Land Conservation Plans Discussed - by Rosetta Key

A wildfire, school strafing incident,ongoing aircraft and munitions testing noises, as well as the expanded mission of Navy Lakehurst, Fort Dix and Mcguire ... at times makes for a difficult relationship between the mega base and its neighboring communities but help is on the way.

Navy Lakehurst Chief Environmental Engineer Dennis Blazak says progress is being made in coming up with compatible development and land conservation plans based on the findings in a draft land-use study. Blazak says the study looks at the patterns of land use around the bases of Navy Lakehurst, Fort Dix and Mcguire of what the most important development issues are for the surrounding communities.

Blazak says,"It's really the town's plans so the towns can all come together and decide what they care about the most and figure out a way to make those plans compatible with the military uses of the bases."

Manchester Councilman Kenneth Vanderziel says their primary concern with Navy Lakehurst is the noise. "From the planes flying over, the artillery fire during training exercises, the assault teams coming in and the helicopters."

David Mckeon with the Ocean County Planning Board, says compatible development takes the base's noise levels into consideration. He says, "We're going to try to work with them to minimize flight hours or to minimize flight paths."

Blazak says, "we think that by relatively small modifications of the military operations like changing the way we train, changing the way we fly that we can really address a lot of the concerns of the people outside"

The mission of the three contiguous bases of Fort Dix, Navy Lakehurst and McGuire continues to grow with announcements of millions of dollars in Federal appropriations to expand the mission of the mega base.

Councilman Vanderziel says although it isn't a problem now, there's also growing concern over the impact a growing military family population will have on its High School because Lakehurst pays tuition to send students Manchester's High School. He says officials will be asking if the Navy Lakehurst officials are making plans to give the Manchester School District extra funding in the future to help offset the impact?

Pinelands Preservation Alliance Program Monitoring Director Theresa Lettman says "there are two counties, nine municipalities and three watersheds that encompass the areas surrounding the joint land use base." She's says during a meeting this week, they wanted to get all the entities that will be working on coming up with compatible land use plans together to understand what the mission of the base is and also also get them more aware of the joint land use plan.

Lettman says, "there are a lot of changes that will be on going at the base and so to get it involved now and do it early and not wait until these developments are not right up on their border is a good idea."

by Rosetta Key