Community Correspondence - 144 Letters from Concerned Citizens - Crane Page: 3 of 144

                                
BRAC Commission
10 July 2005
Admiral (Ret.) Harold Gehman                                  JUL 14 2005
Commisioner                                                    Received
Base Realignment and Closure Commision
2521 South Clark Street, Suite 600
Arlington, VA 22202
Dear Admiral Gehman:
I am writing this letter as a member of the defense community and as a taxpayer.
I am particularly concerned with the move of the Chemical/Biological function from
Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division (Crane Chem/Bio), located on
NAVSUPPACT CRANE, IN to the US Army's Edgewood Chemical Biological Center
in Aberdeen, Maryland. I have several specific concerns as follows:
I Cost:
The whole goal of the BRAC act was to save DOD money by eliminating unneeded
facilities.
According to the Department of Defense Base Closure and Realignment Report, Volume
I, Part 2 of 2: Detailed Recommendations dated May 2005 (BRAC Report), section 8:
Recommendations - Medical Joint Cross-Services Group, "Joint Centers of Excellence
for Chemical, Biological, and Medical Research and Development and Acquisition"
(BRAC report pages Med-15 to Med-19) total twenty year savings for moving a
maximum of 559 direct jobs and 582 indirect jobs from various activities to Aberdeen
Proving Ground were given as $46.0 M.
I believe that these savings were grossly over exaggerated and that moving Crane
Chem/Bio results in increased costs to the taxpayer to perform the same work.
I will base the discussion from this point on the MED CR0028R COBRA Results As of 5
May 2005 (Cobra) (Which, by the way, does not agree with the jobs numbers reported in
the BRAC report) and on the reported labor rates for the affected facilities.
A. One time costs.
Cobra reports one time costs for moving Crane Chem/Bio as $3,775,974 (Cobra page 12)
with no one-time cost savings. Note that Crane Chem Bio's 49 work years represent 20%
of the total Chem/Bio force being moved to Aberdeen. Therefore 20% of the Aberdeen
Mil-Con costs are accountable to the Crane Chem/Bio relocation. Cobra reports one time
Mil-Con costs at Aberdeen of $11,911,931. Crane's portion would be 20% or $2,382,386

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