BRAC: All aboard!

Maryland’s businesses stand to benefit as the Base Realignment and Closure plan brings new jobs, contracting opportunities to state

Friday, Aug. 4, 2006

Click here to enlarge this photo Laurie DeWitt⁄The Gazette The Bethesda Urban Partnership, a nonprofit that runs the free downtown Bethesda 8 Trolley, plans to market its use more as the workforce at the National Naval Medical Center grows in the coming years. The medical center could gain as many as 4,200 employees by 2011 under the Pentagon’s Base Realignment and Closure plan, potentially reshaping the area’s transportation needs, but the trolley does not currently serve the Medical Center Metro station. Click here to enlarge this photo Laurie DeWitt⁄The Gazette ‘‘I see a lot of pluses for Bethesda,” saysW. David Dabney, executive director of the Bethesda Urban Partnership. Click here to enlarge this photo Laurie DeWitt⁄The Gazette This 22,000-square-foot, four-story building is being built in Laurel by Legends Group of Burtonsville, which anticipates more demand for housing and commercial space as nearby Fort Meade grows. The National Security Agency’s headquarters plans to add 7,500 jobs before the end of 2008.

Almost $2 billion worth of military-related construction is expected in the next four years just at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Andrews Air Force Base in Camp Springs, Fort Meade in Anne Arundel County and Aberdeen Proving Ground northeast of Baltimore, according to a recent study completed for the state.

That does not count the value of new construction for private contractors and other businesses that crop up around the bases, housing developments and government subcontracts.

Some companies are getting ahead of the contracting curve. The Opus Group, a Minneapolis development company with its eastern regional headquarters in Rockville, has already obtained the rights through an ‘‘enhanced-use” lease from the Army to develop a high-technology research campus on 200 acres at Aberdeen.

The lease agreement allows the Army to maintain ownership of the land, while keeping public development costs to a minimum, said Thomas Olmstead, Opus’ national director of government programs who works out of Rockville.

‘‘It’s not a contract, but more of a real estate transaction,” Olmstead said. ‘‘The Army still has ultimate control of the project.”

The campus has the potential for more than 2 million square feet of office and laboratory space, along with a hotel and conference center. Opus hopes to break ground on the project’s first building by next June, Olmstead said. It’s too early to estimate a value for the proposed campus, he said.

Understanding the military governmental contracting process logically helps in winning contracts, said Olmstead, whose previous experience includes working on designing and construction programs for the Air Force. Opus has done other projects for the federal government, although the Aberdeen one is the first enhanced-use lease, he said.

‘‘The Army is not difficult to deal with — it’s been a congenial process for us,” Olmstead said. ‘‘But it does help to know the language, the specific acronyms involved.”

The Army has also selected APG Development Partners, a joint venture between Pennsylvania companies LCOR and Weston Solutions, to develop a 1,300-acre antiterrorism and law enforcement training center at Aberdeen. Several subcontractors are Maryland businesses, such as Whiting-Turner Contracting Co., a Baltimore construction firm.

A boost to Bethesda

In Bethesda, where the Naval Medical Center could gain as many as 4,200 employees by 2011 under the Pentagon’s Base Realignment and Closure — BRAC — plan, officials are working to attract at least some of those people to downtown to dine, shop and even live there.

Ross Development and Investment of Bethesda is among the companies reviewing downtown Bethesda for new housing, office and retail developments that could benefit by the additional people. Ross has proposed erecting a 17-story, 116-unit condominium complex at the intersection of Fairmont and Norfolk avenues. The development is also expected to include retail shops.

That project is one of several being planned for Bethesda that will likely benefit from the additional BRAC jobs, said W. David Dabney, executive director of the Bethesda Urban Partnership, a nonprofit that promotes downtown Bethesda. ‘‘I see a lot of pluses for Bethesda,” he said.

Besides marketing downtown Bethesda as an attractive place to live, transportation improvements need to be made to get more people who work at the medical center into downtown during lunchtime and after work, Dabney said. That could include a shuttle system between the medical center Metro station and downtown, as well as more marketing of the free downtown Bethesda 8 Trolley, he said.

