Mugu Commander to Testify at Hearing

Point Mugu’s commanding officer and Ventura County’s two congressmen plan to testify on behalf of the threatened Navy base next week in an hourlong presentation designed to prevent the shutdown of Point Mugu.

Adm. Dana B. McKinney will join community representatives at a public hearing in San Francisco on May 25 in a show of the Navy’s support for the base that a federal commission has added to the Pentagon’s recommended closure list.

Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley) said he was delighted to learn that McKinney would join him and Rep. Anthony C. Beilenson (D-Woodland Hills) at the hearing before the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission.

The congressmen learned of McKinney’s pending testimony from his boss, Adm. William E. Newman, who pledged the Navy’s full commitment to saving the base.

“Today’s meeting gave us clear indication the Navy is as opposed to closing Mugu as we are,” Gallegly said in a statement. “Adm. Newman made it very clear that he’s willing to go to the mat on this with the rest of us.”

Beilenson said he was encouraged by Wednesday’s meeting. “Our work is cut out for us, but it is now obvious that the Navy agrees with our position,” he said.

Until this point, the Navy has cautiously avoided participating in local efforts to preserve Point Mugu and its 9,000 jobs.

Three of the base-closing commissioners are scheduled to tour Point Mugu on May 30.

They are Al Cornella, a South Dakota businessman and Vietnam-era Navy veteran; Rebecca G. Cox, an airline executive and wife of Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach), and Benjamin F. Montoya, a retired admiral and chief executive of a utility company in New Mexico.

Gallegly said he remains displeased that the commissioners won’t see the base before hearing community testimony on Point Mugu’s importance to the nation’s military.

Yet he said the timing of the visit will not be critical to Point Mugu’s fate. “We are confident that our arguments are going to make the difference, not their appreciation of the landscape.”