Local leaders attend BRAC update Staff Report What’s next for BRAC? That’s what an estimated 250 people learned Feb. 20 when Maj. Gen. Robert Williams and Col. Mark Needham presented a public briefing at John Hardin High School. Williams is commanding general at Fort Knox and the U.S. Army Armor Center there, and Needham is the installation’s garrison commander. Among those attending the briefing were Meade County Judge Executive Harry Craycroft, Brandenburg Mayor David Pace, Messenger publisher Rena Singleton and Russ Powell, executive director of the Meade County Area Chamber of Commerce and leader of its Meade County BRAC Action Group. During their comments and in response to questions, Williams and Needham said: • Plans are still in place for the Armor Center to be moved to Fort Benning, Ga., with the move starting in 2010 and being completed the following year. Environmental impact studies are underway, and construction should begin this fall after their completion. • Congressional budget legislation has cut BRAC funding for the current federal fiscal year to $2.5 billion from the $5.6 billion requested by the Department of Defense, but expectations are that additional money will be included in a supplemental appropriations bill due for consideration in March. • The 3,400-member infantry brigade combat team that had been expected to be stood up at Fort Knox this year instead is being formed at Fort Hood, Texas, from which it will deploy for war duty and to which it will return, finally moving to Fort Knox in the summer of 2009. They noted that funding has been approved for two of the three phases of construction of the unit’s facilities, and that some construction is under way. • That construction has not yet begun on the $200 million, 908,000-square-foot building that will house the Human Resources Command, but that if funding is available this summer, work could begin in the fall, with an estimated completion date of 2010. About 75 percent of the 3,400 personnel who will staff the command will be civilians, they said. • That the influx of military and civilian personnel in connection with BRAC will have a dramatic impact on Meade, Hardin and neighboring counties. For example, they said an estimated 2,500 school-age children will relocate with their parents, and that about 500 of those likely will attend schools in Meade County. The latest BRAC-related initiative is a labor survey to be conducted by the Lincoln Tail Workforce Investment Board. Telephone interviews will be conducted as part of a comprehensive study to assess local salaries, hiring trends and occupations. (See related story page 11A.) For more information about BRAC, visit www.oneknox.com or www.ltadd.org.
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