air Guard headquarters would be out of the same complex along with Army Guard statewide headquarters as well as the headquarters for these two Army Guard units, is that right?
Ms. HOOLEY. Right.
Mr. OLVER. How many total people are there in the two units?
Ms. HOOLEY. 1200.
Mr. OLVER. Thank you.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much, appreciate your attendance and your testimony.
We're pleased to have now Mr. Peter Visclosky with us as our next witness from Indiana. We have your statement, Mr. Visclosky, and it will be entered into the record. It's relatively short, so if you wish to either read or summarize, you're welcome to do whatever.
STATEMENT OF HON. PETER J. VISCLOSKY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF INDIANA
Mr. VISCLOSKY. Mr. Chairman, I don't. I simply appreciate the opportunity to come before you and Mr. Hefner and Mr. Olver and the other Members of the Subcommittee, to emphasize to you that I am very concerned about the quality of water in the current system at Camp Atterbury, Indiana. The Members of the Committee and the staff have been very good to work with in the past. We would anticipate working with you in the future as far as ordering your priorities, given the tremendous pressure you have been under.
Page 741 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I would simply add that I want to really congratulate the Subcommittee for your extraordinary efforts on behalf of the quality of life for all the men and women in the United States Armed Forces.
[Prepared statement of Hon. Peter J. Visclosky follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. And you are requesting $6.7 million over the President's budget request.
Mr. VISCLOSKY. Yes, sir. We would appreciate your kind consideration.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much.
Chris Smith, from New Jersey. We've already heard from two of your colleagues from New Jersey. We want to welcome you and, again, we have your written testimony.
STATEMENT OF HON. CHRIS SMITH, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY
Mr. SMITH. Mr. Chairman, I am again appearing before your Subcommittee to ask for help on an API lab. The lab, known as MILCON P–208, would be for the Naval Air Warfare Center in Lakehurst, New Jersey.
Page 742 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I think it should be underscored and stressed that this lab, a super lab, if you will, that consolidates functions throughout Lakehurst for the arresting gear, the launch and recovery of our aircraft. It is a one of a kind facility, the only facility in the world that does this kind of work.
This would have been up and running had it not been for two BRACs that had Lakehurst on the list, and most recently the last BRAC, by a vote of 7-to-1, the BRAC strongly affirmed that Lakehurst, because of its unique mission, needs to be continued. So this MILCON, frankly, is something that should have been done yesterday.
The Navy itself—and I have letters from all of the appropriate, from Rear Admiral Smith to Vice Admiral Lockard, strongly urging that this be part of our military construction. The target year is now the year 2000. For the last decade, we've seen those years slip every time because of some other extraneous—in the case of BRAC, it just put it off completely. So we're hoping that best case, put it in the Fiscal Year 1999 budget, at least engineering money and some design money that might be put forward in the year 1999, and then stay on track for the year 2000, as the Navy says it would like it to be.
I know last year you were under some constraints of no new labs. The hope is that this lab, which again is a decade late in being constructed, be done as soon as possible, preferably in the year 1999.
[Prepared statement of Hon. Chris Smith follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Page 743 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much for your testimony. This is on the five-year development plan, to your knowledge, and scheduled for the year 2000?
Mr. SMITH. Scheduled for the year 2000, it's one of the top five priorities of NAVAIR. So, in terms of all of their types of scoring, it's right at the top of the list. But I'm asking that this Subcommittee consider an extra boost because we've had one delay not of our making for the last decade, namely, being on two BRACs, on hit lists.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you, Questions?
Mr. HEFNER. No questions.
Mr. SMITH. I would ask, Mr. Chairman, as well, if these letters from these distinguished Admirals be made a part of the record.
Mr. PACKARD. They will be a part of the record.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you, Mr. Smith.
We're pleased to have now Mr. Sam Farr, one of my colleagues from California. We're pleased to have you before the Subcommittee, Sam, and you have a relatively short statement. You can either summarize or read it.
