The U.S. Senate has called for another round of military base closures.
A companion bill from the House says nothing of the kind.
So it will be compromise legislation , now being cooked up in Washington , that will give local leaders their next hint of whether San Diego County will feel a new wave of base closures.
As yet, there is no list of bases that might be closed, or turned over to another purpose.
A House-Senate conference committee is taking up base closures as part of a wider effort to come up with a defense authorization bill.
The committee first met last week and will likely spend 2 & #733; weeks on the compromise bill, said Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-El Cajon, who sits on the conference panel.
The legislation would not close the bases by itself. Rather, it would set the ground rules for identifying bases that will close.
The senate called for a base closure round with a 53-47 vote Sept. 25. California’s senators , Democrats Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein , opposed the bill.
One week later, the Senate approved a $345 billion defense authorization bill , with a base closure provision , on a vote of 99-0.
The House approved its $343 billion defense authorization bill 398-17 on Sept. 26.
If a compromise bill containing base closures gets House, Senate and White House approval, the base closure ritual will begin.
As in past years, a commission will draw up a list of bases to be closed or given new tenants. Congress will only be able to approve or reject the list as a whole; it will not be able to amend the list.
The bill the Senate considered in September called for the base closure commission to start meeting in early 2003 and finish its job by the end of the year.
According to one congressional source, lawmakers have used the war against terrorism as an argument both for and against base closures.
A person could argue the United States should not be cutting bases when it is at war.
Then again, another person could argue that the money saved by closing bases could be poured into the war effort.
Hunter said he is concerned about the time it takes to bring former military bases out of federal care.
The government has not yet disposed of 55 percent of the land covered by four previous rounds of base closures, he said.
Hunter said the Department of Defense should dispose of current property before it initiates another round of base closures.
“What really drives costs in the DoD is payroll,” Hunter added.
He said the department has a very large number of people in its acquisition bureaucracy, noting he has tried to cut that amount
