Fort Meade BRAC in the news - Lost taxes / Hurt feelings

It’s coming and so are the budget issues.  Below is a summary from a recent Baltimore Sun Article.  See full article at link below.

State and county officials are hoping that the Army will pitch in to assist with infrastructure upgrades needed to keep pace with the anticipated BRAC growth.  However, with a planned office complex to be built on the base, the building will not generate any tax revenue for the surrounding areas.   That’s right, because it’s on the base they will be tax exempt including impact fees.  This 15 building $700 million dollar office complex is expected to have over 2,000,000 s.f. of office space and two golf courses that would accommodate around 10,000 BRAC related defense contractor employees.  This information is according to a recent article in the Baltimore Sun
“Planners expect a nationwide military base realignment to bring up to 60,000 jobs and 28,000 households to Maryland, with most of them concentrated around Fort Meade in Anne Arundel and Aberdeen Proving Grounds.”  This includes base and DOD defense contractor jobs as well as everything from waitresses, toll takers and other local jobs needed to support the influx.
"private office parks being developed outside Fort Meade's fence to serve other defense contractors do pay taxes and development impact fees. Those projects also are subject to zoning and regulations meant to ensure there are adequate public facilities to serve the jobs.”
This could leave local Anne Arundel County taxpayers to pay the bill for road and public facility improvements.   Local officials project that about 22,000 jobs are expected to relocate to or near Fort Meade over the next seven or eight years.from growth at NSA and from defense contractors moving to the base to work with the Army or its tenants.

Col. Kenneth McCreedy, commander of Fort Meade, said that he sympathized with cash-strapped state and local officials, but rejected any suggestion the Army wasn't paying its fair share for the infrastructure serving the base. "The Army doesn't have money to write checks," McCreedy said. "If a check gets written, it won't be by the Army."

Fort Meade is however expected to turn over some land to the county including a  portion of the base property for the proposed widening of route 175 by the main gates.  They are also being asked to donate land near the new Odenton Town Center

Others point out that the widening of Route 175 was planned long before the on-base development was announced and that most of the services provided his project, such as water and sewerage, are supplied by the Army, not the county or the state.

A spokeswoman for Maryland Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, meanwhile, noted that $23 million worth of transportation projects to improve traffic and transit around the state's bases are included in an appropriations bill slated to be voted on by the full Senate, possibly today.

• FortMeadeHomes.com
• Baltimore Sun newspaper article

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