spending arizona tax dollars to keep federal government pork in arizona Original Article Arizona maneuvers to keep bases open Billy House Republic Washington Bureau Mar. 27, 2005 12:00 AM From Pearl Harbor to Portsmouth, Maine, in more than 400 military-base communities across the country, the ticking of the clock is getting louder. With a deadline of May 16, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has less than seven weeks to unveil the Pentagon's recommended list of which military installations should be shut down or revamped into something new. Arizona, like other states, has been busy maneuvering to protect its five main military installations. At stake could be the 83,500 jobs and more than $5.6 billion in annual economic benefits represented by the Valley's Luke Air Force Base, Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, Fort Huachuca in Sierra Vista and the Army's Yuma Proving Ground and Marine Corps Air Station Yuma. Arizona officials also are working to shield other, less-mentioned facilities, including the Silverbell Army Heliport at Marana and the Naval Observatory Flagstaff Station, and to keep alive Army and Air National Guard units stationed in or near Phoenix, Tucson, Florence and Flagstaff. "Arizona will vigorously defend all of our military facilities," Gov. Janet Napolitano says. Analysts say the four previous base-closure rounds were never so mysterious or unpredictable. What is predictable is the bewilderment and panic that will strike many of the communities soon to be targeted. "Many worst fears will be fulfilled," says Loren Thompson, a military analyst with the Lexington Institute, a Virginia-based public-policy think tank. Luke alone pumps $1.4 billion a year in to the local economy, and many West Valley businesses depend upon it for revenue. George Velez, who owns Sideline: Your One-Stop Shop, says closure of the Glendale base would be devastating. Seventy-five to 80 percent of his business, which is across the street from Luke, is related to the base. Even many of the customers who come from Litchfield Park are there because of Luke, he says, including military retirees. The business, which has been located near Luke since 1991, has grown over the years. In addition to selling trophies and engraving, it is a U-Haul outlet and does dry-cleaning and UPS deliveries. "It would be really tough if the base closed," Velez says. "It would be a ghost town around here." Rumsfeld says there is as much as 25 percent excess capacity in the nation's 425 military facilities, indicating that as many as 100 bases will end up on the chopping block. The Pentagon says closing and consolidation of bases would free up as much as $7 billion a year that could be redirected to new weapons systems, better facilities for soldiers and their families and other priorities. Some analysts dispute there's that much fat to cut. But once Rumsfeld announces his targets for closure, the nation's attention will fall upon an independent base-closure commission. That nine-member panel will hold hearings this summer across the country and must fashion a final base-closure list by autumn for President Bush and Congress to either accept or reject in its entirety. States, communities and politicians will be pitted against each other as they scramble to convince the commission members to rescue their targeted bases and the jobs and other economic benefits that those installations represent. In the end, the installations on any final closure list approved by the president and Congress will have six years to shut down. Ironically, one of Arizona's most powerful voices in protecting its military installations also has been one of the nation's leading advocates for shutting down more bases -- Sen. John McCain who is expected to take over the chairmanship of the Senate Armed Services Committee in two years. Even as this nation remains at war, McCain has led the way in arguing that there never has been a better time to proceed with the process best known as BRAC, or Base Realignment and Closure. "BRAC has taken on a new significance in the war on terrorism," McCain argued to other members of Congress last year who sought to pass legislation delaying this year's closure process. "The sooner the issue is addressed, the greater the savings that will ultimately go toward modernization and better pay and benefits for our hard-working service members." On paper, it's a process free of politics. But high-priced Washington lobbyists have been working on behalf of such worried states as Mississippi and Missouri, as well as many communities. And elected lawmakers across the country have been promising to do everything they can to protect their area's military installations. Texas has spent $250 million to buy land around its military installations in an effort to make them less likely to be targeted. Florida has agreed to pay unemployment compensation to military spouses who give up jobs when forced to relocate there because of reassignments. Arizona is no exception in preparing for this round of base closings. The governor in 2004 established a full-time state office in Washington, D.C., with the prime mission of making the case for the uniqueness of Arizona's network of military installations, and to monitor base-closure developments. Napolitano also assembled an ongoing Military Affairs Commission of retired military officers, local officials and activists to help lead the defense. State lawmakers have enacted measures designed to make Arizona bases less vulnerable, including one addressing land-use plans in the areas near active military airports. Tucson in 2004 passed a $10 million bond referendum to assist with land acquisition around Davis-Monthan, the single largest financial investment made by a municipality in the state. Members of the Arizona congressional delegation have worked to secure $27.3 million in