Media not biased? You be the judge ... printed in July 2 issue of Mount Vernon Voice:


No Help on BRAC
Ft. Belvoir Gets $1.4 Billion for BRAC, County Gets Zero

Steve Hunt, Staff Writer

Millions for Fort Belvoir, but “not one precious dime” for Fairfax County.

That pretty much summed up Mount Vernon District Supervisor Gerry Hyland’s frustration with the federal government regarding funding for implementation of Base Realignment and Closure action at Fort Belvoir which will bring more than 20,000 new jobs to the south county area.

“If I sound frustrated, I am,” Hyland told his colleagues at the board of supervisors meeting Monday.

In addition to no federal help, the board was told by a Virginia Department of Transportation representative not to look for much help from the state either.

So what’s a county to do?

Pony up the dough itself – and that’s exactly what it’s doing, allocating more than $12 million of county funds for additional lanes for Milligan Road, a proposed connector route between Richmond Highway and Telegraph Road.

Last week, U.S. Rep. Jim Moran, a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, announced the authorization of $1.4 billion for BRAC at Fort Belvoir was included in the FY 09 Military Construction Appropriations bill which was approved by the House Appropriations Committee last week.

“Fort Belvoir is undergoing a facilities upgrade in order to accommodate the 19,000 new employees scheduled to be relocated there by 2011,” Moran said, noting that legislation provides a major portion of money required for construction of a new hospital, office building and a defense access road into the post’s Engineer Proving Ground.

Fort Belvoir BRAC-related military construction projects include $744 million for the National Geospatial Agency headquarters facility on the EPG site south of Springfield $274 million for a Fort Belvoir Office Complex at a site to be determined later this year, possibly the General Services Administration warehouse in Springfield $198 million towards the Fort Belvoir Hospital replacement, $91 million for Fort Belvoir Infrastructure Support, $36 million in defense access roads for the design and entrances to the EPS, as well as funding for additional various agencies.

Moran acknowledged that the federal government is going to have to come up with the funds to help the county absorb the new employees commuting to the area.

“Much more is needed to mitigate the growing traffic congestion in the region that the BRAC moves will cause and I will continue to fight for our region’s fair share,” Moran said.

But for the time being that doesn’t do much to quell the frustration of Hyland and Lee District Supervisor Jeff McKay who are faced with millions of identified infrastructure needs and no money to fund them.

During a public hearing on the proposed Six-Year VDOT Secondary System Construction Program for FYs ’09 through ’14, supervisors heard the bad news – the already lean funding is to be decreased by about 45 percent, from $119 million to $65 million from FY ’08 to 2013.

The reduction is due to several factors including the General Assembly’s elimination of the abusive driver fees, increased highway maintenance costs and lower transportation revenue.

What this means for residents of Mount Vernon and Lee is that the funding for the widening of Pohick Road from Richmond Highway to I-95 has been eliminated, as has the funding for the widening of Rolling Road from DeLong Drive to Fullerton Road.

In addition, much to the chagrin of McKay, the funding for construction of improvements to Telegraph Road from Hayfield Road to South Kings Highway has been delayed beyond 2014.

McKay noted that the widening of Telegraph Road has been on VDOT’s supposed “six-year plan” since the 1980s.

“The six-year plan is coming up on 30 years,” McKay commented.

Hyland knows the angst of south county residents and their fears about what’s to happen with the coming of BRAC, such as the residents of the Rolling Road area.

That is compounded by the fact that they have already gone through a planning process years ago to make the right improvements and that was “prior to BRAC being dumped in our lap.”

Now to have to try to retrofit some things that they tried to do years ago, and that are even more important now in light of BRAC, and then to be told because of funding we can’t do them “puts us in a very difficult situation in terms of how best do we accommodate the BRAC changes in those communities,” Hyland said.

The lack funding from the state is exacerbated by the lack of funding from the federal government.

“The Army, the federal government, Congress have been in my opinion of no help whatsoever in terms of giving us the funding that we know needs to be there to make the improvements that are necessary,” Hyland told his fellow supervisors.

Looking across the Potomac River for help, “the relief isn’t there,” Hyland said.

He pointed out that the federal government is able to find substantial funding “to do all things that are helpful and necessary for the Army to do the things on the post and on the EPG, and all those internal improvements that they need, but not one precious dime to do the things off-post that are necessary.”

Hyland said at this point the county and VDOT must find some way to get a process in place to “at least move forward” with the improvements they know need to be done there and cobble together the funding.

“Obviously the question is where do we get the money to do it?” Hyland said.

The goal for Hyland as well as McKay and Springfield District Supervisor Pat Herrity, is how to help their constituents “get around in their communities without major disruptions and a major impact on their quality of life,” Hyland said.

McKay reminded the board that just hours before the board had acted to dedicate $12 million “of our own money” to make sure that when Mulligan Road is constructed to replace Woodlawn Road through Fort Belvoir which has been closed to the public, that roadway be four lanes as opposed to two lanes on day one.

McKay noted that money is “$12 million that Fairfax County had to raise because we had to be courageous and implement a budget that increased the tax rate on commercial property owners. That’s where that money is coming from.

“We’ve come to the realization that we have a role to play and we have to do something, but with that comes a tremendous amount of frustration,” he said.