Page 744 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
STATEMENT OF HON. SAM FARR, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Mr. FARR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I will summarize. I represent a lot of military interests, as you know. Fort Hunter, which is one of the fifth largest properties in the country, the Defense Language Institute, the Naval Post Graduate School, the Coast Guard Center, the Fleet Weather Station, and Fort Ord was the largest base closed in the smallest area in the history of a BRAC closing, and I've never been before this Committee, but I come before you today because the issue is vitally important.
The Defense Language Institute is on the Presidio of Monterey, which is the oldest active military property in the United States. You'd think it would be on the East Coast, but it's actually in California. It was a Spanish Presidio before.
In that, we have the largest language school in the world. It's a military language school called the Defense Language Institute. It's run by the Army TRADOC. That language school is, at this moment, if you look at that map, is teaching 21 languages around the world to 3,000 military students. It also has the capability and is doing video teletraining. What they do is they train students here in Washington. They train people in the Gulf. They train people on the Sinai Peninsula. Frankly, this is a school that is our military intelligence training. The people who go through that school are probably housed in every classroom, linguist classroom in your district, in any district of any Member on this Committee because 80 percent of the language teachers in America have come through the Defense Language Institute. So, it's in our national security.
Page 745 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
What the school needs, because it's got all these old buildings, it's got a shortage of space to build what they need as a video training facility. At present, there are seven teletraining studios in temporary studios which have been created out of existing classrooms, and we have increased the workload of that school from a little over 2,000 last year to almost 4,000 by the end of this year. So, the military services realize that language training is in their keen interest, and it's interesting the Marines have been sending the largest delegation. First ashore seems to know that they want to be able to speak the language of the place they're going to.
The studios are not equipped with proper lighting, insulation, or network capability for teletraining, and they cannot be expanded. The space they occupy is desperately needed for its original purpose, classroom instruction, so we just have this incredible cramping. And at a cost of $1.35 million, this really would be more cost-effective than leasing space off-post.
TRADOC made this the highest priority to construct, although it didn't make the final cut list of the Army, and that's why I'm here today. I think that's why we have this Committee to be able to look at the Administration's recommendations and to give some political priority to them where you feel it's competent.
I'm just here to ask your support in light of what's going on in the world today, that we need to have a video training facility. This is a teletraining facility, this doesn't just do it for the people there, this does it for anybody, and what this school does so well is, after you are a student there, they keep in touch with you and update your skills all the time, so you don't have to go back to Monterey to do it, you can pick up these updating skills here in Washington, you can do it anywhere in the world that they can do the teletraining, but they need a facility on-base to do that, a state-of-the-art facility, and that's why I'm here asking for your help in getting that for us. And the rest is in the submitted testimony.
Page 746 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
[Prepared statement of Hon. Sam Farr follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much. Is there a question?
Mr. HEFNER. I have no questions.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you, Mr. Farr.
Mr. FARR. Look forward to working with you.
Mr. PACKARD. I did not see any other members come in, so we will proceed with the National Military Family Association, if you would like to come forward, please.
Again, we have your testimony, I've reviewed it, and if you would like to summarize, we'd appreciate it.
STATEMENT OF JOYCE RAEZER, SENIOR ISSUES SPECIALIST, ISSUES AFFECTING MILITARY FAMILIES, NATIONAL MILITARY FAMILY ASSOCIATION
Ms. RAEZER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. NMFA, as usual, is most grateful to you and all the Members of the Subcommittee for their steadfast support for the military. We can't show you all the fruits of your labors over the years, but we have included in Attachment 1 of our written statement, pictures of the groundbreaking of the new child development center in Darmstadt, Germany. Funds for this project were added to the Fiscal Year 1996 budget by this Subcommittee.
Page 747 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I'd like to take a moment, Mr. Chairman, just to thank Representative Hefner on behalf of NMFA for his many years as one of the military family's best friends. We will miss him and wish you well in your future endeavors.
