Panel’s Base Closings Hit List Is Expanded : Military: Federal commission targets eight facilities, including eliminating Naval Air Station at Point Mugu, as well as McClellan. About 12,000 civilian jobs could be affected.

A federal commission expanded the Pentagon’s list of proposed military base closings Wednesday, targeting another eight installations in California whose shutdown, if ordered, could cost the state another 12,000 civilian jobs.

The additions include McClellan Air Force Base near Sacramento and its Defense Logistics Agency maintenance depot, the Army’s sprawling port facilities at Oakland and the Naval Air Station at Point Mugu near Oxnard, which does missile testing work.

The Pentagon previously had targeted McClellan’s air logistics center for possible downsizing. But on Wednesday, the commission added the depot and said it will consider eliminating the entire base as well because the rest of the installation would not be needed if the depot and the logistics center were shut down.

Commission officials stressed that Wednesday’s action does not necessarily mean that the added bases will be ordered closed when the panel--known formally as the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission--makes its final recommendations July 1.

Commission Chairman Alan J. Dixon said that in many cases the commission merely expanded the list to make sure it considers a wide range of alternatives. “It means the commission believes a fuller evaluation of the base is a reasonable thing to undertake,” he said.

Nevertheless, the move is certain to raise concerns, with many communities destined to lose income, at least temporarily, if the bases are shut down or moved. The state’s congressional delegation has been protesting the proposed cutbacks vigorously.

The California bases were among 32 installations nationwide that the commission added Wednesday to the Pentagon’s original list of 119 bases. It also recommended the complete closure of six others--including McClellan--previously targeted for cutbacks.

The 1995 round of base closings, the fourth that the government has conducted since the end of the Cold War, is designed to rid the nation’s military of costly and unneeded installations as the services shrink.

Defense analysts have warned that unless the services can close unneeded bases, they will not save the money needed to maintain military preparedness and to modernize weapons in the face of the sharp decline in defense spending.

The Pentagon had planned to shut a great many bases during the 1995 round but ended up proposing a relatively small number, partly to avoid more political opposition and partly to avert the high initial costs of shutting facilities.

Even so, military officials said that the services must close or consolidate most of the installations that they have proposed or they will not have enough money in coming years to meet their needs for troops and equipment.

The commission is scheduled to review the Pentagon’s list between now and late June and unveil its recommendations by July 1. After that, Congress and the President have two months to accept the proposals intact or to send them back for reworking.

The commission also voted to add four smaller California facilities to the list. The Navy initially proposed closing them, but they were omitted by the Defense Department on the grounds that California’s economy was being hit hard by other closures.

The four include the Fleet and Industrial Supply Center in Oakland, the Naval Warfare Assessment Detachment in Corona, the Engineering Field Activity at San Bruno and the office of the supervisor of shipbuilding, conversion and repair in San Francisco.

The General Accounting Office, the congressional watchdog agency, had criticized the Defense Department for omitting the four bases and McClellan Air Force Base from the original list, which was made public Feb. 28.

Although the Pentagon is supposed to consider the impact on the local economy when deciding base-closing recommendations, the GAO noted that the exceptions granted to California were the only ones the Defense Department made.

Although closing the missile testing facility at Point Mugu would affect about 9,000 jobs, most of them would be moved to the installation’s sister base at China Lake in the Mojave Desert, commission officials said.

Shutting the four smaller installations would involve far fewer civilian job losses. Panel figures show that the supply center at Oakland has 1,052 jobs; the facility at Corona, 800 jobs; the engineering facility at Bruno, 237 jobs, and the port supervisor’s office, eight jobs.

In all, 22 military installations have been closed in California since the base closings began in 1988. The current round proposed by the Pentagon would eliminate another 34,200 civilian jobs nationwide, not counting Wednesday’s additions.

The decision to target McClellan for possible closing, rather than just for reductions, was a slap at the Air Force, which had hoped to cut back its depot operations more gradually. But the commission noted that the other services are eliminating several of their depots.