And noting the fact that the need to widen Telegraph Road was identified three decades ago, long before today’s current traffic congestion clogs the road on a regular, if not daily, basis and BRAC is expected to make the situation much worse, McKay expressed that frustration.

So as the needs for an improved road network grow, and the cost of construction increased, the dollars from VDOT dwindle to nearly half of what they were at the start of last year’s six-year plan and substantially less than the previous years’ plans.

"The frustration level is quite high for a reason,” McKay said.

The "Media" is biased sometimes. You just need to decide for yourself which accrately tries to present both sides of the issue. For example, Makr Levin versus Diane Rehm.

IMO, Mark Levin does a good job covering both sides an issue and is fair in his presentations. His documentary on the Protocols of Zion is a good example of this.

whoever thinks the US media isnt bias is an idiot. the only source i trust for news is BBC, with exception to reporting on their own country, which i really dont care about.


"the wisdom of the wise will perish, the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish."

Gravis Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> whoever thinks the US media isnt bias is an idiot.
> the only source i trust for news is BBC, with
> exception to reporting on their own country, which
> i really dont care about.


If by "biased" you mean insipid, pandering, patronizing and self-involved then, yes, the U.S. media are "biased."

WashingToneLocian Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Gravis Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > whoever thinks the US media isnt bias is an
> idiot.
> > the only source i trust for news is BBC, with
> > exception to reporting on their own country,
> which
> > i really dont care about.
>
>
> If by "biased" you mean insipid, pandering,
> patronizing and self-involved then, yes, the U.S.
> media are "biased."


i was thinking more of politically influenced by their owners.


"the wisdom of the wise will perish, the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish."

inkahootz Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> IMO, Mark Levin does a good job covering both
> sides an issue and is fair in his presentations.
> His documentary on the Protocols of Zion is a good
> example of this.


Is that the one where he kept referencing "Hillary Rotten Clinton"?

"Media bias" has more to do with the utter laziness of the press than anything else. In my opinion with very few exceptions most "broadcast journalists" are a bunch of complacent star fuckers set on getting big paydays and feeding their own egos. The worst offenders include Anderson Cooper, David Gregory, Katie Couric and Lou Dobbs. These "journalists" make Geraldo Rivera look like Edward R. Murrow.

w



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/02/2010 12:22AM by inkahootz.

inkahootz Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> IMO, Mark Levin does a good job covering both
> sides an issue and is fair in his presentations.
> His documentary on the Protocols of Zion is a good
> example of this.


Mark Levin is a hack and stretches the truth so much it becomes lies. He said recently Obama voted against declaring the Iranian Red Guard a terrorist organization when in fact Obama cosponsored legislation declaring they were.

Now, lets take the Valerie Plame/White House debacle. Mark Levin consistently conveyed false and misleading information including that she was not a covert (pronounced cuvert) agent and her husband mission was a boondoggle set up by Plame. He also stated that all her neighbors knew of her position in the CIA, which was a "rumor" that had been put to bed as a non truth by Fitzgerald.

Mark has increasingly stated the oppression of woman in Iraq, confusing Iraq's historical position on educating women until they are at least 20 years old, with that of the Taliban record of abusing women and not allowing girls to be educated.

Factually, on many occasions he is just wrong. He said that in 1988, the Washington Post endorsed Dukakis, and of course they did not.
I cannot listen to his cackle for more than a few minutes.

Apparently, we are talking about different Mark Levin's. I am talking about the film director, and Sundance Film Festival winner (for the film SLAM), while you are talking about the ultra conservative author and syndicated radio show host. The one you are talking about is bald; the one I am talking about has a full head of hair!

Wow. All this sparked by a l'il ol' Mount Vernon weekly's coverage of a local issue.

I didn’t see the article since I was out of town. I would offer one clarification regarding Mulligan Road and the allocation of more than $12 Million of county funds to the project. Fact is the Army is fulfilling its part of the original agreement on how the road will be funded. Specifically, Army paid the cost of the environmental analysis of the right-of-way (in excess of $1 million), and, the cost of design of the four-lane road, and construction of two lanes (another $31 million).

The County, VDOT, even the congressional delegation agreed that the cost of building the 3d and 4th lane, estimated at $17 million, would need to come from another source. When DOD closed Woodlawn Road, it closed a TWO-lane road, so the replacement obligation is to replace TWO lanes. However, others asserted that, because it had long been in the county’s Comprehensive Master Plan to widen Woodlawn to four lanes at some point in the future (whenever funding might become available), DOD’s action in effect closed a FOUR-lane road. Not only has Army acceded to that particular logic, it has, in fact, borne the brunt of the cost.

(Note also that the Army provided more than two acres of Fort Belvoir real estate to be used in a "land swap" with Woodlawn Plantation in exchange for plantation property along Old Mill needed to fit four lanes from Richmond Highway up to Pole Road.)

What goes unanswered in the article is where plans are for the widening of Telegraph Road from two to four lanes north of Beulah Street. As it is, the insistence on a four-lane Mulligan means we’re going to end up with four lanes feeding into two. I’m not a traffic engineer, but, seems like that might be a problem. According to the article, this is on Mr. McKay’s mind where he notes, “the fact that the need to widen Telegraph Road was identified three decades ago, long before today’s current traffic congestion clogs the road on a regular, if not daily, basis and BRAC is expected to make the situation much worse …”

He goes on to say, “The frustration level is quite high for a reason.”

Indeed.