THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, April 15, 1995 TAG: 9504130008
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A6 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Medium: 63 lines
Jack Dorsey's ``Fight over Hornets'' (news, April 3) quoted and highlighted a question asked of him by Derryl Garner, Newport, N.C.'s mayor and president of the Allies in Defense of Cherry Point: ``Why would they do this to us?'' - meaning of course, how could the Navy recommend sending the F/A-18s from Naval Air Station Cecil to Naval Air Station Oceana rather than to Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, as approved by the 1993 Base Realignment and Closure Commission.
I was disappointed that Mr. Dorsey did not choose to answer the question, because the answer is very obvious: common sense.
To move the Navy F/A-18s to MCAS Cherry Point, in Havelock, N.C., will require building essentially a new master jet base, a new Field Carrier Landing Practice (FCLP) airfield and community infrastructure when such a base, FCLP field, and infrastructure already exist at NAS Oceana in Virginia Beach.
The saving in dollars is staggering. Upgrading MCAS Cherry Point will cost $400 million to $600 million plus the new airfield.
Moving to NAS Oceana will cost about $80 million. Wasting this amount of money is unconscionable and flies in the face of why the Base Realignment and Closure Commission was created.
Moreover, the move of the F/A-18s to NAS Ocean and Virginia Beach rectifies the gravest error committed by BRAC 1993. That was the sentencing of 12,000 Navy dependents to a substandard lifestyle.
Picture, if you will, you and 11,999 other people moving from a city that has all the necessary housing, hospitals, doctors, schools, roads, sewage, etc., to an area where these things barely meet the minimum requirements of the people who now live there.
There are no jobs for dependents, which would push even more Navy families below the poverty level and onto the public dole. Many families could not move until affordable housing became available, creating a terrible morale situation and thereby damaging squadron readiness.
Besides being what the Department of the Navy (this includes the Marine Corps) wants, there are many more common-sense reasons to approve the move from Cecil to Oceana.
Suffice it to say that only a few people in the Cherry Point area who stand to make a lot of money from the expected growth are in favor of F/A-18s to Cherry Point.
To prove this point, two polls taken by the Newbern, N.C., Sun Journal (Feb. 19) show 78 percent of the people in that area did not want the jets and 61 percent were happy with the decision not to bring the F/A-18s to Cherry Point.
What is best for the Navy, best for the military budget and best for the people who must move does not enter the vision of the selfish few; only dollar signs are there. These people must not be allowed to have their way.
The real answer to Mayor Garner's question is, ``How could the '93 BRAC make such an irrational decision in the first place?''
P. F. HOLLANDSWORTH
Captain, U.S. Navy (ret.)
Virginia Beach, April 4, 1995
KEYWORDS: BASE CLOSURE AND REALIGNMENT COMMISSION by CNB