By KELLY HANNON
Half of the employees expected to fill 2,658 new jobs at Quantico Marine Corps Base by 2011 already live within commuting distance of the post.
Where the rest of them will live is crucial to Stafford and Prince William leaders as they prepare to cope with housing, school and transportation demands.
The jobs are being assigned to Quantico by the federal Base Realignment and Closure Commission.
"You need good information to make good decisions," said Stafford Supervisor Mark Dudenhefer, who co-chairs a committee of local officials doing the planning.
Quantico's boomlet of jobs is smaller than at its military neighbor to the north, Fort Belvoir.
The equivalent of the Pentagon, 22,000 jobs, is being moved to the eastern Fairfax County army installation by 2011.
Quantico's share of the jobs may be more manageable, but to prepare, the base Business Performance Office did a demographic study looking at where the new workers are expected to live--and whether they'll have children enrolling in public schools.
The base also expects that between 54 and 578 adult students will be enrolled in training academies for investigative agencies.
BRAC's decision moved headquarters for all services' criminal investigation departments and the site of the Counterintelligence Field Activity and the Defense Security Service to Quantico. The base is already home to the FBI Academy and the Drug Enforcement Agency Training Academy.
A quarter of the 2,658 new employees will move into the Quantico area. That's a gain of about 650 workers. Another quarter of the new employees will not relocate, and will have a longer commute to work.
The number of new residents because of BRAC isn't extraordinary in Stafford, which has grown rapidly in recent years, said Tim Baroody, Stafford's director of economic development and legislative affairs.
"The numbers are certainly far from alarming," Baroody said.
Stafford issued 1,400 permits for new dwelling units in 2003, 1,900 permits in 2004 and another 1,600 in 2005.
Accompanying the 650 new employees at Quantico will be an estimated 683 children. Stafford and schools districts to the south would receive 263 school-age students. Prince William and school districts to the north could expect 246 students, according to the demographic study.
Stafford has enrolled 400 to 500 new students a year over the past two years, said Denise Fruik, Stafford schools' supervisor of planning and construction.
The impact of the 263 new students will depend on where they locate, and how much space is available at the schools in their neighborhoods. "Some areas of the county can handle it better than others," Fruik said.
Families moving to Stafford for the new Fort Belvoir jobs could cause a bigger boom in students. She's waiting for more demographic information from that installation.
"Belvoir should probably not be ignored in this equation," Fruik said.
Moving more vehicles on and off Quantico could further clog base entry points.
This is Dudenhefer's biggest worry. Interstate 95 backs up daily near base gates at rush hour, especially at the Telegraph Road/Russell Road exit, he said.
"That interchange was never designed to handle the amount of traffic it's already handling. Then, add to that the Quantico Corporate Center, a million square feet of office space. So yes, we're going to have problems, more problems than we have now," Dudenhefer said.
The peak arrival time will be 7 to 8 a.m, according to the report. The departure peak will be 4 to 5 p.m.
He's also worried about the impact of new commercial office space at Boswell's Corner on U.S. 1 south of Quantico.
The Marine Corps wants to put the new employees in facilities west of Interstate 95. Dudenhefer thinks a new gate should open in western Prince William and Stafford to ease the daily crush near the two biggest gates, both east of Interstate 95.
"Then all the people that live in Stafford west of I-95 don't have to get on I-95 and further congest the traffic that's headed all the way up to Washington," he said.
The Corps is still studying security issues.
Not everyone will be heading to the base every day, according to the Corps study. Out of the 2,658 employees, 74 will telecommute. Another 120 workers will have off-hour shift work, and another 270 employees will have flexible schedules.
Most of the new jobs are civilian. About 65 percent of the workers--1, 752 jobs--are civilian, compared with 351 military positions and 555 contractor employees.
The housing market in Stafford, and farther south, should benefit from the newcomers.
"It certainly would be a good thing for the housing market because we're in a lull right now," said Gail Penman, a Realtor with Century 21 in Stafford. That trend could be reversing, though, and Penman said "2007 seems to be off to a great start."
Nevertheless, she's not sure everyone will be able to buy in Stafford. She holds out hope that the situation will change by 2011. "I've been on many different committees and I've been trying to talk to builders about building in a price range people can get into reasonably and be proud of what they're living in," Penman said. "I'm glad to see some of the prices come down a bit because we were just runaway. Our prices were way over what most people could afford."
The demographic snapshot is part of a larger environmental impact study conducted by Quantico. That process, expected to wrap up by September 2007, will examine land use and security measures at Quantico. The study will recommend a preferred location for the new jobs on the base. The secretary of the Navy chooses the final location. A draft of the environmental impact study is expected in February.
Dudenhefer said there's work ahead to prepare for BRAC jobs, but he doesn't want it to distract from other transportation projects. Another interchange on I-95 that needs attention is at Courthouse Road, he said. And he wants the federal government to pay for road work required to cope with an influx of BRAC workers from Quantico and Belvoir.
"I don't think the residents of Stafford should pay additional taxes because the federal government decided to move 3,000 jobs to Quantico. The residents are already here. We already have congestion, we have problems we don't need more," Dudenhefer said.
To reach KELLY HANNON:
Email: khannon@freelancestar.com
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Want to learn more? The next meeting of the Quantico Growth Management Committee is at 7 p.m., Monday, Jan. 22, 1 County Complex Court in Prince William County. |