[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 131 (Thursday, September 6, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11136-S11137]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           AMENDMENT NO. 2622

  Mr. ALLARD. Mr. President, I rise to speak on amendment No. 2622, 
which the Senate will be voting on later today offered by Senator 
Salazar.
  Mr. President, I regret that I must rise to oppose this amendment 
from my friend and colleague from Colorado. But this issue is of too 
great importance to the men and women who are fighting for our freedoms 
around the world.
  My colleague has characterized this as an Army versus the ranchers 
and farmers issue. I do not think this is our fighting men in the 
military versus farmers and ranchers, and here is why. Because I 
believe there are willing sellers and willing buyers in this particular 
instance. Private property owners, I have been told, approached the 
Army and said: Look, we have some land available we want you to 
consider in your plans to expand a needed training area, for the Army 
to consider looking at dealing with us and selling that land.
  So I think this particular proposal does not need to be an Army 
versus farmers and ranchers. I think this can be worked out with 
deliberation and thought during this process. Two years ago, the entire 
Colorado congressional delegation made a successful argument to the 
BRAC Commission to keep Fort Carson Army Base in Colorado Springs open. 
We made a commitment that if the Army kept Fort Carson open and even 
added soldiers, we would make sure our soldiers stationed there would 
be provided with adequate training to do their job.
  The Army kept Fort Carson open and restationed two new brigades, 
totalling more than 10,000 new soldiers, to the mountain post due to 
the commitment made by the entire Colorado delegation.
  It would be hypocritical for us as a delegation to now tell the Army: 
We want those new soldiers, and we want the economic benefit from those 
new soldiers, but we are unwilling to do what is required of us as a 
State to ensure that our men and women stationed at Fort Carson are 
provided with adequate training.
  This amendment is a horrible precedent that will impact more than 
Fort Carson. It is a national security issue at a time when our Nation 
is engaged in armed conflict. Currently, the Army has a backlog of 2 
million acres needed for training. The shortfall is expected to 
increase to 5 million acres by 2011, according to the Department of the 
Army's response to the National Defense Authorization Act of 2007, 
which is available for perusal by my colleagues.
  This issue could be reaching your State. Congress should be working 
with the Pentagon to address this serious backlog that is hindering the 
Army's ability to provide adequate training our soldiers need and 
deserve.
  I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the letter of 
opposition to the Salazar amendment from the Secretary of Army, Pete 
Geren.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. ALLARD. According to the Army, the Salazar amendment is too 
restrictive. It prevents them from doing anything on Pinon Canyon to 
resolve even their differences with the farmers and ranchers, including 
photocopying handouts or maps to the citizens with questions, holding 
community meetings to find common ground, and even doing a required 
environmental impact statement.
  Senator Salazar and I have offered amendments to last year's and this 
year's Defense authorization bill to address many of the valid issues 
raised by concerned citizens and elected officials whose communities 
are affected by the proposed expansion of Pinon Canyon, the need for 
any expansion of Pinon Canyon by the Army, and the economic and 
environmental impact to southeastern Colorado. I agree with my 
colleague that the Army needs to answer questions. I agree we need to 
ensure the residents and communities impacted by any expansion are part 
of the process and their concerns are addressed. I believe this 
amendment would not accomplish those goals but, rather, actually keep 
us from getting needed answers to which they are entitled. Where we 
disagree is on the approach. This amendment will have long-term 
unintended consequences we could regret. I ask my colleagues to 
consider those consequences before they vote.
  I ask my colleagues to vote no on the Salazar amendment.

