S. HRG. 105±275 MILITARY CONSTRUCTION APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 1998 HEARINGS BEFORE A SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION ON H.R. 2016 AN ACT MAKING APPROPRIATIONS FOR MILITARY CONSTRUCTION FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE FOR THE FISCAL YEAR ENDING SEP- TEMBER 30, 1998, 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 39±863 cc WASHINGTON : 1998 For sale by the U.S. Government Printing Office Superintendent of Documents, Congressional Sales Office, Washington, DC 20402 COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS TED STEVENS, Alaska, Chairman THAD COCHRAN, Mississippi ROBERT C. BYRD, West Virginia ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii PETE V. DOMENICI, New Mexico ERNEST F. HOLLINGS, South Carolina CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont SLADE GORTON, Washington DALE BUMPERS, Arkansas MITCH MCCONNELL, Kentucky FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey CONRAD BURNS, Montana TOM HARKIN, Iowa RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama BARBARA A. MIKULSKI, Maryland JUDD GREGG, New Hampshire HARRY REID, Nevada ROBERT F. BENNETT, Utah HERB KOHL, Wisconsin BEN NIGHTHORSE CAMPBELL, Colorado PATTY MURRAY, Washington LARRY CRAIG, Idaho BYRON DORGAN, North Dakota LAUCH FAIRCLOTH, North Carolina BARBARA BOXER, California KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas STEVEN J. CORTESE, Staff Director LISA SUTHERLAND, Deputy Staff Director JAMES H. ENGLISH, Minority Staff Director SUBCOMMITTEE ON MILITARY CONSTRUCTION CONRAD BURNS, Montana Chairman KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas PATTY MURRAY, Washington LAUCH FAIRCLOTH, North Carolina HARRY REID, Nevada LARRY CRAIG, Idaho DANIEL K. INOUYE, Hawaii TED STEVENS, Alaska (ex officio) ROBERT C. BYRD, West Virginia (ex officio) Staff SID ASHWORTH C. RICHARD D'AMATO, Minority (II) CONTENTS TUESDAY, MARCH 11, 1997 Department of Defense: Department of the Navy .................................................................................. 1 Department of the Air Force ........................................................................... 35 THURSDAY, MAY 8, 1997 Department of Defense: Department of the Army .................................................................................. 61 Defense agencies: U.S. Special Operations Command .......................................................... 101 Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Services Operations and Readiness ................................................................................................ 101 Defense Logistics Agency .......................................................................... 101 Defense Finance and Accounting Service ................................................ 101 (III) MILITARY CONSTRUCTION APPROPRIATIONS FOR FISCAL YEAR 1998 TUESDAY, MARCH 11, 1997 U.S. SENATE, SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS, Washington, DC. The subcommittee met at 9:37 a.m., in room SD±192, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Conrad Burns (chairman) presiding. Present: Senators Burns, Stevens, Murray, Reid, and Inouye. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT B. PIRIE, JR., ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE NAVY, INSTALLATIONS AND ENVIRONMENT ACCOMPANIED BY: MAJ. GEN. JOSEPH STEWART, DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF, INSTAL- LATIONS AND LOGISTICS, U.S. MARINE CORPS REAR ADM. DAVID NASH, CHIEF, NAVAL FACILITIES ENGINEERING COMMAND, U.S. NAVY CAPT. JOHN BRUNELLI, DEPUTY CHIEF, NAVAL RESERVE, U.S. NAVY OPENING STATEMENT OF CONRAD BURNS Senator BURNS. Good morning and I will call the committee to order. Senator Murray, the ranking member, is on her way. The subcommittee this morning will hear testimony on military construction, family housing, BRAC, and Reserve programs for the Navy and the Air Force. I welcome this morning our new ranking member of military construction, Senator Murray of Washington State, and thank you for coming. I look forward to working with her and her staff as we work our way through the 1998 military construction programs. We are pleased to hear from the Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Installations and Environment, Robert B. Pirie, and we wel- come you this morning. It is great to have you with us again. I cer- tainly thank you for coming. Would you please introduce the gentlemen that you brought with you this morning. Mr. PIRIE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With me this morning are: Rear Adm. Dave Nash, who is the Chief of the Naval Facilities Engineering Command; and Maj. Gen. Joe Stewart, who is the Deputy Chief of Staff of the Marine Corps (1) 2 for Installations and Logistics; and Capt. John Brunelli, who is the Deputy Chief of the Naval Reserve. Senator BURNS. We thank you and want to commend you for your commitment to the quality of life of our sailors and our ma- rines, as well as their families. We recognize the Navy has a sig- nificant challenge to maintain the momentum in an area