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Home My WebLink About5.1 Air National Guard CITY CLERK File # 420-50 AGENDA STATEMENT CITY COUNCIL MEETING DATE: August 5, 2003 SUBJECT: Consideration of Request by City of Mountain View to oppose the relocation of the California Air National Guard 129th Rescue Wing from Moffett Federal Airfield to Castle Airport in Atwater, CA Report Prepared by: Christopher L. Foss Economic Development Director ATTACHMENTS: 1. Letter fi.om City of Mountain View (Mayor Kasperzak) 2. Draft letter opposing the relocation of 129th Rescue Wing RECOMMENDATION.' ~,~, ~/ Receive report and provide Staff with appropriate direction relative to City of Mountain View's request regarding the potential relocation of the California Air National Guard 129th Rescue Wing. FINANCIAL STATEMENT: None. DESCRIPTION: Mayor Lockhart recently received a letter from the Mayor of Mountain View requesting that the Dublin City Council oppose the potential relocation of the California Air National Guard 129th Rescue Wing from Moffett Federal Airfield to Castle Airport in Atwater, California (Attachment 1). The City of Mountain View is very concerned about the validity of the draft Environmental Assessment (EA) that was prepared for the proposed relocation, and they are concerned about the strategic importance of retaining the Rescue Wing at Moffett in the event of a natural or manmade disaster in the Bay Area. At the request of Mayor Lockhart, Staff has placed this item on this agenda for discussion and consideration. Staff has also prepared a draft letter opposing the relocation for your review (Attachment 2). RECOMMENDATION: Receive report and provide Staff with appropriate direction relative to the City of Mountain View's request regarding the potential relocation of the California Air National Guard 129th Rescue Wing. COPIES TO: ITEM NO. H/cc-forms/agdastmt. doc [ July 15, 2003 The Honorable Janet Lockhart City of Dublin 100 Civic Plaza Dublin, CA 94568 Dear Mayor Lockhart: On behalf of the Mountain View City Council, I am writing to you to ask you and your city council to contact Governor Gray Davis, members of your Congressional delegation and Air Force Secretary James Roche opposing efforts currently under way to relocate the California Air National Guard 129th Rescue Wing (129 RQW) from Moffett Federal Airfield to Castle Airport in Atwater, California. The California Air National Guard recently released a draft Environmental Assessment (EA) for the proposed relocation of the 129th RQW from Moffett Federal Airfield to Castle Airport in Atwater. The 129th RQW is citing increasing tenant costs at Moffett Federal Airfield as well as high housing prices in the Bay Area for reasons for the proposed relocation. In its review of the draft EA, Mountain View City staff identified significant concerns with the cost comparison analysis portion of the draft EA that could seriously compromise or perhaps invalidate some of the conclusions reached in the draft EA regarding the perceived benefits of relocating the 129th RQW from Moffett Federal Airfield to Castle Airport. The City believes that these issues and concerns, if not addressed and r ~ct~fl,.d., could result in the C'alifornia Air National Guard making this very important relocation decision based on inaccurate cost information. The Mountain View City Council is also opposing the relocation of the 129th RQW from Moffett Field to Castle Airport because of the strategic importance of retaining the 129th RQW at Moffett in the event of a natural' or manmade disaster in the Bay Area and concerns that the departure of the 129th RQW may lead to other uses of the facilities used by the 129th at Moffett that may be mUch more intrusive and less compatible with the surrounding commUnities and the land use and development plans NASA Ames Research Center currently has for Moffett Federal Airfield. The Mountain View City Council unanimously adopted a position of opposition to the proposed relocation of the 129th RQW at its July 8, 2003 meeting. OFFICE OF THE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL 500 CASTRO STREET, P.O. BOX 7540 · MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA 94039-7540 · 650-903-6305 · FAX 650-903 Attachment The Honorable Janet Lockhart July 15, 2003 Page 2 Additionally, Congresswoman Anna Eshoo and 10 other California House members from the Bay Area delegation sent a letter dated July 8, 2003 to Air Force Secretary James