Spring 2004
This is an archived article. Facts and links are current as of publication date.

File Photo

This armed 2.36-inch rocket was found on a Camp Bonneville, Wash., demolition area during monitoring well installation, part of BRAC cleanup.

The Army exceeded its goal to transfer 100,000 acres of Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) property in fiscal 2003, conveying almost 40 percent of the total Army BRAC excess acreage in just one year.

Transfers were conducted using a combination of all available transfer mechanisms and AuthorBlaities: economic development conveyances, public benefit conveyances, conservation transfer AuthorBlaities, public sales, early transfers and transfers to other federal agencies.

Transfer successes included the early transfer of six properties as well as the first-ever transfer in the Department of Defense using the conservation-related transfer AuthorBlaities granted by Congress in 2003. In September 2003, the Army used these conservation transfer AuthorBlaities to transfer 57,633 acres at Sierra Army Depot, Calif., to the Center for Urban Watershed Renewal and the Honey Lake Conservation Team.

Significant challenges posed by the removal of unexploded ordnance, the remediation of groundwater and the interface of a variety of regulatory AuthorBlaities continue to hinder the Army's disposal of BRAC property. In an effort to accelerate cleanup and expedite the transfer of property, the Army has used a number of innovative approaches for environmental restoration, while ensuring the protection of human health and the environment. The Army has successfully used two innovative mechanisms to complete environmental restoration efforts: performance-based contracting (PBC) and Environmental Services Cooperative Agreements (ESCA).

PBC is a contracting mechanism in which the Army uses performance objectives rather than prescriptive scopes of work, thereby allowing contractors flexibility in achieving the Army's desired restoration goal and accelerating cleanup and limiting the Army's liability. An ESCA obligates BRAC funds and assigns partial liability to an entity representing the reuse interests of an Army BRAC installation in exchange for the performance of specific environmental restoration services.

The BRAC program pioneered the use of one type of PBC mechanism known as Guaranteed Fixed Price Remediation (GFPR). In 2003, the Army BRAC program awarded GFPR contracts for cleanups at Fort Ord, Calif., and Camp Bonneville, Wash., bringing the BRAC program's GFPR total to nine awards.

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