Basil Forest wrote:
> I am tired of public funds being spent on projects
> that are really only of interest to some small segment
> of American  society.  I think we need another
> memorial to slavery like we need a  memorial to
> prohibition...another bad American idea that we
> should forget. Suggesting that Fortress Monroe
> is as historically significant as Jefferson's
> Monticello is just a further insult to the man
> along the lines of  unproven and unproveable
> allegations of miscegenation with a slave girl.

Mr. Forest, I'll assume that you and I are not likely to agree on the Fort
Monroe historical and cultural issues, so I won't harangue you on those.
But I'll bet that you'll give me at least a brief hearing on the question
of public money at post-Army Fort Monroe. On that, you and I might in fact
agree.

No matter what anybody wants or says, a lot of federal money is going to
be spent to clean Fort Monroe after the Army leaves. How can we minimize
that expenditure and maximize Fort Monroe's contributions to Tidewater's
and Virginia's economy?

The post comprises nearly 600 acres, only about a tenth of which is the
famous moated fortress. Because Fort Monroe served for well over a century
as a coastal artillery post, it has lots of environmental problems.
Federal law requires cleaning the place up.

According to the planning authorities, any of three basic cleanup programs
can be followed.

The most expensive cleanup plan -- up to many hundreds of millions of
dollars -- is required for massive development. No one even knows for
sure, but they know the order of magnitude.

The least expensive -- I'm guessing a few tens of percent of the higher
amount -- is required for reusing the existing buildings and for
continuing mainly to use bayfront green space as green space.

(Kids live and play all over the post right now. Nothing explodes. Nothing
harms them. The problems are underground, where footings and roadbeds and
utilities would go if there were massive development.)

The most expensive plan amounts to a federal subsidy for Hampton and its
developers, profiting nobody else very much in any sense. If you want to
see for yourself a picture of what Hampton wants to do to Old Point
Comfort, please just see the home page at CFMNP.org.

But we could instead let Fort Monroe evolve slowly into a grand public
place for everybody -- a place that respects Tidewater's enormous need for
more public waterfront green space.

And if we did that, we'd need some of that federal money, but nowhere near
what it'd cost to clean up the place so that Hampton could use it
selfishly, merely as a cash windfall.

Also if we did that, we'd give Hampton Roads a signature place, a place
that could help to brand the region positively, helping the economic
development folks attract the kinds of enterprises we need here.

And that'd be without putting Hampton's taxpayers at risk, as they are
under the present plan.

Yes, a grand public place at Fort Monroe would cost some federal money. My
own view is that the most sensible way to do it is to create a hybrid
national park like San Francisco's Presidio -- innovatively structured,
and self-sustaining by using Fort Monroe's assets to generate revenue.

That's all being looked into, in fact.

A grand public place of some sort at Fort Monroe would cost a lot less
federal money than would donating this 600-acre National Historic Landmark
-- so designated a half-century ago -- to one city for narrowly
envisioned, short-term, parochial purposes.

And it would profit us a lot more, even if Mr. Forest's view of history is
right.

Thanks.

Steve Corneliussen
P.S.: Mr. Forest, if by chance you think I'm a Hemings-TJ paternity
believer, I ask you to glance for maybe 60 seconds at www.TJscience.org.

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