The following is the public comment offered on the reuse plan for Fort Monroe:

Fort Monroe gives new meaning to the expression “If you build it, they will come”.

In April 2008, a reuse plan was presented for Fort Monroe and while it is a marked improvement over the 2006 plan, it still presents a level of development that comes at too high a cost.

The Fort Monroe Federal Area Development Authority (FADA) continues to propose residential development where the largest cost drivers are those public services that support that development. Water system improvements are estimated at $4 million. Wastewater collection systems will run $1.2 million. Stormwater quality collection and retention systems are estimated at $1.2 million. Public schools shoot up to almost $2.2 million with maximum development.

The Army estimates it spends up to $15 million a year keeping up buildings, plumbing and infrastructure. Depending on the level of redevelopment, the reuse plan estimates annual operating and maintenance costs to run between $4 and $4.7 million. Those estimates assume private ownership of most of the buildings, many of which aren’t of any historical significance, are deteriorating, and/or are likely to be razed and replaced with new construction.

Fort Monroe lies almost entirely in a designated 100-year floodplain. The Fort is a National Historic Landmark and many of the buildings have not been elevated or altered since their con¬struction, making them especially prone to flood damage. The reuse plan also takes note that there is increased flooding potential created by long term sea level rise caused by climate change. Understandably, flood protection comes in with a whopping $13.8 million price tag and no assurances that flood damage can be ultimately mitigated. Read the rest of this entry »

Governor Kaine along with members of his Cabinet will receive a briefing on the status of the Fort Monroe Reuse Plan and tour the facility on Wed., Aug. 20, 9:00am starting at the Chamberlin Hotel, 2 Fenwick Avenue.

From the Citizens for a Fort Monroe National Park, here is our message for Governor Kaine:

We should advocate what the Pilot’s editors wrote in early June, following the release of the Park Service study. Their editorial concluded:

“But none of those stories will be told as effectively or reach as broad an audience unless the National Park Service is involved in the next stage of Fort Monroe’s history, unless preservation groups commit resources to establishing a public trust for its protection, and unless local, state and federal leaders unite in the obvious — creating Fort Monroe National Park.”

That boils down to this: we need the NPS and we need a public trust, and only Virginia’s leaders can make that happen.

Note that the power of this message is that it is not from us. Everyone already knows what we think. It’s in our name. This message is from the editors of the region’s leading daily paper.

Tomorrow, reporters might be present who have been misinformed that the Park Service’s reluctance amounts to an end to national park hopes. But that’s not the meaning of those bureaucrats’ reluctance. Their reluctance stems from understandable caution given the unwise approach that Virginia has taken so far. The NPS does not want to join an unwise “development” enterprise. Luckily, the new reuse plan is open-ended enough that we can still easily recover from Virginia’s unwise start. We can still succeed with what simply must be a many-decades evolution of the _real_ plan for Fort Monroe’s post-Army future.

Wednesday’s festivities are a blip. Virginia must still, and can still, get Fort Monroe right. History demands it and the increasingly beleaguered and congested Tidewater character of our region demands it.