VALDOSTA — Landing on the Department of Defense’s base closure list is a situation that takes years to overcome. If any municipalities know what awaits officials and bases after May 16, it would be Anniston, Ala., and Marquette County, Mich.

The fate of K.I. Sawyer Air Force Base and Fort McClellan was determined years ago when they landed on the base closure lists.

K.I. Sawyer Air Force Base, in Michigan, was the first to appear on the base closure list in 1993, followed by Anniston’s Fort McClellan in 1995.

Since then, the municipalities surrounding those bases have encountered years of environmental cleanup, all while transferring land and finding new uses for the bases.

“For us it’s been a very challenging, time-consuming, frustrating and rewarding project,” said Steve Powers, county administrator for Marquette County.



IMPACT

With an Air Force base that had about 5,000 employees, there was little Marquette County could do to avoid the impact of Sawyer’s closure.

Marquette County’s population of 75,000 declined by about 10,000, while Northern Michigan University “took a significant hit in enrollment,” Powers said. Surrounding infrastructure such as housing and apartments that were built to house off-base military personnel were no longer needed, while car dealerships and retailers felt the impact in monetary terms.

“From what I’ve read and been told, the community

reaction was to work very hard to have K.I. Sawyer removed from the closure list,” Powers said. “(BRAC) has really consumed much of our time here at the county in terms of effort and attention needed by the board of commissioners. It’s really involved many aspects of our community.”

Two years later, Fort McClellan would experience the same, when its closure caused Anniston to lose hundreds of jobs in which civilian employees had to seek work elsewhere. While these bases now have a mixture of uses that have increased employment and brought national attention to its redevelopment, the process in between has been anything but simple.



ENVIRONMENTAL

Named to the 1995 BRAC list, Fort McClellan didn’t close until four years later. Meanwhile, Sawyer closed two years after the 1993 BRAC list was published.

Although both bases have been closed for five years or more, the process to make them suitable for development is continuous.

“The process on the cleanup is long-term,” said Ron Levy, BRAC environmental coordinator for Fort McClellan. “Certainly, it’s something that takes time.”

Once Fort McClellan’s closure was announced, Levy said officials immediately began work on the characterization of the base.

Characterizing a base for cleanup is a specific process that requires the identification of where items of environmental concern are located such as solvents or weapons that could cause groundwater contamination.

Officials also conduct a site investigation where enough examples are taken to confirm any releases and the extent of contamination. This is followed by defining a remedial action, conducting a feasibility study, reviewing a remedial design and then implementing an action for the clean up, Levy said.

“You see the types of things that are associated with training bases and there’s a lot of work in characterizing that and trying to clean that up. Before you can even get a shovel in the ground, you’ve got to fully characterize a base,” Levy said. “Believe me, it’s a process that involves a lot of different agencies. There’s a lot of people sitting at the table.”

At Fort McClellan, environmental coordinators had two programs to follow in the clean up process. They included the Hazardous Toxic and Radioactive Waste and Ordinances and Explosives.

The HTRW, Levy said, contains issues with landfills, groundwater contamination, maintenance operations contamination associated with vehicles, underground storage tanks that may have been leaking and groundwater issues, whereas OE deals with the location of where weapons were fired and removing those elements.

At Sawyer, environmental concerns included four landfills, fuel storage above and below ground, contamination to groundwater from fuel releases, as well as groundwater contamination from engine maintenance and solvents.

For more than 10 years, geologist Mark Petrie has been the project manager overseeing the cleanup of Sawyer. One of the first steps in the cleanup included conducting a environmental baseline survey in which inventory was taken of storage tanks, waste storage areas and weapons. From that information, Petrie said officials documented any environmental problems and addressed them based on a prioritized list.

“This is basically a city unto itself,” Petrie said. “So you have unique types of problems that you’re only going to see at a military base.”



REDEVELOPMENT

When Fort McClellan was named to the base closure list, one of the first thing Anniston officials did was created a master plan through the joint powers authority.

“This way down the line we could make sure the development that came in would fit in that area,” said Dan Cleckler, director of the joint powers authority. “When a base closes if it can be conveyed to a community for economic development the entities involved have to appoint a local redevelopment authority.”

For Fort McClellan and Sawyer, the redevelopment authorities have played a vital role in finding a reuse for the bases.

“In our case, the joint powers authority have been charged with redeveloping the property to bring in more jobs and revert the negative impact,” Cleckler said. “We didn’t start receiving property until 2001 even though our Army closure was announced in ’95.”

In Marquette County, Powers said one of the most important organizations during the closure of Sawyer has been its local redevelopment authority.

“The most essential role has been the LRA,” Powers said. “We became the authority responsible for working with the Air Force, working with the federal government to convert the facility to civilian use.”

The conversion of Sawyer, Powers said, has gone through several phases and just recently received a purchase proposal from a development company.

“I think having a specific, dedicated LRA is essential,” Powers said. “We became the LRA in ’97 and prior to that time I think there was a time and need for a clarity of purpose, clarity of goals and for a public entity that had the resources to work with the federal government on this very difficult challenge.”

The development company, Telkite, plans to reuse a portion of the Air Force base. Meanwhile, Powers said the county’s airport was relocated to the base with other parts of the base already sold as well as the housing units.

“We’ve had some success,” Powers said.

Now, Northern Michigan University’s enrollment is at an all-time high, the number of civilian jobs have been replaced and Marquette County has been recognized by the National Association of Installation Developers for its economic administration.

“We’re pretty proud of that. We’ve had a lot of work yet to do,” Powers said. You have to be patient, but you also have to be aggressive when working with the federal government but not be completely satisfied with what you’re being told.”

At Fort McClellan, Cleckler said the joint powers authority has played a vital role in transferring the base to civilian use. The base now houses a first-class child development center for 200 children, a community college, an auto parts manufacturer and The Anniston Star.

The auto parts manufacturer relocated from Canada about two years ago and has a staff of about 150. Meanwhile, Anniston signed a contract with a food processing facility that should employ about 200.

“We’re bringing in those types of industries and trying to diversify,” Powers said. “That’s what we’re here for, that’s our charge to bring in those new jobs to negate the bad economic effects.”