2 Local Navy Facilities to Join Forces

After years of consolidating services, Ventura County’s two naval bases will soon become one in an administrative move designed to save money.

The Naval Construction Battalion Center in Port Hueneme and the Point Mugu Naval Air Weapons Station will officially merge Oct. 11 and be called Naval Base Ventura County.

“There will be a single command authority established here for the Navy in Ventura County,” said Navy spokeswoman Teri Reid. “It’s one base with two different sites.”

Capt. James Rainwater, who heads Point Mugu, will command the new base. Capt. Jim McConnell will remain the head of the 31st Naval Construction Regiment at Port Hueneme, which includes four Seabee battalions and the Seabee logistics center.

The bases have been consolidating services, such as public affairs, finance and safety, since October 1998, Reid said, but “our missions remain the same.”

Consolidating the bases should save the Pentagon $6 million between 1998 and 2001, Reid said. “Each base having its own services was not the most cost-effective course.”

A combined 8,552 military personnel, 6,605 civilians and 1,329 contractors work at the two bases, Reid said. While some jobs have remained open through attrition and retirement, no new jobs should be lost because of the consolidation.

Some Navy veterans expressed support for the consolidation.

“I think it’ll be better for the Navy to come under one command rather than duplicating everything,” said retired Seabee Henry Knowles, 75. “I think it’ll be a benefit to the bases.”

Knowles worked as a Seabee with stints at Port Hueneme from 1943 to 1974, then as a civilian at Point Mugu for about a decade in the 1980s and 1990s.

But, Knowles added, the two bases had a rivalry, which might be mellowed by the merger.

As it adapts to a changing world, the military must cut costs, said LeRoy Miller, 69, who retired from the Port Hueneme base in 1978 as a master chief equipment operator.

“Things have to go through a certain evolution,” Miller said. “I don’t see any problem with them combining. I really think it’s probably a money-saving, smart move.”

An invitation-only ceremony at Point Mugu will mark the merger Oct. 11.

“The [Naval Air Station] flag will be lowered,” Reid said.

Navy Base Ventura County will be both an aviation major shore command and a major naval construction force mobilization base, she said.

All segments of the new base will probably remain committed to the same goals they have always had, Knowles said.

“We’ve all got to cooperate,” he said. “We’re all here for the same business.”