Patriots Alliance: Focus on fort jobs, not land
Group endorses Kyrillos’ legislation to create redevelopment authority
BY SUE MORGAN
Staff Writer

Boosting the morale of

Fort Monmouth’s current work force and its subcontracted employees is the top priority for two leaders of the Patriots Alliance, an advocacy group for military subcontractors.

To Patriots Alliance co-chairs Frank Muzzi and S. Thomas Gagliano, the buzzword is not land but jobs, specifically those of the 5,000 government workers and approximately 4,000 to 5,000 subcontractor employees, who ought to be the focus of any discussion of the military installation’s future.

As staunch proponents of creating an official Fort Mon-

mouth Redevelopment Authority (FMRA), both Muzzi and Gagliano believe that pending legislation sponsored by state Sen. Joseph M. Kyrillos (R-13) is key to ensuring that those jobs still exist for now and after the base’s scheduled closing in September 2011.

This week, Muzzi and Gagliano responded to criticism of the Kyrillos bill, expressed by members of the five-month-old Fort Monmouth Reuse Committee (FMRC), a multijurisdictional entity with representatives of the fort’s three host communities, county government, the state, and the private sector.

Kyrillos introduced his legislation to create a formal, nine-member redevelopment authority charged with overseeing new uses for the fort’s land, structures and facilities for the base’s 1,126 acres to the state Senate on Jan. 10.

Four of the redevelopment authority’s nine voting members would be appointed by Gov. Jon S. Corzine under the bill.

The other five voting members of the FMRA endorsed by Kyrillos would be the state’s Secretary of Commerce, Economic Growth, and Tourism; a representative of the county freeholder board; and the mayors of the three host communities –– Eatontown, Tinton Falls,and Oceanport.

Known as S-1049, the legislation is now under review by the Senate Economic Growth Committee.

FMRC members, particularly those representing the host communities, have complained that if S-1049 garners the approval of the Legislature and Corzine, most of the decisions regarding the fort’s future will be made by state representatives with the county and municipal governments having minimal say in the process.

But Muzzi and Gagliano, who are both senior vice presidents of separate military subcontracting firms, argue that state involvement on the FMRA is necessary because all of New Jersey, not just Monmouth and Ocean County, will be impacted by the fort’s shutdown under the Pentagon’s Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process.

Because S-1049 requires that at least one of the gubernatorial appointees be a Monmouth County resident, the FMRA will actually have more input from the municipalities and the region than the state, said Muzzi, of Eatontown-based MTC Technologies.

“It’s not a local development situation,” Muzzi said. “The impact [of Fort Monmouth’s closing] upon the state economy could be $3.5 billion.”

Federal law requires communities and regions impacted by base closures to set up a state-endorsed redevelopment authority before funding from the Defense Department’s Office of Economic Adjustment (OEA) can be released to find new uses for the government-owned land, Gagliano explained.

“The Kyrillos bill is a very good way to approach the need for an authority,” said Gagliano, of Tinton Falls-based EPS. “Under BRAC [federal] law, a redevelopment authority must be established.”

The proposed FMRA would focus on broader issues than the existing FMRC, which Muzzi and Gagliano say has been concentrating more on land use than on preserving the jobs of the fort’s more than 5,000 civilian employees and another 4,000 to 5,000 workers employed by subcontractors such as MTC and EPS.

The two firms specialize in command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, known collectively as C4ISR for the U.S. Army.

“We certainly don’t denigrate the efforts of the {FMRC],” Gagliano said. “But the jobs of over 5,000 people and another 4,000 people working for [subcontractor] companies are in jeopardy. We want to do everything possible to help them.”

Under the BRAC process endorsed by the Pentagon, the bulk of Fort Monmouth’s civilian workforce, largely composed of engineers and scientists and their staffs, would be required to relocate to the Aberdeen (Md.) Proving Ground if they wish to retain their jobs.

Subcontractors such as those involved in the Patriots Alliance do not want to see that happen nor do they wish to move their operations and employees to Maryland, Muzzi and Gagliano pointed out.

Faced with the decision of either uprooting their families and moving out-of-state or losing their jobs, many federal and subcontractor workers might simply decide to seek employment elsewhere, Gagliano said.

“We’re very concerned about the morale of the people working at [Fort Monmouth],” Gagliano said.

With the governor and state representatives on board, the FMRA would be in a better position to attract well-paying high technology jobs to the Fort Monmouth property that could be filled by the government workers, Muzzi said.

Corzine’s business acumen could prove useful in courting established technological firms to locate at the base, he added.

“Governor Corzine has a business background. He might have the contacts that could bring in people that might be interested in high tech,” Muzzi said.

The Patriots Alliance has no doubt that the fort’s land is desirable real estate for a number of commercial, residential or office uses, Gagliano said.

“We’re very satisfied that it is very valuable, valuable land,” Gagliano said. “But we’re looking at the jobs that are there now and the job potential for the future.”

“We’d like to see high tech jobs there with high tech salaries,” he continued. “People would be attracted to those jobs.”

At the recommendation of the Patriots Alliance leadership, the redevelopment authority ultimately established by S-1049 will be authorized to apply to the OEA for $300,000 in start-up funding for its operation, Gagliano said.

That funding would be used in part to hire an executive director “who would be a key person to be chosen as a result of a far-reaching search,” he said.

The executive director hired by the FMRA should be experienced with base closures, Gagliano added.

Last fall, the existing FMRC applied to OEA for $315,000 in start-up funding. The application remains on hold until the state legislature shows support for the Eatontown-based group, according to John Leigh, a program manager for the OEA.

Should the FMRC receive the $315,000, it would be eligible to receive $35,000 in matching funds for its efforts from the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (DCA), according to state Secretary of Commerce Virginia Bauer, who co-chairs the FMRC with Eatontown Mayor Gerald J. Tarantolo.

While endorsing Kyrillos’ bill, the two business leaders say they are looking forward to reviewing a separate piece of legislation designed to create a redevelopment authority that has been proposed by state Senator Ellen Karcher and Assemblyman Michael Panter, both (D-12).

To date, that legislation is still in the process of being crafted, according to spokespersons for both Karcher and Panter.

Tarantolo, Tinton Falls Mayor Peter Maclearie and Oceanport Mayor Lucille Chaump have indicated that they have met with Karcher and Panter to discuss the forthcoming bill’s contents and to ensure that their jurisdictions’ interests are adequately addressed in its language.

All three mayors are among the seven voting members of the existing FMRC as is Bauer.

The Kyrillos bill does provide that the local municipalities will retain planning and zoning power over the portion of the Fort Monmouth land physically located in each community once the military vacates the premises.

However, Eatontown Borough Council President Theodore F. Lewis a nonvoting member of the FMRC is expected to ask his council colleagues to consider passing a resolution addressing the makeup of the redevelopment authority proposed by the Kyrillos bill.

If S-1049 is approved, Eatontown would only have one voice, that of its mayor, involved in the decision-making process about Fort Monmouth, Lewis has said.