Military Construction Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2002 Hearings
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S. HRG. 107–273 MILITARY CONSTRUCTION APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 2002 HEARINGS BEFORE A SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION ON H.R. 2904/S. 1460 AN ACT MAKING APPROPRIATIONS FOR MILITARY CONSTRUCTION FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE FOR THE FISCAL YEAR ENDING SEP- TEMBER 30, 2002, AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations ( Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/senate U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 70–864 PDF WASHINGTON : 2002 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800 Fax: (202) 512–2250 Mail: Stop SSOP, Washington, DC 20402–0001 COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS ROBERT C. BYRD, West Virginia, Chairman DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii TED STEVENS, Alaska ERNEST F. HOLLINGS, South Carolina THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania TOM HARKIN, Iowa PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico BARBARA A. MIKULSKI, Maryland CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri HARRY REID, Nevada MITCH MCCONNELL, Kentucky HERB KOHL, Wisconsin CONRAD BURNS, Montana PATTY MURRAY, Washington RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama BYRON L. DORGAN, North Dakota JUDD GREGG, New Hampshire DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois BEN NIGHTHORSE CAMPBELL, Colorado TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota LARRY CRAIG, Idaho MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas JACK REED, Rhode Island MIKE DEWINE, Ohio TERRY SAUVAIN, Staff Director CHARLES KIEFFER, Deputy Staff Director STEVEN J. CORTESE, Minority Staff Director SUBCOMMITTEE ON MILITARY CONSTRUCTION DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California, Chairman DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas TIM JOHNSON, South Dakota CONRAD BURNS, Montana MARY L. LANDRIEU, Louisiana LARRY CRAIG, Idaho HARRY REID, Nevada MIKE DEWINE, Ohio ROBERT C. BYRD, West Virginia TED STEVENS, Alaska (ex officio) (ex officio) Professional Staff CHRISTINA EVANS B.G. WRIGHT SID ASHWORTH (Minority) Administrative Support ANGELA LEE ALYCIA FARRELL (Minority) (II) CONTENTS TUESDAY, JULY 31, 2001 Page Department of Defense: Office of the Secretary of Defense ................................................................... 1 Defense agencies: Military Community and Family Policy .................................................. 27 Ballistic Missile Defense Organization .................................................... 27 Special Operations Command .................................................................. 27 Tricare Management Activity ................................................................... 27 Department of the Army .................................................................................. 51 WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1, 2001 Department of Defense: Department of the Navy .................................................................................. 85 Department of the Air Force ........................................................................... 111 (III) MILITARY CONSTRUCTION APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 2002 TUESDAY, JULY 31, 2001 U.S. SENATE, SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS, Washington, DC. The subcommittee met at 2:33 p.m., in room SD–138, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Dianne Feinstein (chairman) pre- siding. Present: Senators Feinstein, Johnson, Hutchison, and Craig. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE STATEMENT OF HON. DOV S. ZAKHEIM, UNDER SECRETARY OF DE- FENSE (COMPTROLLER) ACCOMPANIED BY RAYMOND F. DUBOIS, JR., DEPUTY UNDER SEC- RETARY OF DEFENSE FOR INSTALLATION AND ENVIRONMENT OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR DIANNE FEINSTEIN Senator FEINSTEIN. Good afternoon. I know that Senator Hutchison is on her way, but in the interest of time and because we have a vote coming up at about 3 o’clock, I thought I might just start and make my opening remarks, and then hopefully Senator Hutchison will be here and she will make hers. I would like to welcome all of the witnesses. I would like to thank them for appearing before the subcommittee. I look forward to working with Senator Hutchison. We are good friends, and here she comes right now. I was just saying I look forward to working with you and am delighted that we are together as chairman and ranking member of the MILCON subcommittee. The fiscal year 2002 military construction budget that is before us today is really a good news story in just about all respects. The top line is nearly $10 billion and, with the exception of BRAC, vir- tually every account in the budget has seen significant increases. I am especially pleased to see the emphasis this budget places upon quality of life issues, particularly improved housing. We ask a great deal of our men and women in uniform. We cannot begin to pay them what they deserve, but we certainly should not ask them to live in substandard housing, to work in dilapidated facilities, or forego the kind of community amenities that so many of us take so for granted. Our military personnel and their families have (1) 2 enough to worry about in carrying out their mission without being burdened by major quality of life concerns. I am also happy to see the hefty across the board increase in funding for the guard and reserve components. For years Congress has been urging the executive branch to submit realistic guard and reserve budgets. For years Congress has seen no results. This budget submission really marks a turning point in recognizing the importance and the funding need of the guard and the reserve. I am, however, concerned about the level of funding for BRAC in this budget. The $532 million proposed by the President is just over half of last year’s appropriated amount for BRAC. I under- stand that the BRAC process is winding down, but I also under- stand that environmental cleanup bills associated with BRAC are climbing. The Navy reports that it has $92 million in unfunded, must-pay BRAC environmental compliance costs for fiscal year 2002. We really need to address these costs and this budget frankly does not appear to do so. It seems strange to me that there may be plans to request a new round of BRAC closures when we have not even paid the tab for the last go-around. But while this is on balance a good news budget, I hope it is more than just a 1-year spike. The infrastructure needs of the mili- tary are enormous regardless of whether we have another round of BRAC or not, regardless of how we rejigger our force structure overseas. The fact remains that the United States will always need to support a robust military. We will need new facilities to meet new mission demands and we will need to maintain and sustain our existing military facilities. Infrastructure investments are not the kind of gee-whiz tech- nology that tend to capture large infusions of money. Building a barracks is not as exciting as building the Joint Strike Fighter. But without adequate housing for the families, we will not have pilots to fly those planes. Without adequate aircraft maintenance shops and runways, we will not be able to keep the planes flying. Simply put, without an adequate investment in infrastructure, we will not have the best military in the world. So I look forward very much to hearing from our witnesses today. First, Senator Hutchison, it is great to be with you and perhaps you would like to make your remarks. STATEMENT OF SENATOR KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON Senator HUTCHISON. Thank you, Madam Chairman, and I too ap- preciate the opportunity to work with you. I had thought it would be with reverse chairs, but nevertheless, whatever chair it is, I think we will be able to do what is right for our military and for our country, and I really look forward to working with you. I look forward to hearing from each of the panels today on the military construction priorities. The large increase in military con- struction in the President’s budget request is important to the mod- ernization of our facilities and the transformation of our forces and facilities for the future, certainly a step in the right direction. I also want to recognize the Department of Defense and the serv- ices for restoring the 5 percent contingency fund back into the 3 project budgets. I think that is critical to the long-term stability and effective execution of the military construction program. I do have questions about the increasing percentage of our con- struction budget allocated to bases overseas. It is absolutely nec- essary to have some forces forward deployed. Currently we have 74 installations outside the United States, with almost 213,000 per- sonnel permanently stationed in 140 countries. My question is have these commitments subsumed funding that in some cases might have been better used to maintain or improve our enduring domes- tic base infrastructure? The fiscal year 2002 budget includes significant funding for over- seas projects. We continue to make these significant infrastructure investments overseas before the completion of Secretary Rumsfeld’s defense review. It seems like military construction realignment ini- tiatives are being put ahead of the policy decisions that we would need to base our decisions on. It is critical that the Department of Defense conduct a com- prehensive review of these overseas installations to ensure they continue to be correctly balanced against other priorities. I look forward to hearing from all of the panels today and seeing how the services plan to balance their priorities. Thank