Mr. Chairman, NMFA supports the construction request in the Department of Defense's Fiscal Year 1999 budget, especially for DOD schools. We also wish to associate ourselves firmly with the eloquent words in your press release of February 12, 1998—military families do not understand how senior leaders can say that adequate and affordable housing is a high priority and yet requests that so little be done to ameliorate the current deplorable situation.
Of particular concern to NMFA is the deficit in funding for repair and maintenance of government family housing. Families are resigned to hearing that routine maintenance and repairs can't be done because there's no money. What disturbs them, however, is when installations don't seem to have the resources to repair potentially dangerous problems, such as the glowing electrical outlet that we describe in our statement. The Marine whose wife has lived with this glowing outlet in her kitchen since October is presently deployed to Japan from his home base in Beaufort, South Carolina. His wife is the key wife coordinator for the squadron. She needs her computer and phone hookup for e-mail contact with the squadron's family readiness officer and for emergency contact between Beaufort and Japan.
Maintenance workers temporarily fix, however, left her no power to the outlet that controls her phone that's hooked up to the computer for four days. As of February 24, not all of her quarter's electrical problems had been fixed.
Page 748 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Families see a disconnect between a government that proclaims its interest in the welfare of its troops and yet allows family members to live in quarters with pealing paint, insect infestation, leaky roofs, and filthy kitchens like some of the family housing in Germany we illustrate in our testimony.
NMFA recognizes that the normal process of military construction and the reduced Defense budget will not allow massive renovation projects or replacement construction in a timely manner. We therefor have supported the concept of privatization for the construction of housing for military members. However, as we've expressed in the past, we have several concerns about the process. The first is oversight. Will the services simply hand over the money to private developers and wash their hands of what happens when military families occupy these homes?
What happens when, as in the case of the Bridge Pointe Landing development in Texas, families become frustrated if the developer does not provide the promised level of quality housing and service. Who will hold the developers accountable for fulfilling the provisions of the contracts?
The second is cost. Will service member cost to rent these homes be ''equivalent to their housing allowance'', as stated by Under Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn, in his February 12 testimony before this committee? Early experiences in some of the new developments indicate that costs are often higher.
Three is community. Will military families moving into these new developments expect the same level of community support and recreational services found on base, and will they be disappointed.
Page 749 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Fourth concern is education. Housing privatization can have a tremendous impact on a school district. If replacement housing is built on land that's not federal, the local school district will lose approximately $1800 per child in Impact Aid money. Will local schools be able to absorb the influx of children from new housing? Are leaders of the surrounding communities, especially school superintendents, being consulted early enough in the privatization process to provide input on the project's possible impact on the entire community? The word that we're receiving is that they are not being included in those discussions.
With deep gratitude for what you have done in the past, NMFA again turns to this Committee for assistance in helping the military families we represent. Repair and maintenance accounts can't be raided to the extent that military families are forced to live in substandard and even dangerous situations. Privatization initiatives should be carefully constructed so families benefit and the civilian communities in which they live are not negatively impacted.
Communities are not just bricks and mortar, but are living organisms. As families are separated more and more often by frequent deployments, the importance of the military community as a stabilizing force to families increases. Privatization, housing or services, must not lead to the destruction of that community. Thank you.
[Prepared statement of Joyce Raezer follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much, Ms. Raezer, we appreciate your testimony. I think both Mr. Hefner and I have made a significant effort to go into the housing, much of which has been certainly dilapidated and poorly maintained housing. I have done so across not only this country but across the world in the last two years, I've been to many housing projects. We visited some of the newer remodeled or reconstructed housing and some of the new construction housing projects, and talked to some of the families. Certainly, we're doing all we can, we think, at least that's our highest priority, is to try to catch up with the backlog, huge backlog that exists out there.
Page 750 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
I was very interested in your comments on privatization and your questions very well put together, and certainly those are questions that need to be answered, and I hope will be answered before any project moves into a private enterprise. We do think, however, that the private sector has a role to play in trying to help us catch up faster than what the traditional way that we've been doing would allow us.
