Joint Basing Question

[cantfly]

I think joint basing would work and save money if independent auditors were allowed to select the most efficient way of doing things. Either combining the AF and Army way, choosing the best process from either branch, or doing it a completely different way.

Imagine airmen having having to cut grass in front of their respective buildings like the Army.

What are your experiences on joint bases and does it work?https://www.google.com/amp/www.military.com/daily-news/2016/10/06/army-chief-calls-for-joint-basing-review.html%3Fvariant%3Dmobile.amp

[Fuzz]

I think Rand did a study and determined that joint basing was at best a wash and worst a more expensive. Being on a joint base, it's not the worst thing, but funding always favors the owning side and more so when that side has a Corps with 3 star in charge. The biggest issue is the cultural differences like you mentioned the Army has 4,000 privates sitting around if they are in garrison to use for manual labor. As we all know the in thr AF everyone has a job, which causes the exact problem of mowing grass. Army: "just find an E-2 to mow your grass you don't need a landscaping contract!" AF: "all our airman have jobs".

Also the when the Army is home they are in a garrison mindset, which doesn't mesh well when the AF side a mobility wing sending planes out on operational missions everyday. Couple months ago a big storm was expected to roll through and the AF leadership was considering evacuating the aircraft, but the Army (which owned the base Ad Hoc system) sent out a message early releasing everyone immediately without consulting the AF leadership. They stopped it before it got too far but they apparently couldn't grasp why we needed to keep people around to launch real world missions or prep jets to evacuate.

[ThreeHoler]

Joint basing is terrible. Lived it for too many years.

"I have eight wing commanders, Bob."


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[yatalpan]

The devil is in the details, the services handle things differently which drives thrash.

 Also I recall from my days when JBSA stood up there was no cost savings.  We spent enough money there to build a new base consolidating medical training at Ft Sam.

[M2]

The joint base program is a miserable failure.  The 502 ABW ("owners" of JBSA) couldn't occupy one of the many historical buildings on Ft Sam Houston when they needed a new home.  No, they had to build a new $9.7 million 25,000-square-foot headquarters just to show those lowly Army types who's in charge!

And sorry, the Air Force still resides on their Air Force Bases, and the Army on their camps/forts/garrisons/whatever.  There is no "joint" in "JBSA Lackland,"which is what the signs now say when you drive onto base.

Bottom line, "joint bases" are a fucking joke.

[hindsight2020]

I remember when I was going to PIT (the second time...ugh) while this jointness thing was going on, and the Randolph dependas were all up in arms because the consolidation of the San Antonio area MPF functions into  RAFB got things a bit, too "colorful" for their tastes. In their defense, my craptastic sack-o-shit AFRC host functionals shoved my second class AGR citizen ass to the AD section to get some mickey mouse BAH re-certification bvllshit form. When I went in there there was a no-shit retired ARMY vet screaming at some AF E-3 at the top of his lungs while she checked her screen (probably on AF messenger talking to her O-3 sugar daddy). SFS had to get called in. It was "ARMY strong" in there for sure. Don't shoot the messenger LOL.

Edited April 24, 2017 by hindsight2020

[cantfly]

1 hour ago, M2 said:

The joint base program is a miserable failure.  The 502 ABW ("owners" of JBSA) couldn't occupy one of the many historical buildings on Ft Sam Houston when they needed a new home.  No, they had to build a new $9.7 million 25,000-square-foot headquarters just to show those lowly Army types who's in charge!

And sorry, the Air Force still resides on their Air Force Bases, and the Army on their camps/forts/garrisons/whatever.  There is no "joint" in "JBSA Lackland,"which is what the signs now say when you drive onto base.

Bottom line, "joint bases" are a ing joke.

I was at Fort Meade, MD which is a joint installation but isn't advertised as one. All the intel folks from the different branches utilized the same Army housing, we all performed the same types of intel jobs at the NSA, and on base sports was a blast! My shop supervisor was Navy, but the Ops Floor Supervisor was Air Force and Army. Initially, I had an AF supervisor who did my EPR that wasn't even in my AFSC...lol. 

Every office had a good mixture of Marines, AF, Navy, and Army personnel. Trying to figure out how the NSA made it work using only two buildings for us all to include civilians. 

Edited April 24, 2017 by cantfly

[panchbarnes]

14 hours ago, M2 said:

The joint base program is a miserable failure.  The 502 ABW ("owners" of JBSA) couldn't occupy one of the many historical buildings on Ft Sam Houston when they needed a new home.  No, they had to build a new $9.7 million 25,000-square-foot headquarters just to show those lowly Army types who's in charge!

And sorry, the Air Force still resides on their Air Force Bases, and the Army on their camps/forts/garrisons/whatever.  There is no "joint" in "JBSA Lackland,"which is what the signs now say when you drive onto base.

Bottom line, "joint bases" are a fucking joke.

 

Not to mention how Kelly got sold to the city at a steep discount, only to have the AF rent a majority of the buildings back at a significantly higher cost, all because the AF missions didn't downsize along with the close of Kelly and Brooks.  FWA?  Look no further than "JBSA-171."

[Weezer]

On 4/24/2017 at 10:52 AM, panchbarnes said:

 

Not to mention how Kelly got sold to the city at a steep discount, only to have the AF rent a majority of the buildings back at a significantly higher cost, all because the AF missions didn't downsize along with the close of Kelly and Brooks.  FWA?  Look no further than "JBSA-171."

For what it's worth, the divestment of much of Kelly was a BRAC decision, not the AF's.  Furthermore leasing facilities vice owning them has different types of costs, and you may get some benefits as far as the owner being responsible, more or less, for maintenance and repair.  As far as government fiscal policy goes, the handling of leased facilities instead of owning them comes from a different pot of money.  Offramping Kelly also got rid of a duplicate management chain...Kelly was a whole separate AFMC logistics center that had a huge manpower tail.  Not all of that went away, but a large amount of it did.