The commission voted 8-0 to take a broad look at identifying the best situation for three Pentagon-run graduate schools - the language institute and Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif., and the Air Force Institute of Technology in Ohio.
Vicki McCall, president of the Utah Defense Alliance, said “there was so much ambiguity” in the commission's discussion, that it is hard to tell what they will consider. “Even the commissioners are not really sure what this means right now,” she said.
But she said her impression from talks with commissioners, including former Utah Rep. Jim Hansen, is that they are looking at leaving them unchanged or combining the three schools at one location, which probably would rule out Utah.
“It's a stretch to think we're going to get it, but I would not deny there's an opportunity, because now it's being discussed for closure,” McCall said, but her sense is the commission is not looking to relocate the language institute.
The state has long had its eye on the school, located on the California coast south of San Francisco, and there has been discussion of moving the facility since 1991, in part because of the expense in keeping it where it is.
In 1994, the state submitted a proposal to the Army to move the language school to Hill Air Force Base and partner it with Brigham Young University's nationally renowned language program.
Utah's bid was taken seriously at the time, but any plans to relocate the language institute were scuttled through a combination of some financial incentives offered by the city of Monterey, and opposition from President Clinton's chief of staff Leon Panetta, who had represented Monterey in Congress.
The Defense Language Institute employs about 1,300 civilian workers, including 800 faculty. It offers courses in about 25 different languages to 3,000 students annually from each branch of the service.
Utah officials continue to believe the state would be a good fit for the school, because of the language programs at the state's universities and the large number of returned LDS missionaries who are bilingual.
In this round, the Pentagon did not recommend any changes to the three graduate schools in its closure and realignment list released in May, but the commission revived the potential for changes by including it on its list.
Retired Gen. Lloyd Newton expressed reservations that the commission would only look at moving all three facilities to Monterey, “taking it to a high-cost area.”
“I don't have a problem in engaging in a process of deciding whether we should combine these functions. I do have a problem in that, seemingly, we have already decided where these functions should go,” he said. “Instead of studying this to see if it should go to Monterey, we should be studying this to see where is the best place for it to go.”
That sentiment was supported by other commissioners and the staff. “We don't want to preclude any options here. We want to look at the best option,” said retired Admiral Harold GehÂman, Jr.
The commission will hear from the communities that could be affected by changes to the schools and will vote Aug. 22 on any final action. It would take votes from seven of the nine commissioners to close or realign any of the facilities.