Roche strongly opposing the proposed relocation of the 129th RQW (enclosed). The Santa Clara County Cities Association Board of Directors also unanimously agreed at their July 10, 2003 meeting to oppose the relocation of the 129th RQW. I encourage you to bring this issue before.your city council, Congressional representatives and Air Force Secretary and oppose the move of the 129th RQW from Moffett Field. The concerns and opposition of Bav Area communities to the proposed relocation of the 129th RQW must be made known to decision-makers in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. Please contact me or Deputy City Manager Linda Forsberg at (650) 903-6301 if you have any questions or require additional information. ,~L~c.e~rely, // R. Michael K~p~rzak, Jr. Mayor RMK/LF/6/MGR 601-07-14-03L^ Enclosure cc: Congresswoman Anna Eshoo City Council CM, ACM, DCM U h ngfnn DC 20515 July 8, 2003 The Honorable James G. Roche Department of the Air Force Pentagon, 1670 Air Force, RM 4E871 Washington D.C. 20330-1670 Dear Secretary Roche, Most of us wrote to YOu last year on April 12, 2002, expressing our serious concern and opposition to moving the 129th Rescue Wing from Moffett Federal Airfield in the San Francisco Bay Area. We received a letter from Colonel Groves on June 11, 2002 informing us that the issues we raised in opposition to the move would be taken into serious consideration. We understand you are now reviewing the recommendation to move the 129th Rescue Wing and request that you meet with us at your earliest convenience before you make a final decision. On June 27, 2003 we learned about a very troubling recent disclosure made to Congresswornan Eshoo regarding a move of the 129th Air Rescue Wing from Moffett Federal Air Field to Castle Airport in Merced County, California. Astonishingly, Guard Command has indicated to your staff that no community opposition exists to the move. They further advise that the new hangar recently erected at taxpayer expense for $16 million be abandoned and that an additional $45 million (or more) be spent to reopen a closed California Air Force Base located in the Central Valley. This makes no economic sense given the state of the economy and the investment of tax dollars already made to benefit the Air Force in the Bay Area. The notion that the retention level of trained 129th Rescue Wing personnel will improve is patently false, as is any suggestion that the delegation supports the move. We're outraged that internal Guard documents have been used in presentations to your leadership staff conveying 'no community Opposition' to the relocation. Nothing could be further from the truth. During her decade of service in Congress, Congresswoman Eshoo has consistently sought and secured the delegation's support for the needs of the 129th at Moffett and we have willingly worked with her to make the requests a reality. To suggest in any way that the 129th move and that she supports this is not only incorrect ...it is blatantly wrong. Given the distortions of fact in the Guard Command's report, we want to make certain that you know that NASA Ames has offered to honor the spirit of the commitment made to the Air Force by Dale Compton in his 1993 letter. This means the 129th Rescue Wing's share of the support costs will be limited to the originally agreed upon amount ($1,310K during FY 1995). In addition to this very generous rate (a rollback to 1993 levels), NASA Ames has also agreed to a sign a long-term agreement with 129th Rescue Wing. PRINTED ON RECYCLED PAPER We must underscore the fact that the figures used in Guard Command presentations relative to the cost of living in the Bay Area are grossly exaggerated and based on data calculated during the "dot corn" boom. The cost of living is higher in the Bay Area than ott~er parts of the country, however, the costs of buying or renting homes have recently leveled out and have even declined. Housing for service men and women remains available at Moffett Field, and the local communities are committed to assisting us to identify more affordable housing lo cations. While the additional housing locations may not be in some of the more affluent areas such as Saratoga, there are a number of wonderful cities located less than an hour away that offer readily available, affordable housing. The millions of people who call the Bay Area home are vulnerable to attack. The single largest public safety concern to us now are the possibility o£ terrorist attacks and weapons of mass destruction. As a Member of the House Intelligence Committee, Congresswoman Eshoo has deep concerns on these very issues. The 129,th Rescue Wing is trained for operations in treacherous environments, not to mention the technological abilities they have which enable them to provide a significant level of assistance to State and local disaster management specialists. While the 95th Civil Support Team's (CST) mission is to respond to a WMD attack and is also located in the Bay Area, the 129th can greatly, enhance CST's ability to re.spond to an event in one of our large cities such as San Jose or San Francisco. Moreover, the 129th's centralized location at Moffett Field is an excellent place to locate and establish a state-of-the-art intelligence integration facility for command, control, commurfications and the coordination of incoming intelligence and, if necessary, a triangle or quarantine as an event unfolds such as occurred during the Loma Prieta Earthquake in October, t989. In fact, NASA Ames is very interested in working jointly with the Air Rescue on disaster-preparedness training. The last and most important consideration we would like to share with you concerns the issue of retention. We dismiss the argument that moving away from the Bay Area will increase the retention rate of the 129th. Many of the people in the 129tt' have deep ti.es to our communities, including family, schools, and homes. The men and women of the 129th have not been asked (as a unit) if they wish to remain with the 129th if they are required to move away from the Bay Area. Many have expressed their attachments to the area and their sadness at the prospect of leaving it. Given the magnificent service these brave men and women have performed on our collective behalf, we think it's wrong to ask them to make more sacrifices. We underscore our complete and total opposition to moving the 129th Rescue Wing away from the Bay Area. We urge you to call a halt to this misguided and. questionable effort. To diminish the readiness to respond to a disaster in the Bay Area and Silicon Valley is imprudent, to walk away from millions of dollars of improvements made for the 129th at Moffett is wasteful, and to ignore the significant progress made with NASA on a host of critical issues is baffling. The proposed move could not be made without appropriations of tens of millions of dollars and does not take into consideration the long-term view of what, arguably is. the world's most advanced high technology area in our country. We urge youto keep the 129th at Moffett and know that the misrepi-esentations of community and congressional support for a move are exactly that ... misrepresentations. We look forward to receiving your timely response. ~~~..~Sincerely' August 6, 2003 Mr. James G. Roche, Secretary of the Air Force Department of the Air Force Pentagon, 1670 Air Force, RM 4E871 Washington, DC 20330-1670 PROPOSED RELOCATION OF THE CAL~ORNIA AIR NATIONAL GUARD 129th RESCUE WiNG Dear Secretary Roche: On behalf of the Dublin City Council, I am requesting your support to keep the California th th Air National Guard 129 Rescue Wing (129 RQW) at Moffett Federal Airfield and oppose any efforts to relocate the 129th RQW elsewhere in California. We believe that the 129th RQW's presence at Moffett Federal Airfield is beneficial to residents of the Bay Area, California and the nation because of the 129th RQW's vital role in California and national, civil and military defense efforts. We feel that the 129th RQW's continued presence is more critical than ever since the events of September 11, 2001, and it is imperative that the 129th RQW's presence be felt for the security of the residents in the Bay Area in the event of an act of terrorism or a natural disaster. For those reasons, the Dublin City Council joins other Bay Area communities and the legion of Bay Area legislators that oppose the proposed relocation of the California Air National Guard 129th Rescue Wing from Moffett Federal Airfield to Castle Airport in Atwater, California. Sincerely, Janet Lockhart Mayor Area Code (925) o City Manager 833-6650 - City Council 833-6650 o Personnel 833-6805 o Economic Development 833-6650 Finance 833-6640 o Public Works/Engineering 833-6630 = Parks & Community Services 833-6645 o Police 833-6670 Planning/Code Enforcement 833~8610 o Building Inspection 833-6620 , Fire Prevention Bureau 833-$60~, Printed on Recycled Paper Attachment 2