Aberdeen pushes forward amid BRAC resistance from New Jersey

BALTIMORE (Map, News) - Preparations for thousands of new jobs at Aberdeen Proving Ground are moving forward despite ongoing efforts to halt the Base Realignment and Closure transfer at its largest source.

New facilities are being built, gates and roads are being upgraded, and contractors are being sought for the next phase of building, regional BRAC manager Karen Holt told Harford officials at a quarterly meeting this week.

“Anyone who goes on post can see the dirt is moving, that old buildings are gone, and preparations are being made to put up the new buildings,” Holt said Tuesday.

But Fort Monmouth, N.J., which is slated to close and have about 8,000 of its jobs moved to Aberdeen, is still putting up a fight.

A lawsuit will be heard July 24 in U.S federal court seeking to stop the transfer.

The 2005 decision to close the New Jersey base was invalid because congressional testimony from an Army official on the high cost for closing and relocating the base was ignored or suppressed, said Eugene LaVergne, attorney for the American Federation of Local Government Employees Local 1904.

Maryland is preparing for the transfer, given that no BRAC decision has been overturned, Holt said.

“We’re at the halfway point now, and the clock is ticking,” she said.

“There’s about a billion dollars’ worth of construction going on at the Proving Ground at this point, so it seems pretty irreversible,” said County Councilman Richard Slutzky, of Aberdeen.

Opening in the fall is the first laboratory building at the “Gate” project, where Army land is being leased to private developers so defense contractors can have offices and facilities on base, Holt said.

While construction proceeds on the $477 million campus for the workers from Monmouth, the Army has set a July 30 deadline for contractors bidding to build the new Army Test and Evaluation Command headquarters, a proposed $25 million to $100 million facility at Aberdeen employing about 610 people.

To meet the increase in workers, several of the entrance gates are being moved and expanded, and local officials will conduct a feasibility study in mid-July for a “multimodal” transit center combining MARC train service, MTA buses and park-and-ride facilities, Holt said.

msantoni@baltimoreexaminer.com

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