that we want to work with you to achieve those objectives. I think our missions have changed in the last 10 years. We con- tinue to appropriate and be concerned with the quality of life of our marines and sailors. We know that they are probably the most mo- bile of all of our military troops and we want to make sure that they have everything that they need in order to make a really fighting outfit like they are known to be. We have asked you to address the fiscal year of 1998, the con- struction request for Navy housing, a portion of the base closure account, and the request for the Navy reserves. So if you have your opening statement, and I would tell you that your entire statement will be made part of the record, and thank you for coming this morning. You may proceed. Mr. PIRIE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With your permission, I will just hit some of the highlights. Senator REID. I wonder if I couldÐÐ Senator BURNS. Oh, I am sorry. I better do this. I better recog- nize my ranking member this morning. Senator Murray, I am sorry. STATEMENT OF PATTY MURRAY Senator MURRAY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I really appreciate your arranging this early hearing on our Navy and Air Force mili- tary construction, BRAC, and housing programs, and I am very pleased to serve as your ranking member on this very important subcommittee, and I look forward to working with you, Mr. Chair- man, and all of the committee in much the same fashion as my predecessor Senator Reid, who is here with us today, worked so successfully with you last year. The programs the subcommittee oversees are crucial, focusing as they do on the quality of life of our uniformed personnel here and abroad and on the vital infrastructure that allows our forces to op- erate with assurance as the world's sole superpower. These pro- grams allow in the long run to defend our interests and those of our allies and friends across an increasingly confusing and com- plicated world scene. I recall that this committee was able to mark up and report its annual bills out, get them through the Senate and the Congress and to the President's desk very early in the process. Even though the committee added some $617 million to the request last year, the President wisely signed it. It was overwhelmingly supported in the Senate, much of that due to your excellent work, Mr. Chair- man, in putting it together. I hope that we can repeat that per- formance this year. Mr. Chairman, judging from the President's request, it looks like we are being invited to rewrite much of the budget submitted. The request for our Guard and Reserve program is, as in the past sev- eral years, largely inadequate and perhaps deliberately so. For the 3 Guard and Reserve we appropriated $411 million last year. The re- quest for fiscal year 1998 is for less than $173 million. So either the administration is preparing to put the Guard and Reserve out of business or, more likely, it expects us to add to the budget to fund it appropriately, just as the committee did last year. I have no doubt that we will together do just that. We admon- ished the administration last year not to repeat the budget history of underfunding the Guard and Reserves, anticipating a huge plus- up by the committee, but it seems to have done just that. First, the overall request for the Guard and Reserve is two-thirds less than the amount we appropriated for fiscal year 1997. In order to match last year's amount, we would have to add nearly $239 million to the budget. Second, Mr. Chairman, the budget for housing has been reduced by some 13 percent from last year's appropriated amount. This is the heart of quality of life and I am not certain that we can leave it at the requested level. I know that the Department is attempting to put into place a new public-private housing initiative, the De- partment of Defense family housing improvement fund, which al- lows the private sector to participate in our housing programs. I fully support that initiative, and indeed one of the first of two of these programs has just been announced at a naval base at Ever- ett, WA. But this program is in its infancy and I am not certain there is any justification for the substantial reduction in the budget for family housing. Third, Mr. Chairman, I have looked through this budget and I have found that the only category which actually experiences an in- crease over last year is for NATO infrastructure. The request is slightly over last year's amount, but is greater than the entire amount requested for the Guard and Reserves. I have to ask, what is wrong with this picture? We gut the American National Guard and Reserve and plus-up the amounts for allied construction in Europe. And I thought the cold war was over. Having said all this, Mr. Chairman, I warmly greet Messrs. Pirie and Coleman, Assistant Secretaries of the Navy and the Air Force. Each of them have been most helpful to this committee in the past and I know that they are concerned about the budget problems that I have just cited, and I know that whatever can be done to correct them, each of us will do so.