LTG Flowers addressing LA District team members at annual Town Hal

We know he gave two hours off to all District team members who attended the annual Town Hall. We know he’s as serious as a heart attack about implementing USACE 2012.

We know from the Chief Engineer directly that “Los Angeles has its share of heroes” as he handed out commander’s coins and a Bronze Star to deserving people.

And we know he can make a room full of folks roar like a “Lucy” laugh track as he tried to stump them in “Corps Jeopardy.”

LTG Bob Flowers let us know all those things and more during his whirlwind visit to the District Oct. 15. Speaking to a crowd of 400-plus in the downtown headquarters, Flowers strode the aisle and elaborated on a stirring video with his relentlessly upbeat comments about the Corps. “We are absolutely unique,” he boomed. “No other country has anything like the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.”

Besides his sweeping survey of the Corps’ horizon, Flowers took time to bestow awards on District team members, attend the annual retirees luncheon (see accompanying story) and answer questions from his attentive audience. One questioner, noting the new career of former Gen. Wesley Clark, asked the Chief Engineer what his post-retirement plans might be.

“I’m not going to run for President,” he declared to general merriment. “I’ll retire next year and then want to work in the private sector for awhile. Then when I finally retire, I want to become a mentor and work with the disadvantaged. What’s always lit my fire is to see the light come on in somebody’s eyes.”

Those receiving commendations from the general included Richard “Dick” Nagle who never hesitates to share what he knows and shares credit unselfishly”; Terry Dean, for “multiple achievements” that helped the INS and Border Patrol officers; Sheryl Blackburn, for her work ensuring vehicle maintenance and access cards; Alfonso Quintero, whose plans and specs for the Tropicana and Flamingo Wash projects have been instrumental in its progress; Lloyd Godard, “who stepped in when half his (environmental) section was out”; Glynn Alsup, for his yeoman efforts with American Indians in Arizona and New Mexico; Mary Young, who revived the EEO office into a vital unit; Michael Hrzic, who volunteered to help fight raging fires in Arizona both last year and this; Rick Leifield, who introduced a new computerized project management system into civil works; Keith Lo, “the MVP of computer support” in the Information Management Office; and Mike Tharp, Public Affairs, first-place winner in a 2002 Corps-wide print journalism competition.

Flowers also pinned a Bronze Star onto the uniform of MAJ Dave Hurley for his exceptional efforts setting up Task Force Fajr (“First Light”) to restore power in Iraq.

After thanking “all of you for being the people you are and doing that jobs you do for us every day,” Flowers emphasized three themes: the Corps contributions to national security; to the economy, and to the environment.

He noted that one study estimated it would cost $1.6 trillion over the next 10 years to fix the nation’s infrastructure, and the Corps “is an organization poised to help and support that effort.” Overseas, the Corps operates in 92 countries, especially in the developing world, and he called it “an agency working to close the gap between the haves and the have-nots,” which he said would also help “take away the recruiting ground for terrorism.”

In Iraq and Afghanistan the Corps has 487 team members on station. It wasn’t until the end of April that the first Corps employees were on the ground to begin the Restore Iraqi Oil mission, and Flowers said the country began its first postwar oil exports June 15. “A month and a half,” he marveled. “No other agency in the world could do that.”

The Corps is “the key enabler” in Iraq, Flowers said, “because the key fight right now is to restore that country’s infrastructure. “We’re not getting a thing out of this—we’re not taking one dime in Iraqi oil money. It’s all going back in to rebuild the country.”

USACE 2012 “is all about acting as one team and operating virtually,” he explained. As an example, he cited Mobile District’s work on designing new locks for the Panama Canal. Ultimately, 10 districts became involved in the project, and the Panamanian government has called on the Corps seven times since signing a memorandum of agreement in 2000. “When you do work in a timely fashion, people want you back,” Flowers added.

When he assumed command of the Corps, the median age of team members was 50; today it is 42. The number of employees has dropped to 35,000 from 47,000 a decade ago. About the Corps missions, the general generated laughter when he said: “If it’s not controversial, we don’t touch it. If it was easy, they’d give it to someone else.”

Corps Jeopardy included questions about the Do-It card, the original name of the Dodgers, the year they moved from Brooklyn to L.A., and the number of Environmental Operating Procedures. Winners got 59 minutes off. Losers were supposed to do pushups.

At the end of his talk, Flowers’ aide-de-camp showed a moving montage of images from Corps districts around the world, including many from L.A. It was set to the music of a song by rocker Bob Seger, and the title could aptly describe the Chief Engineer himself:

“Like a Rock.”