Lennar Corp. is several months away from signing a term sheet with the state-supported China Development Bank to invest $1.7 billion in Treasure Island and Hunters Point Naval Shipyard, two key base redevelopment projects in San Francisco. San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee last week said the loan “is very important to our city, and we’re not letting it go,” Bloomberg News reported …
Acknowledging there will not be a BRAC round next year, Secretary Panetta told more than 600 attendees Monday at the ADC 2012 Annual Conference that the nation’s fiscal challenges will continue to drive the need for DOD to pare its infrastructure at the same time it reduces its end strength. “Our budget made tough decisions to cut the size of the force. It would be irresponsible for us not to cut excess infrastructure and overhead as well,” Panetta said. And while it wasn’t a surprise that Congress shot down the department’s request to hold a new BRAC round in 2013, the Monterey native said it was an important topic to broach, and a debate that must continue …
Top administration officials now say the Defense Department never intended to carry out a BRAC round in 2013. That revelation came out at a House Armed Services Committee hearing Wednesday on the potential impact of budget sequestration when the panel questioned Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter and Acting Director of the Office of Management and Budget Jeffrey Zients. Rep. Rob Wittman asked the two witnesses to reconcile the Pentagon’s request at the beginning of the year for new BRAC rounds in 2013 and 2015 with President Obama’s comment last month that he does not support a new round of base closures …
Last week’s return of the former Fort Ritchie, Md., by Corporate Office Properties Trust to the entity originally created to oversee its reuse, PenMar Development Corp., followed a November 2009 federal court ruling that the Army failed to adequately assess the environmental impact of COPT’s new master plan. The decision stemmed from a lawsuit filed by two area residents claiming that COPT’s plan was significantly different than the one approved by Pen Mar in 1997 …
The bold redevelopment planned for the former Naval Station Treasure Island is slated to become a regional destination for the San Francisco Bay area distinguished by innovative urban planning strategies and an unparalleled commitment to environmental stewardship. The reuse project will take advantage of the latest standards of the profession related to construction technologies, transportation, urban design, waste systems, adaptive reuse of historic structures, landscape architecture and habitat management. For shepherding the transformation of Treasure Island and the adjacent Yerba Buena Island from the formative planning years through an intensive entitlement process, ADC is awarding …
The Air Force is adopting natural techniques to clean up closed bases as part of a larger initiative to turn closed bases into environmentally friendly and energy-efficient places to do business. At the former Chanute Air Force Base in Rantoul, Ill., the Air Force is employing “evapotranspiration” to combat groundwater contamination. As the Air Force Real Property Agency explains it, “Environmental engineers at the former installation planted [poplar] trees around landfills located at the site …
The year 2011 was filled with accomplishments for the Fort Chaffee Redevelopment Authority, as it generated a historic high in revenue and recorded a number of successes in its effort to convert 7,000 acres at the former Army post in northwestern Arkansas into the mixed-use community now called Chaffee Crossing. For its tremendous progress in creating workforce, housing, commercial and recreational opportunities, ADC has named Fort Chaffee Redevelopment Authority, led by executive director Ivy Owen, the Base Redevelopment Project of the Year …
Friends of Fort Rucker has asked four communities neighboring the Alabama post to raise a little more than $200,000 each of the next three years to hire consultants to help local leaders prepare for the next round of base closures. The group’s first task is conducting a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats analysis for Rucker, located in the southeastern corner of Alabama, reported the Dothan Eagle. The next step would be hiring a Washington consultant to look out for the interests of Rucker and the community. Unlike the approach base supporters adopted during BRAC 2005, they will employ defensive and offensive strategies in the next base closure round, according to the story.
PenMar Development Corp., the entity created in 1997 to oversee redevelopment of Fort Ritchie after it closed, has taken the property back from Corporate Office Properties Trust following several months of discussions between the two parties, the development corp. announced Tuesday. PenMar had sold the 591-acre site, located in central Maryland just over the Pennsylvania border, to COPT in 2006 for $9 million. The developer paid PenMar $5 million at the time; the remainder wasn’t due until 2016 …
Nine months after workers completed its chemical weapons disposal mission, Umatilla Chemical Depot in northern Oregon was deactivated last week by the Army after 71 years of use. Many of the 830 workers with contractor URS when incineration was finished remain at Umatilla helping to dismantle the chemical agent disposal facility. About 100 jobs are being cut by the end of this year, and 550 will be eliminated next year, reported the News Tribune. Most remaining employees will leave by the end of 2014. Reuse of the depot will follow the BRAC process, thanks to special legislation in the fiscal 2012 defense authorization bill. About 7,400 acres of the 20,000-acre facility will be transferred to the Oregon National Guard in about six months. Other potential reuses include as a wildlife refuge, or for farming or industrial use.