Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I join you in welcoming our witnesses this morning to discuss the Department's military construction, family housing, base closure, and environmental restoration and compliance programs.

I would like to welcome back Secretary Gibbs, who is the only one of today's witnesses who has testified before this committee, and I wish to welcome the rest of our witnesses to their first official appearance before our committee.

In Secretary Penn's case, we welcome you back to your first appearance in your new position since your recent nomination hearing.

Despite not having testified before, some of our witnesses, in particular Mr. Grone, are well known to the members of this subcommittee.

Because our time is so limited due to the upcoming joint session with Ukrainian President Yuschenko, I will be brief in my opening remarks, as we have so much ground to cover in a short time.

We are here today to discuss both the budget request for military construction, family housing and DOD environmental programs but also, or perhaps I should say especially, the 2005 base closure round. There are a number of questions regarding the implementation of the BRAC round that I hope we can address during today's hearing to the extent time allows, and through questions for the record on issues we are not able to get to today.

Between the BRAC round here in the United States and the potential changes in our overseas basing due to the recommendations from the global posture review, which are not subject to the BRAC process, we will have many important matters before the Congress and the Department that fall within the jurisdiction of this subcommittee, and I look forward to discussing those items today.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.