Impending Closure of Ft. Ord Draws Numerous Pet Projects

The impending closure of Ft. Ord has sparked a massive lobbying effort in Monterey County by residents, businesses and government officials who all have pet projects for the sprawling coastal Army base.

Some of the ideas sound practical: a state college campus, a retirement community, an industrial park, an oceanographic research center, an Internal Revenue Service center.

Some are more whimsical: an immense amusement park.

Others seem simply bizarre: a German military base.

Whatever the final choices, local officials hope the future use of the 28,000-acre fort--an area the size of San Francisco--will be decided quickly.

Ft. Ord is scheduled to shut down in the mid-1990s when the 7th Light Infantry Division moves to Ft. Lewis in Washington state. The departure of 20,000 soldiers and civilian jobs would strip $500 million a year from the Monterey County economy.

That’s why local leaders hope to winnow down the many ideas for the future of the base into a few viable uses that can be quickly implemented.

“Thousands of ideas have been promoted from all sorts of people,” said Ret. Army Lt. Gen. James Moore, head of the Ft. Ord Community Task Force. “Some want to leave all the property in its natural state, some want to develop the whole thing and most want something in between.”

The most controversial issue is what to do with the base’s four miles of beaches and sand dunes. Environmental groups, a number of local politicians and residents of upscale cities such as Carmel and Pacific Grove want this stretch of coastline preserved as a state park.

But the grittier Army towns adjacent to the base--Marina, Seaside and Sand City--stand to lose most from the departure of so many military paychecks. Fearing hard times, officials and merchants there see hotels and other development as a way to to replace lost jobs and tax dollars.

“Nine-nine percent of my customers are military, so when this base closes, I’ll probably have to close down too . . . along with a lot of my neighbors,” said Leila Calamia, owner of Jimmy-Lei’s Pawnbroker, located in a small Marina shopping center. “We need development to replace all those lost jobs.”

While the future of the fort’s coastline is in dispute, there is consensus that the inland section of the base would make an ideal site for a state university. San Jose State University officials have expressed interest in obtaining about 700 acres for the school’s satellite campus, now in Salinas.

A number of federal agencies also have inquired about the property. Officials at the Naval Post-Graduate School and the Defense Language Institute, both in Monterey, have expressed interest in the thousands of duplexes and townhouses that serve as family housing at Ft. Ord.

Defense Department officials also acknowledged they have discussed with the German government the possibility of establishing a military air base in the United States, because Germany’s often overcast weather offers few days for military flights.

“At one of our meetings we asked if we had a choice between the German army and the IRS, could we vote for the German army,” quipped Dick Goblirsch, city manager of Sand City.

While a German military base is the longest of long shots, many of the other ideas stand a reasonable chance. The fort is likely to be subdivided into a number of different uses.

Assemblyman Sam Farr (D-Carmel) is promoting a project for the property “that would make the Monterey Bay a world center for marine research.” The National Oceanic and Aeronautics Administration, which has an office in Monterey, might move to the property, he said. The state university campus also could devote resources to marine studies and private research groups, specializing in oceanography, could obtain base land.

“This area could be like a mini-Silicon Valley, but focusing on ocean research instead of computers,” Farr said. “It has tremendous potential.”

Monterey County has had an economy based almost entirely on agriculture, tourism and the military. Now that the military is leaving, the best way to promote the remaining two industries is by building an international airport at Ft. Ord, said Monterey County Supervisor Marc Del Piero.

Among the more unpopular proposals were those from Japanese investors who were intrigued by the base’s vast acreage and its two 18-hole golf courses.

But before many of these proposals become a reality, a plan must be developed to clean up toxic contamination left after six decades as an Army base. Ft. Ord, a U. S. Environmental Protection Agency Superfund clean-up site, has more than 7,000 acres contaminated with petroleum products, benzene and lead. Under current federal guidelines, the contaminated area must be cleaned up before any of the base is made available for development.

The clean-up could take more than 20 years, but federal legislation was recently proposed to speed up the process and allow development on uncontaminated parcels.

“Twenty years is simply not acceptable,” said U. S. Rep. Leon Panetta (D-Monterey). “You can’t stick a community with a white elephant for that long.”

The Army has until 1997 to shut down the base. But the first troops will begin moving out in the summer of 1993 and the entire division should be gone by the end of the following year, Panetta said.

Some officials hope that the university and a number of federal agencies can relocate to the base immediately after the troops leave, with private industry to follow. If the property is effectively developed, the area’s affordable housing problem could be solved and the county eventually could have a stronger economic base, local officials say. But they fear that a lengthy delay would have serious economic consequences.

A model of the worst case scenario is Hamilton Air Force Base in Marin County, said Farr. The military closed the base in 1974, but the community is still squabbling about whether to allow private development on the 2,000-acre site.

“We’re trying to avoid a situation where the base is mothballed, the Army is gone, and we don’t have any way to replace that missing payroll,” Farr said. “That’s why we’re doing all this planning now.”

The Ft. Ord Task Force, headed largely by local politicians, plans to hold public hearings on the various ideas for the fort and submit a recommendation to county officials by the end of 1992.

One of the communities that will suffer the greatest economic impact from the base closure is Marina. Its current population is 28,000, but once the troops leave, it will drop to 13,000. Businessmen like Paul Johnson, who owns a 108-unit apartment building in Marina--with the majority of his tenants soldiers--will be fighting for survival.

“I’m trying to stockpile as much money as I can to get me through the hard times,” Johnson said. “I’ve got a $33,000-a-month mortgage payment on the building. When the soldiers leave . . . I don’t know who is going to replace them.”