NJ lawmakers warn against new base closings round

A bipartisan group of New Jersey House members is urging the Defense Department to avoid proposing a new round of military base closures in its next budget request.

“At a time when the United States faces adapting threats from around the globe, including groups like [the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria], we cannot afford to diminish the capabilities we use to neutralize these threats, and protect our freedoms at home,” the lawmakers wrote in a letter to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel late last week.

“One needs to look no further than the recent terror attacks in Paris to realize that the threat of terrorism at home and abroad is ever-present,” they added.

The bipartisan group, led by Republican freshman Tom MacArthur, argues a new Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC) is too costly and that there are “many better ways” for DOD to save money.

New Jersey lawmakers who signed the missive include Democratic Reps. Donald Norcross and Frank Pallone Jr. and Republicans Leonard Lance, Chris Smith and Frank LoBiondo.

The Pentagon is expected to propose a new BRAC round to lawmakers when it sends its fiscal 2016 budget to Capitol Hill on Feb. 2.

Congress has blocked DOD’s recent attempts to shutter facilities due to members’ concerns that a base-closing commission might axe facilities in their own districts.

Garden State lawmakers have cause to be concerned.

Three military sites in southern New Jersey — McGuire Air Force Base, Fort Dix and Naval Air Engineering Station Lakehurst — were selected for closure during the last BRAC round in 2005.

The facilities were combined into Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in 2009, creating the state’s largest base and second-largest employer.

MacArthur, Norcross and LoBiondo all sit on the House Armed Services Committee and could easily propose language to the National Defense Authorization Act barring the Pentagon from closing any installations.