So we are going to seriously look, and continue to look at privatization, but certainly your concerns are our concerns as well, and we're very anxious that the housing allowance take care of our families' housing needs, that there's not a need to go off-base and into the community and thus increase their cost.
Every private sector project, whether it's on-base or off-base, however, for family housing, we think should be designed and the contract should include provisions that would allow the housing allowance to be the sole requirement from the active duty. We can't promise that, but that's our goal.
Do you have any comments or questions?
Mr. HEFNER. No.
Mr. PACKARD. We again appreciate very much your testimony, it's very well done.
Ms. RAEZER. We appreciate the opportunity.
Page 751 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. PACKARD. We're on the same team, I believe.
Ms. RAEZER. I think so.
Mr. PACKARD. I think our goals and our objectives are yours and your association's.
Ms. RAEZER. And I think we agree on the privatization. We understand we have to go this way, we're just looking for the safeguards.
Mr. PACKARD. And we're asking the question of most of our witnesses, is it their intent to make privatization their sole method of building or refurbishing housing, or is it simply an augment to the existing system. And I think we're getting back the answer that they're going to still continue to provide MILCON housing as probably their fundamental source of housing, with privatization assisting and augmenting it rather than replacing it. Thank you again, Ms. Raezer.
Ms. RAEZER. Thank you.
Mr. PACKARD. The Fleet Reserve Association. We appreciate your being here and we're looking forward to your testimony. Again, you have submitted a comprehensive testimony and, if possible, we'd appreciate your summarizing.
STATEMENT OF JOSEPH BARNES, DIRECTOR, LEGISLATIVE PROGRAMS, QUALITY OF LIFE, FLEET RESERVE ASSOCIATION
Page 752 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. BARNES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Fleet Reserve Association thanks you for this opportunity to present its recommendations. We'd also like to associate ourselves with remarks of NMFA to Mr. Hefner, thank him for his tremendous support through the years, and wish him fair winds and following seas in the future.
This distinguished Subcommittee takes seriously the task of supporting the quality of life for our uniform personnel and their families, and the Association salutes you and Members of the Subcommittee for your strong and continuing commitment.
FRA has difficulty, however, believing that DOD shares this strong commitment when it reviews the 1999 Military Construction budget. A chart depicting total obligation authorities for recent years against those requested for 1999 is attached to our complete statement. Especially noteworthy is the fact that family housing construction has decreased over 40 percent annually since 1996.
The 1995 Defense Science Board Task Force on Quality of Life recommended privatizing much of the housing for military families. Some difficulties have surfaced with the commercial units now available for military families in Texas and Washington. As the representative of enlisted personnel of the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard personnel, FRA is concerned about unaffordable rental costs for junior enlisted members and the negative effect off-base commercial housing may have on impact aid provided to nearby public schools. Some local communities are waiving property tax for developers in order to encourage them to build military housing. This loss in the school tax base is significant to the schools educating military children and to the quality of the education being provided to them.
Page 753 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
FRA cautions DOD and the services to go slowly in encouraging privately developed housing. Commercial residences must be cost-effective for all pay grades. It must also be secure and well maintained. For these reasons, FRA is not yet prepared to fully endorse privatization of military housing.
Although current Navy and Marine Corps bachelor housing leaves much to be desired, no BQs have been requested for the Navy and only four for the Marines for 1999. Many sailors and Marines are deployed for six months or more each year, and deserve better than being housed in crowded barracks lacking privacy and equipped with gang heads, inadequate laundry facilities, and no place to store gear.
Good physical fitness is important to reducing the increased stress of frequent deployments. While physical fitness centers are at the top of wish lists for bachelor personnel, only three fitness centers are requested for 1999.
Childcare is of great importance to service families. Twenty-three facilities were approved for construction from 1996 to 1998, but only three are requested for 1999. The Quality of Life Task Force report cited DOD's aim to meet 65 percent of the demand for childcare by 1997 and 80 percent by 1999. FRA questions the Department's commitment to attaining this goal.
