Officials call for inquiry into Fort closure

Six Monmouth County Assembly members sent letters April 23 to Governor Jon Corzine and United States Attorney Chris Christie asking them to intervene in the closing of Fort Monmouth.

Assemblywoman Mary Pat Angelini and Assemblyman David Rible from District 11, Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande and Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon from District 12, and Assemblywoman Amy Handlin and Assemblyman Sam Thompson from District 13 all signed the letters.

“The process by which Fort Monmouth was chosen to be closed should outrage every citizen with an interest in good government,” said O’Scanlon. “It goes beyond the importance of the Fort in the war on terror, which is considerable. The fact that our Federal Government would make decisions in this way-lying to achieve an end driven by political considerations rather than following the truth to its natural conclusion – is an insult to every American, and further undermines our already shaky confidence in the government that it will do what is right.”

In the letter to Christie, the assembly members refer to “a mountain of evidence” that had been uncovered previously showing that Army officials “deliberately skewed and concealed data.”

The letter continues that if the concealed information was known at the time of the base closing commission’s decisions, the outcome would have been to retain the Army facilities at Fort Monmouth. 

“We are on this day urging Governor Corzine to direct the State to intervene in a pending civil lawsuit challenging the decision to abandon Fort Monmouth and we write to you to request that your office undertake a review of the enumerable false statements and actions by Army officials and/or others which resulted in a complete distortion of the data upon which the base closing commission based its decision,” it states in the letter to Christie. 

In the letter, the assembly members also write that the actions by army officials in the matter are already the subject of a federal lawsuit initiated by an employees’ union. 

The letter to Corzine states, “While you have made it clear on many occasions that you oppose the closing of Fort Monmouth there is a growing sense that Fort Monmouth supporters are entering a David versus Goliath phase in which only a miracle, notwithstanding your opposition together with the bipartisan assistance of the area’s Congress members, can save the Fort …We write to urge the State to throw its full weight behind the pending federal lawsuit by intervening in its own behalf and in behalf of the residents and commercial enterprises of the Monmouth County area. The Fort employees are most directly affected.”

According to the letters, various cost estimates dealing with the overall costs of moving the Fort operations to Maryland were deliberately deflated and skewed. 

“We urge U.S Attorney Christie and Attorney General Anne Milgram, at the urging of the Governor, to join the battle, even at this late date, to save Fort Monmouth,” said O’ Scanlon.