‘‘The trolley goes by the main Bethesda Metro station but doesn’t go by the naval center Metro station,” Dabney said of the bus that’s designed to look like a trolley car. ‘‘We will look at that. ... As it stands now, naval center employees can hop on the Metro at the naval Metro station and go down one stop to downtown Bethesda. Then they can ride the trolley free.”

Other ideas to review include carpools, van pools and enhanced cycling opportunities, Dabney said. ‘‘We want to make it as easy as possible to get into downtown Bethesda,” he said.

Ginanne Italiano, president of the Greater Bethesda-Chevy Chase Chamber of Commerce, and Richard Parsons, Montgomery County chamber president, agreed it wasn’t too soon to being planning for new employees and potential residents. They want to be involved with the county’s proposed BRAC committee, which a spokesman said should be in place by early next year.

The Bethesda chamber has already been affected, as the National Museum of Health and Medicine, which will be moving from Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., has joined the organization, Italiano said.

More people will likely move to Montgomery County because of the additions at the medical center, but even Prince George’s and Frederick counties should see people moving there who seek housing that is not as expensive as in Montgomery, said Anirban Basu, chairman and CEO of the Sage Policy Group, a Baltimore economic and policy consulting firm.

Montgomery County’s biotech industry could also be affected by the BRAC-related expansion at Fort Detrick, he said.

‘‘That could create synergies between the biotech research [at Fort Detrick] and the Montgomery County scientific community,” Basu said.

Other companies benefiting

The Pentagon expects to start awarding construction contracts related to the recent BRAC round next fiscal year, an Army spokeswoman said.

Near Fort Meade, where almost 6,000 employees and ‘‘embedded” contractors — who are essentially full-time employees — will move beginning in 2008, several projects that will likely benefit by the BRAC moves are in the works. Also fueling those developments is the buildup at the National Security Agency’s headquarters in Fort Meade, which is in the process of adding 7,500 jobs before the end of 2008.

In the Prince George’s County portion of Laurel, a 22,000-square-foot, four-story building that will have residential units, office and retail is being built — the first of three buildings planned by Legends Group of Burtonsville to be completed by 2008, said developer Michael Collins.

Collins began that project before the latest BRAC plan was unveiled, but the realignment plan has helped increase interest about leasing space there, he said.

Several new housing developments are under way near Fort Meade, including Cherry Tree Park in Howard County, where townhouses start at $400,000, and Bluepointe at Seven Oaks in Anne Arundel County, where townhouses start at $329,000.

That is only the beginning, said James R. Baldwin, vice president of M&T Bank’s commercial banking group and president of the Fort Meade Alliance. The nonprofit organization, which supports business growth around the base, has seen its membership grow more than fivefold to 114 in the past year, said Baldwin, whose office is in Annapolis.

‘‘Those new members are private companies, community organizations, individuals,” he said. ‘‘There has been heightened interest in the area.”

The Halle Cos., a Silver Spring development company, is planning a 5.5 million-square-foot, mixed-use development on 130 acres near Fort Meade in Anne Arundel County, said Stephen N. Fleischman, a Halle vice president. The company hopes to soon get approval from the county for two spec-office buildings, he said.

The BRAC moves are an impetus for such development, Fleischman said. ‘‘It is our understanding that there will be many government contractors looking for office space near Fort Meade. We hope to be able to fill these needs,” he said.

Corporate Office Properties Trust, a Columbia real estate investment trust, recently bought 178 acres near Fort Meade for $26.6 million for the third phase of its National Business Park office campus. The acquisition was essential to ‘‘position the company to meet demand from the upcoming BRAC” changes, Randall M. Griffin, president and CEO, said in a statement.

In southern Prince George’s near Andrews, where hundreds of BRAC-related jobs are scheduled to move, new housing, office and retail developments are also expected near the base.

‘‘It will give us a good shot in the arm,” said M.H. ‘‘Jim” Estepp, president and CEO of the Greater Prince George’s Business Roundtable Council and president of the Andrews Business and Community Alliance.