Where practical and affordable, Congress should direct the Service Secretaries to include requests for family service centers, libraries, religious and education centers, dependent schools and medical and dental facilities, particularly where current infrastructure requires replacement or renovation.
Page 754 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The Navy moved its entire recruit training program to the Naval Training Center, Great Lakes, which is the Navy's oldest basic training installation. Its infrastructure is in poor condition and, if not rebuilt soon, it will no longer be fit to train new accessions into the Navy.
Additional attention is directed to deteriorating work areas at other Naval and Marine Corps installations, a situation that is a significant readiness challenge. Only Congress can direct the military to work on modernizing its infrastructure. FRA recommends that DOD take funds requested to close and realign additional bases and use it to improve the military's crumbling infrastructure at existing installations.
Press accounts cite a pending federal budget surplus and a military budget windfall. If realized, any portion of this money should be appropriated to fund recommendations detailed in this statement.
Mr. Chairman, FRA is grateful to this Subcommittee and Congress for its efforts to provide quality of life programs for the nation's uniformed personnel. Serious challenges face the military. Not only is there concern for the military's infrastructure, but recruiting and retention rates are down, operational and personnel tempos continue to be high, and peacekeeping missions are threatening readiness. Despite this scenario, there is continued pressure to further reduce manpower levels. Our country can ill-afford another exodus of talent as occurred in the 1970s.
Mr. Chairman, this Subcommittee can, as it often does, lead the way on these important quality of life needs. Thank you very much.
Page 755 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
[Prepared statement of Joseph Barnes follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Very well stated, Mr. Barnes, we appreciate your testimony. I think we recognize, as you have stated, the inadequacies of the budget that's been submitted, particularly in bachelor quarters and in family housing and other areas. This Committee is committed to those issues and we'll do what we can to beef up the budget.
Comments or questions, Mr. Hefner?
Mr. HEFNER. No.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much.
Mr. BARNES. Thank you.
Mr. PACKARD. Our concluding witness is Mr. Anderson, and he will be testifying with regard to the Reserve Officers Association. We have your comprehensive statement. I have reviewed it, it is extensive. We hope that you will summarize.
STATEMENT OF STEVE ANDERSON, GUARD AND RESERVE ISSUES, RESERVE OFFICERS ASSOCIATION
Mr. ANDERSON. I shall be brief, sir.
Page 756 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. On behalf of more than 90,000 members of the Reserve Officers Association, representing each of the uniformed services, I appreciate the opportunity to address this Subcommittee.
The Association is very grateful to the Subcommittee for its continuing support of the Guard and the Reserve. Frankly, without your support and without the facilities you provided, the Guard and Reserve could not have contributed as effectively as they have to recent mobilizations.
Base closures and force realignments have generated requirements for new construction to support new missions. Much of the appropriated funding for military construction for the Guard and Reserve has been for new construction, while the needs for repair and renovation have grown. During the '80s when defense spending was on the rise, Reserve component military construction backlogs continued to grow.
If the Reserve components are to continue to make significant contributions to national security, they must be provided adequate facilities to meet unique requirements, including the location of facilities where there are persons and skills needed to meet Reserve component needs.
Demographics are indeed critical to the location of Reserve units and Reserve component effectiveness. Unlike their Active component counterparts, who can readily move to new locations, Reservists are tied to their civilian employment and are often unable to relocate for Reserve assignments. For this reason we must provide the best training facilities as possible and put them where Reservists are located.
Page 757 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The following will address military construction needs for each of the Reserve components. Today the Army Reserve has a backlog of $1.9 billion of known construction requirements. This facility shortage is further complicated by numerous base closings and the loss of support facilities, many of which were geographically proximate to Army Reserve units. All of these factors contribute to an average utilization rate of over 200 percent in existing facilities.
Over half of the Army Reserves' 2800 facilities, which average 33 years old, are inadequate to meet recognized training, maintenance and storage requirements. Many fail to meet Army standards. This situation has created a training environment that is increasingly unsafe, environmentally unacceptable, and damaging to readiness.
