Local officials continue debate on
moving 1,262 jobs to Massachusetts site



By Jessica Wehrman

Dayton Daily News



LEXINGTON, MASS . | In the early months of 2004, a coalition of
Massachusetts civic leaders brought a group of planners to Hanscom
Air Force Base to help determine whether the base, nestled tightly
between lush green Boston suburbs and Revolutionary War
battlefields, could expand.



After all, a key component of the upcoming base closure process was
space — and Hanscom, a comparatively diminutive Air Force base just
at 846 acres without a single runway to its name, seemed to have
little to spare.



The planners looked around and asked a question that would result in
a controversial $410 million state improvement plan denounced by two
Ohio congressmen: Why not build up, they asked?



The Massachusetts proposal to expand would add levels to existing
buildings and fill parking lots with multi-level parking garages.



This week, the independent base realignment and closure commission
is scheduled to vote on a Defense Department recommendation to give
Hanscom at least 2,795 new jobs, including at least 1,262 from
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Those jobs include government jobs
and embedded contractor jobs. Counting contractors and other
so-called "indirect jobs," the Wright-Pat number swells to 2,250.



The Pentagon recommendation aims to beef up Hanscom's role as the
center of all work on command, control, communication, computers,
intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance — known as C4ISR to
the Air Force. The work helps airmen on the battlefield determine if
they've hit targets, and provides other battlefield communications
as well.



Whether the Massachusetts expansion proposal played any role in the
Defense Department's recommendations is a subject of some deb