Boston Globe
March 24, 2005

Towns quietly prepare for closing

By Matt Viser, Globe Correspondent

As Governor Mitt Romney and Senator Edward M. Kennedy tout the benefits of
saving Hanscom Air Force Base, local officials in the towns around the base
are quietly preparing what they call the unthinkable: The base is shut down,
and its prime real estate is put on the market.

A committee of town officials has started looking into the base's closure
and, using a $156,000 federal grant, has hired a Watertown-based company to
report on issues the towns would have to consider if the base is closed.
They have also hired a prominent lawyer who specializes in base closings to
advise them on legal issues.

''These communities have a very intimate relationship with Hanscom," said
Sara Mattes, chairwoman of the Hanscom Area Towns Selectmen, a group of
local officials currently weighing the base closing. ''It's painful to be
having to do plan B. But it's a necessity. It's the only responsible thing
to do. The economic impact of a closure is huge, so the better the plan is
for redevelopment, the better it is for everyone."

Until now, no studies have been conducted on how the base, which narrowly
escaped a closing in 1995, could be redeveloped for commercial and
residential use. The firm studying the closing, Sasaki Associates, will
present its initial findings at a meeting tonight in Lincoln.

The US Department of Defense is considering a list of possible bases to
close, which will be reviewed by a nine-member commission. It is unclear
whether Hanscom will be targeted for closing, though some outside
consultants have speculated that the base is a prime candidate for either
shutting or downsizing. One list circulating the Internet, drafted by a
former Marine and posted on a website called G2mil, calls Hanscom a ''small
research base," whose work ''can be moved to other underutilized Air Force
Research labs."

If Hanscom were to close, one of the first things to happen would be the
establishment of a Local Redevelopment Authority, which would oversee the
land and could have power to rezone it or deny a developer's proposals.

The Hanscom Area Towns Selectmen -- called HATS and includes officials from
Bedford, Concord, Lexington, and Lincoln -- is planning ahead in hopes of
ensuring that the towns can influence what happens with the land.

''We don't want to be caught on this," said Sheldon Moll, a Bedford
selectman. There are ''lots of value on that base in terms of what towns
would be interested in. And there's a lot that could be developed, from a
mall, to a housing development, to whatever. . . .The towns would like more
than just the traffic."

The redevelopment planning is in its initial stages, Moll said, adding that
if the base closes a more detailed study would be conducted. Discussion
focuses on topics such as encouraging commercial development instead of
housing, which would not overburden schools, and promoting an urban center
to limit traffic congestion.

Frederick Merrill, the Hanscom project manager from Sasaki, said his
upcoming report is broadly conceptual and analyzes how a base closing would
affect traffic patterns, water, and sewer lines. The report will also focus
on which communities would be required to provide education and public
safety services. Lincoln has jurisdiction over nearly half the Hanscom land
and would be most affected, Merrill said.

''Hanscom is such a great location," Merrill said. ''It's in four great
towns. It's next to a major interstate highway. . . . It makes it a very
attractive redevelopment location for a private developer, if it were to
close."

There are two large developers in Massachusetts with experience in military
base redevelopment. Lennar Partners has been hired to plan a mixed-use
development at the former South Weymouth Naval Air Station, and
MassDevelopment is redeveloping the 2,100-acre Fort Devens military base,
which was closed in 1996.

William Burke, vice president for Devens and military initiatives at
MassDevelopment, said there has been ''nothing more than conversation" about
redeveloping Hanscom. Officials from the Massachusetts Port Authority, which
owns and operates Hanscom Field in Bedford, say they have made no plans for
the airfield land if the base closes.

David Knisely, the lawyer working for the HATS committee, said everyone
studying the idea of the base closing is reluctant to talk about it in much
detail ''because we don't want to send any wrong messages."

''We've gotten the congressional delegation and governor's office all on the
same page," he said. ''No one on this team wants to any way publicly start
talking in too much detail about closure. We don't want anyone to think that
anyone wants to go down that path."

© Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
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