                               Exhibit 1


                                        Secretary of the Army,

                                Washington, DC, September 6, 2007.
     Senator Jack Reed,
     Acting Chairman, Senate Committee on Appropriations, 
         Subcommittee on Military Construction, and Veterans' 
         Affairs, Washington, DC.
     Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison,
     Ranking Member, Senate Committee on Appropriations, 
         Subcommittee on Military Construction, and Veteran's 
         Affairs, Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Chairman and Senator Hutchison: I am writing to 
     express the Army's views regarding the Pinon Canyon Maneuver 
     Site (PCMS) in Colorado. The Army wishes to expand the PCMS 
     in order to provide our Soldiers with the best, most 
     realistic, and doctrinally sound training possible.
       The Army's need for U.S.-based training and maneuver space 
     will increase significantly as a result of the planned return 
     of approximately 70,000 troops from overseas bases. These 
     Soldiers previously conducted much of their training and 
     achieved their readiness standards by using overseas training 
     and maneuver space; the same requirements are now being 
     shifted onto an existing U.S. installation footprint. Adding 
     an increased requirement to a finite amount of training space 
     can be partially managed with work-arounds, but there are 
     limits. At some point, training can become degraded in 
     quality and unrealistic. Moreover, the land itself must also 
     recover from intense training exercises. Adding more training 
     exercises to the same plot of land can pose environmental 
     risks.
       In addition, changes to technology and the organization of 
     our units requires each Brigade Combat Team (BCT) to be more 
     agile, be more readily deployable, and be able to secure 
     significantly more territory than their Cold-War era 
     counterparts. To properly train our BCTs, they need to meet 
     higher home-station readiness levels than ever before. To 
     attain this readiness, they need adequate space to maneuver 
     under realistic conditions. Shipping units elsewhere is not 
     an acceptable substitute for home-station training because it 
     would take valuable time from Soldiers away from their 
     Families--Soldiers and Families are already bearing tough 
     sacrifices on behalf of the nation.

[[Page S11137]]

       The Army has a growing training land shortfall that will 
     reach 5 million acres across the entire country by 2011. Fort 
     Carson is not the only base with projected training land 
     shortfalls, but not all bases have an opportunity to expand 
     to remedy to the problem. The Army has the ability to address 
     some of the overall training land shortfall by acquiring land 
     at PCMS. If the Army is legislatively prevented from 
     expanding PCMS, it will harm the Army's ability to provide 
     necessary and realistic training to units stationed at Fort 
     Carson, as well as Active, Reserve, and Guard units training 
     there.
       The Army firmly opposes legislation to limit the Army's 
     proposed expansion of PCMS. Indeed, the Army may need to 
     expand other installations around the country, and such 
     legislation could create a dangerous precedent that the Army 
     will forever be locked into its current training and maneuver 
     space footprint regardless of any future changes to 
     organization, technology, doctrine, or threats.
       Thank you for your consideration of the Army's views as you 
     complete your work on S. 1645.
           Sincerely,
                                                       Pete Geren.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Pryor). The Senator from Colorado.
  Mr. SALAZAR. What is the pending business and the amount of time?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senate is still in a period of morning 
business, and the majority controls 5 minutes.
  Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for up to 2 
minutes of that time, followed by Senator Brown for the remainder.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. ALLARD. Mr. President, I want to make sure we don't have 
Republican colleagues who have a need to speak further in morning 
business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican side has 40 seconds remaining 
in their allotted time.
  Mr. ALLARD. Very good. I have no objection.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Colorado.
  Mr. SALAZAR. Mr. President, I thank my friend from Colorado for his 
views on this amendment. I also thank him for the work we do together 
in support of our military installations which we consider to be part 
of the crown jewel of the Nation's defense and homeland security, and 
we often work on those matters together.
  I will take exception with respect to a characterization concerning 
my amendment in that there is some inconsistency between what we did in 
the 2005 BRAC recommendations, which we all supported, and this 
particular amendment.
  The fact is, the BRAC, in its findings, said we would move the 
additional brigades into Fort Carson, that there was sufficient 
capacity to provide all the training that was required there at Fort 
Carson, and that is because Fort Carson has over 100,000 acres on its 
own site and 235,000 acres of additional land. Now the Army wants to 
acquire land that is going to make the Army's holdings at Pinon Canyon 
greater than the size of the entire State of Rhode Island. My question 
is, What has changed from January of 2005 until today? What has changed 
is that all of a sudden the Army has decided that it needs all this 
additional land.
  I go back to my initial argument, which is, if we care about private 
property rights, if we care about the ranchers in southeast Colorado, 
if we care about national security and making sure we are investing 
taxpayer dollars wisely, then it is important we do a timeout, which is 
all that my amendment does.
  I urge my Republican and Democratic colleagues to support my 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.

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