Well, I put on my traveling boots again, this time for a much shorter trip to Fort Drum, N.Y. It was ironic to me that the weather in New York was colder than in Alaska a week earlier!

 

As I drove around the installation, I saw new facilities being constructed around every corner. Over the next few years, we’ll be working hard to build facilities to support the addition of three brigade combat teams. Before those units can come to Fort Drum, we have to build new headquarters, barracks, housing, child development centers, and various other support facilities.

This enormous boom in construction is being skillfully handled by a program manager named Ed, and his highly motivated team. One of the best parts of my job is meeting members of our team – I really enjoyed visiting with all of the folks at Fort Drum, like Jerry, one of our team leaders. We all have important jobs to do in support of our nation’s defense – I was reminded of this when I met a program analyst named Cheryl who has been working very hard over the past year to support the Soldiers on the installation while her husband was bravely serving in Iraq.

On my visit I also toured a Child Development Center that is under construction.  I met the project engineer team leader Brett, the building contractor, and, I was surprised to meet the customer, Becky. In fact, it was Becky, who serves as the operational specialist for child development, who walked me through the site pointing out the features of the building.  It was interesting to see the relationship that the area office had fostered between her and the contractor to ensure the finished project will be what the customer needs. I can tell that our children are in good hands.

I later toured a storage and maintenance facility for the fleet of snow removal equipment at the Wheeler Sack Army Airfield.  The project engineer Dick, also known as “Rambo-Tool Man”, had helped deliver a high quality facility on time and below the programmed amount. The customer had moved into the facility only days before my visit, and they were very pleased by the final product.

Throughout my travels I saw a number of successful projects and met a number of outstanding people.  For every name I mentioned above (or in the other two blog posts), there are dozens of others whose hard work and dedication are critical to providing the quality of facilities we are delivering today. I was amazed by the number of projects that were being constructed on time, within cost, and without accidents or injuries.  The Corps’ professional staff is working hard to make sure that our service members and their families have facilities for work and leisure activities that are commensurate with the tremendous level of service they are providing to our great nation.

 

It was a great whirlwind of a trip. Thanks for letting me share some of my experiences with you.