To further compound the situation, the Army Reserve has taken over management of several Army installations formerly operated by the Active Army. As a result, the Army Reserve now has an additional 2600 buildings and its inventory is now averaging 47 years old.
We urge the Congress to authorize and to fully fund the Army Reserve's $63.9 million budget request for major construction. We further urge the Congress to authorize and to appropriate additional funding to move essential construction projects into FY 1999.
The Military Construction program for the Air Force is divided into three categories—environmental compliance, new missions, and current mission MILCON. The total Air Force Reserve MILCON request for FY 1999 is for one project valued at $10.5 million. It contains no funds for new mission MILCON, $5.2 million for current mission MILCON, no funds for environmental compliance, and $2.9 million for minor construction and $2.4 million for architectural and engineering services.
Page 758 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The Air Force Reserve current mission MILCON funding levels are inadequate to meet existing infrastructure and needs. The $485 million current backlog would require over 100 years to eliminate at current funding levels.
Additional funding is requested for current mission MILCON to provide adequate facility support to the Air Force Reserve mission. A listing of 106 recognized requirements is included in our testimony.
The budget for military construction for the Naval and Marine Corps Reserve for FY 1999 is for $12.4 million. This request will support only five relatively small projects. It does not include any funds for minor construction, and it includes only minor funding for planning and design of future projects.
The backlog of military construction, the critical backlog of essential maintenance and repair of Naval and Marine Corps Reserve facilities still approaches $423 million. Once again, the MILCON Naval Reserve request for FY 1999 will not keep pace with the impact on inflation on these backlogs.
ROA recommends that the Military Construction request to the Marine Corps and Naval Reserve be approved and that Congress add authorizations and funding for as many projects as possible from a list of projects that we have provided. Of the projects included in the budget request, we particularly wish to emphasize the $4.1 million for the Marine Corps Reserve Training Center in Galveston, Texas, and the $3.6 million for Naval Reserve Administration Headquarters Building in Minneapolis, Minnesota. We also recommend that funds be provided for much needed minor construction.
Page 759 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
The budget request for military construction for the Army, Air Force, Naval and Marine Corps Reserves represents the very minimum required and should be funded. Any additions to the military construction request for the Reserve components will be money very well spent. Thank you for giving ROA an opportunity to testify here today, and I shall be happy to answer any questions you may have.
[Prepared statement of Steve Anderson follows:]
"The Official Committee record contains additional material here."
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you very much, Mr. Anderson. I think we have been rather close to the ROA for many years and followed their efforts and attended many of your functions both here and in our districts.
What criteria did you use and how did you get the information that would be necessary to list the individual projects within each branch of the services?
Mr. ANDERSON. These came from the services.
Mr. PACKARD. They came from the Pentagon?
Mr. ANDERSON. Yes, sir, indirectly.
Mr. PACKARD. And yet most of these, if not all, are not on the President's budget——
Page 760 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
Mr. ANDERSON. No, sir, regrettably they are not. We always seem to fall below the line when the priorities are set.
Mr. PACKARD. Do you believe that these are the top priorities of the Pentagon that didn't make the President's budget?
Mr. ANDERSON. We believe that they are all legitimate priorities, sir, they all are high priorities. They simply fell below the allocation.
Mr. PACKARD. Are they all on there, if you know?
Mr. ANDERSON. Yes, sir, they are.
Mr. PACKARD. You've done a lot of work, appreciate it. Question?
Mr. HEFNER. No questions.
Mr. PACKARD. Thank you, Mr. Anderson, very much, very complete.
To my knowledge, that completes the witnesses that have been scheduled. Are there any others that were unscheduled? [No response.]
With that, ladies and gentlemen, we'll conclude the hearing. We appreciate all of you being here. The hearing is adjourned.
Page 761 PREV PAGE TOP OF DOC Segment 3 Of 3
[CLERK'S NOTE.—The following testimony was submitted for the record.]