Lawmakers seek to stop next base-closing round

Two senior members of the House Armed Services Committee said they would push the 108th Congress to change or repeal a controversial law authorizing a new round of domestic military base closings in 2005.

"I'm just adamantly opposed to it, and I'll take every opportunity I can get to stop it," Rep. Gene Taylor, D-Miss., said about the law in a telephone interview Tuesday from his district.

One of his Republican colleagues, Rep. Joel Hefley of Colorado, "is definitely opposed to the way the law is written and will use his subcommittee to look into this," said a spokeswoman. During last week's reorganization of the Armed Services Committee, Hefley was named chairman of the new Readiness Subcommittee, which will oversee the base closure process.

Their target is the fiscal 2002 Defense authorization law's section on base closures, which caused weeks of bitter wrangling in the hectic, post-Sept. 11, 2001, session of Congress and helped delay adjournment until Dec. 13, 2001, when a conference agreement was finally approved.

Before the compromise was reached, the House had opposed any base closings, and the Senate had backed a closure round in 2003 by a narrow 53-47 vote.

As enacted, the section requires the Defense secretary to submit a list of recommended closings and realignments to a nine-member Base Realignment and Closure Commission by May 16, 2005, well after the 2004 elections. The commission would have until Sept. 8, 2005, to add or subtract sites from the list.

Then, in a step similar to the process used to decide base closings in 1988, 1991, 1993 and 1995, both the president and Congress would have to accept or reject the entire list.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld must decide on the initial selection criteria by the end of this year, a deadline that is spurring Taylor and Hefley to action.

The base closing process was designed to limit the ability of parochial political interests to block attempts to cut spending on facilities of dubious value to the national defense.

The law also contains language prohibiting the White House from having private firms take up the work at a military facility slated for closure-a response to the Clinton administration's attempt before the 1996 presidential election to keep open two Air Force maintenance depots that were to be closed in the vote-rich states of Texas and California.

The Bush administration is eager to close as many installations as in the previous four rounds combined, reasoning that the billions of dollars used to maintain excess capacity would be spent better on improving the military's war-fighting capabilities.

For the 2005 round, the law requires the defense secretary to tie any base realignment and closure recommendations to future national security threats and anticipated fiscal 2006 troop levels and spending. The secretary must review the entire inventory of installations at home and overseas to look for "excess infrastructure."

This review puts at risk "every single facility," said Hefley's spokeswoman. She said her boss "thinks it's a whole waste of time; it creates more paperwork and causes more anxiety for the communities." She said Hefley did not necessarily oppose another round of closings, but "he does not support the way [the law] is right now."

"I'm pleased that someone who's his own man would at least try to change the process, if not repeal BRAC," said Taylor, when told of Hefley's position. Last year, Taylor blasted House Republican leaders for quashing his attempt to get a House floor vote on a proposal to kill the 2005 round of base closures.

Taylor said the U.S. war on terrorism could last years, making it necessary to assure the military has enough "surge capacity" to absorb any future expansion of force levels. "Should we need to expand, we've got the bases," he said. "But here we are-we've closed Cecil Field [a naval air station in Jacksonville, Fla., shuttered in 1999], and now we need it again," referring to an Army National Guard aviation unit's recent move there. "That's insane!"

Even as Taylor plots strategy to stop the next round of closings, he has been busy trying to persuade the Biloxi City Council not to grant a zoning variance for a high-rise development near Keesler Air Force Base.

Such "encroachment" on the base could lead to noise complaints to the base commander, who would have to impose flying restrictions on the pilots, Taylor argues. "Soon the Air Force starts not looking so fondly on the base," he said. "Keesler brings $1 billion to the local economy. We don't need to lose this base."

Other public officials elsewhere have been thinking ahead as well. In Oklahoma, which has not lost a base in the previous four rounds, the state Military Base Closure Prevention Task Force recently issued recommendations to help protect existing bases from encroaching development.

In Virginia, the Hampton Roads Planning District Commission reportedly awarded a $325,000 consulting contract to help devise "a winning strategy for protecting" the area's military bases.

New House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., said last week he did not expect the base closing law to change, but he spoke before learning of Taylor and Hefley's intentions. Hunter was unavailable for further comment, but Taylor expressed confidence that the chairman-who has broken with GOP leaders in the past over trade and security issues and whose San Diego district has a large Navy presence-would be reluctant to block challenges to the law.