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Sometimes economic
development means hanging on to what we have.
This was a
painful lesson in 1995 when Defense Departments Base Realignment
and Closure program took aim at the nations aging and obsolete
military bases. Like most taxpayers, we were all too happy to
get rid of those other bases, until they put ours on the list.
Then we learned
a second painful lesson. We had taken Kirtland Air Force Base
for granted so long that we really didn’t know much about it,
except that it provided a lot of jobs. We had a vague idea of
its economic impact and no idea at all where it fit into the
nations defense.
Clovis and
Alamogordo had made no such mistake. Each city had a long-standing
committee of 50 business people who watched their bases like
hawks. They visited their bases regularly, welcomed the Air
Force bases to city functions and played golf with them, lobbied
for the base commander if they thought the facilities were starting
to look unkempt
The chairman
and committee members were right up to speed on aircraft, equipment
and, military issues and often had a model or two sitting in
their offices.
Bases in other
parts of the country had made the hit list because an inattentive
commander and a complacent community had allowed the base to
become Camp Swampy, forgotten in Washington, a remnant of the
past. Albuquerque learned its lesson.
The business
community and congressional delegation railed quickly and at
the 11th hour, a committee pointed out that the Air
Force's numbers were bad.
They saved
the day. This time. BRAC will be back. And this time the 63
members Kirtland Partnership Committee, organized in 1996, is
ready.
Last week the
committee saw a changing of the guard when chairman Larry Willard
ended his two-year term and turned the controls over Mahlon
Love.
Willard told
members that he considered it his responsibility to get the
word out about Kirtland.
The base's
economic impact is $2 billion a year and provides 19,000 jobs
through the military, federal government and contractors. Interestingly
, the Air Force jobs number only about 5,300.
"Anybody
who says a closure would have little impact on the community
just does not understand," Willard said, noting the thousands
of people passing through Kirtland's gates every day to jobs
and some 200 contractors. And Albuquerque is home to 18,000
retirees.
That got me
to thinking about Brian McDonald, who was in danger of the first
economist to be beheaded when he said during the height BRAC
mania that Albuquerque's economy was sufficiently diversified
to bounce back from the loss.
Has he changed
his opinion? Nope
But he adds
quickly that BRAC wasn’t going to shut down Sandia or Phillips
Labs. "They were going to eliminate 6,400 jobs, many of
them the military support activities of running a small town,
like road maintenance. A lot of those were lower paid, enlisted
military." He said 6,400 out of the city's 325,000 jobs
was a hit but not a disaster.
"The point
I was trying to make was, as a community, we would survive,"
McDonald said. "Nobody wants to have 6,400 jobs go away.
I still think that it is true today."
He pointed
out that other communities have suffered base closings and taken
advantage of the government compensation and donated land to
create new opportunities.
He repeated;
"Nobody wants to lose 6,400 jobs."
It was just
such controversies that made retirement looks good, apparently.
McDonald says he is busy and trying to avoid the limelight.
Meanwhile,
the Kirtland Partnership Community will have to stay at attention.
The budget is shrinking and "out of whack with the infrastructure,"
warned Ben Montoya, who served on the committee that saved Kirtland
the last time.
The budget
sabers are again rattling. "The blue print is there,"
Montoya said.
by
Sherry Robinson,
The Albuquerque Tribune
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