BRAC Vote Saves Groton
Late breaking news on The Day website says that the BRAC commission voted to keep Subase NLON open, with 6 of the 9 commissioners voting to remove the base from the list.
"Commissioner Lloyd W. “Fig” Newton made the motion to save the base, calling it “the flagship of the submarine community.”
"Commission Chairman Anthony J. Principi spoke in support of the motion, calling the Groton base “a center of excellence.”
“If we close New London,” he said, “we will never get it back.”
"The vote was 6-1-1 in favor of keeping the base open."
More info as it becomes available. (Of note, an earlier article in The Day was fairly pessimistic, so it looks like the commissioners kept their cards fairly close to their vests.)
Staying at PD...
Update 0929 24 Aug: The crawl across the bottom on the screen on CSPAN says the vote was 7-1-1, which makes more sense. The Day now has a list of the commissioners and how they voted, which confirms the 7 "yes" votes. (They also removed the incorrect section I quoted in the original entry.) Here's a CNN summary of today's votes; the Red River Army Depot was also removed from the list, and NAS Brunswick, Maine, was added.
The actual motion the commissioners voted on is here; it says that DoD "substantially deviated from" four (of eight) Final Selection Criteria and the Force Structure Plan. It looks like the vote on Portsmouth Naval Shipyard is coming up fairly soon.
The Boston Globe has some reaction from Connecticut politicians.
Update 1013 24 Aug: The Noonz Wire has more, as does the group submarine blog Ultraquiet No More. Looks like the Portsmouth vote will be after lunch; I expect they'll accept the DoD recommendation to close the shipyard, though.
Update 1249 24 Aug: Man, I suck at predicting what the commission will do. It looks like they decided to keep Portsmouth Naval Shipyard open as well; here's another report from the Boston Globe on PNSY. Haven't heard what the vote was. As far as Groton goes, here's what the commissioners had to say before the vote.
Update 1332 24 Aug: Looks like the vote to save Portsmouth was the same 7-1 tally that spared Groton.
3 Comments:
Portsmouth has been spared, too.
8/24/2005 11:44 AM
FYI:
Olympia, WA sets nuclear free policy. Nothing related to nuclear weapons may be brought in or through the city, with the exception of the federal interstates that bisect the city.
8/24/2005 12:34 PM
And on the aviation side of it, it looks like those blithering idiots in Virginia Beach might get their wish about jet noise. The commission gave the state and the city six months to settle the noise abatement encroachment issue (which means buying up a LOT of expensive property back) or BRAC will send all 268 jets, their crews, and maintainers to Cecil Field here in Jacksonville. The State of Florida, and City of Jacksonville met with the commissioners last week, and tossed 200 million dollars on the table to get Cecil back up to par if the Navy decided to move back to their home.
This would be a smart move, as this city doesn't give a rat's ass about noise, so long as it's made by something painted haze gray, and it's putting a half billion dollars a year into the local economy.
I still can't believe that those fools in Virginia Beach don't seem to understand the devastating hit they're going to take, if the Navy shuts Oceana down. This resident of Jacksonville, who used to enjoy the hell of the air shows he got to watch for free when the Hornets went roaring by is more than ready to see them come back. And no, outside of whatever it does to local taxes, I don't stand to make a dime off of Cecil...I make all my money at Mayport Naval Station:-)
8/25/2005 2:39 AM
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