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The Belvoir Shuffle
 By Tom Shoop | Thursday, October 11, 2007  |  01:03 PM

Let me get this straight: First the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission votes to shift thousands of jobs from leased facilities in northern Virginia to Fort Belvoir. Then, when it becomes clear that this will create a traffic nightmare, officials push the idea of instead moving some of the folks to land in Springfield, Va., that is currently home to General Services Administration warehouses.

Now, the Washington Post reports, the Springfield site faces some competition from a piece of property in Alexandria that developers are pushing the Army to consider. Some or all of the jobs slated for Springfield could ultimately end up at the Alexandria site.

It's now starting to look like this shift --which affects about 6,000 of the more than 22,000 jobs originally targeted for consolidation at Fort Belvoir -- will simply move people out of one set of leased space in Virginia to another. If that's the case, my question is: Why bother? Wasn't the whole point of the BRAC move to get these agencies out of leased offices and onto a military base?



Comments


Don't worry about it. No one will move to a leased building in Alexandria. Everyone got upset with so many jobs coming into the Springfield area, and now everyone is mad about the idea that they won't come there. This new idea is being used to put the scare into some of those folks...you don't know how good you got it until you don't have it any more. With all the complaining about traffic congestion, etc., the next BRAC should move as many organizations as possible out of the Northern Virginia area. There are plenty of military installations that would welcome them and it would be cheaper in the long run. The only mistake with the current BRAC is that they should not be moving more people into northern Virginia, but should be moving more people out. What the heck, keep Fort Monmouth open and send everyone there, then put Fort Belvoir on the next BRAC list for closure. Pretty scary, huh?

Wally V  | Wednesday, October 17, 2007 |  02:08 PM


I was caught in a BRAC when they moved my agency from space leased from GSA to space leased from NASA. It didn't make sense then and it still doesn't make sense 10 years later. (And the GSA space was cheaper.)

Michelle  | Friday, October 12, 2007 |  11:35 AM


Who said bureaucracies are efficient, for that matter, has any bureaucracy in the history of government ever been efficient? BRAC not a political process, P-L-E-A-S-E; NAS Cecil Field was closed so that the squadrons could be moved to VA in an already over crowded area with encroachment on the airfield, that made perfect sense. Cecil Field was in the middle of no where with buffers and room for expansion. Oh, JAX had three navy bases they could afford to give up one. That's right Tom, why move? I say instead of BRAC we should have CRAC, Congress Realignment And Closure.

A FED  | Thursday, October 11, 2007 |  01:25 PM


BRAC was a trick to save congress from hard decisions. The BRAC commissioners could play God with no fear of hard questions.

Wise Old Owl  | Thursday, October 11, 2007 |  01:21 PM



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Government Executive Editor Tom Shoop takes a look at news and events affecting the federal bureaucracy, from the perspective of a longtime observer of government.

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