federal funding to acquire more than 2,100 acres and permanent easements around Luke. And in one of the more subtle maneuverings, members of the delegation were able to get the Yuma Training Range Complex renamed after the late Rep. Bob Stump, R-Ariz., who had been a popular chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and forceful advocate of the military. More recently, Napolitano led an Arizona entourage that included staffers from McCain's and Rep. Jim Kolbe's offices in paying a visit on Phil Grone, the assistant deputy secretary of Defense in charge of recommending bases for closure or reorganization. The group offered the state's basic case: that Arizona's diverse and close-knit network of military facilities provides unparalleled high-quality, weather-friendly, cost-effective training for the military. The argument was also made that Arizona's installations are a perfect fit with Rumsfeld's vision of a transformed military, in which different branches work together to form a "faster, lighter, smarter" force. "I believe Arizona has made an extraordinarily strong case for the critical importance of our military installations," Napolitano said. "I'm very optimistic that the Pentagon and the president will recognize that." Whether such efforts will pay off is uncertain. Grone has been visited by dozens of politicians and citizens groups from across the country. And Pentagon officials have said that they will stay true to the announced criteria for judging which bases should be closed and that the military value of each base will be a key factor. But other factors also will be considered, including encroachment by urban sprawl, whether airspace is suitable for training, the possibility of combining different branches on the same base, potential savings to the military, the economic impact on communities, infrastructure and environmental considerations. "I've spoken directly to Rumsfeld, and he's made it abundantly clear that every decision the department makes (on closure) will be based on the military value," said Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., a member of the House Armed Services panel, when asked if he fears politics might hijack the process. But John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a non-partisan defense and research organization, said states have reason to be anxious because, in his view, the announced selection criteria are so vague. "I'm actually bewildered on what the theory is going to be on base closing. Looking at these criteria, I can keep on giving you theories under which this or that base could be closed," said Pike, adding that the situation opens the door to a lot of lobbying. The Pentagon insists that various closure lists that already have been circulating (one being passed around by members of Congress has the Yuma Proving Ground listed as a target) should not be considered reliable. But many believe that once a base is officially on the closure list, the independent BRAC commission will keep it there. The government closed almost 100 major facilities and did dozens of realignments of smaller installations in 1988, 1991, 1993 and 1995. The Government Accountability Office issued a report in January that concluded that those closures have saved the military $28.9 billion. The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, also pointed out that most nearby communities have managed to recover or are recovering. Past commissions have approved about 85 percent of the Defense Department's recommended closure lists. But this year, Pentagon officials have expressed so much confidence that there will be few changes to Rumsfeld's list that they plan to ask Congress to cancel any construction projects at those bases, even before the BRAC commission completes its work. Former Secretary of Veterans Affairs Anthony Prinicipi, tapped to head the commission, has pledged that "to the extent possible, commissioners and staff will visit impacted installations and communities to meet with military, state and local officials, as well as the public." Principi acknowledged that changes to the base-closure statute this year will make it "more challenging" for the commission to alter Rumsfeld's initial list. One of those changes requires that seven of the nine commission members must approve adding a base to the list to replace installations that are removed. Before, a simple majority had been required. The rules still hold that five members of the panel have to approve the removal of a base from the list. Retired Brig. Gen. R. Thomas Browning, who co-chaired the Governor's Military Facilities Task Force, which worked to devise a strategy for protecting Arizona's bases, says it is important for local communities and the state to be prepared to defend their installations. Once the list is published, the hearings will progress rapidly and the communities better be ready, Browning said. "We need to be prepared both individually and collectively to make the case to keep the installation open," he said. "I think some (communities) are prepared, but I think some feel fairly comfortable that we've done enough work." The best chance the commission will have of changing the list is to argue that the Pentagon did not properly apply its own criteria, analysts say. Given McCain's active role in pushing base closures, some also say it will be interesting to see how Arizona's installations fare. "One thing's for certain," says the Lexington Institute's Thompson. "Any Arizona facility targeted for closure will be very closely scrutinized. His (McCain's) office is so engaged in this process that if there is a closure decision hitting Arizona, he'll make sure it was based on merit and the criteria, rather than by some mistake." Reach the reporter at billy.house@arizonarepublic.com or at 1 (202) 906-8136. Republic reporter David Madrid contributed to this article.