CPS May Cut Off Power to Fort Sam For Delinquent Bills

[Nbadan]

Fort Sam Houston has received 1,300 utility service termination notices for delinquent bill payments, which officials blamed on a major budget shortfall.

CPS Energy warned commanders at the post to pay $4.2 million by Wednesday or risk losing power. The post is three months behind on its bills, but both Army and utility officials said the two parties were talking and no cutoff was imminent.

"Who would imagine us not paying our bill?" said Col. Wendy Martinson, Fort Sam Houston's garrison commander. "I worry about it. I can't sleep at night."

The post, which trains medics, faces a $26 million budget shortfall this year - a problem that officials said is symptomatic of the financial woes facing posts worldwide.

WOAI (http://www.woai.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=71830392-DEEB-4814-B964-991B31A3954E)

[Nbadan]

Martinson said the supplemental funding would be a temporary fix. To deal with the budget crunch, the post has fired 100 contract workers, frozen hiring, shut off cell phones and BlackBerry devices, turned in leased cars and stopped troops from using government credit cards.

Next up, early retirements for eligible civilian workers, layoffs of nonessential personnel, cutbacks in degree of services provided, vertical cuts to some services (likely those added during the Clinton era), and increased user fees wherever they can get away with it. If the gates are guarded, it wouldn't surprise me if they close a few of them, and make people drive halfway to hell to get on and off the installation. I've seen this kind of thing happen and it's never pretty

[xrayzebra]

Go back and read the friggin story in the E-N and get your facts straight.
Damn, for someone who has the ability to read, your comprehension lacks badly.

[Nbadan]

What part did I get wrong?

[xrayzebra]

^^They have no intention of cutting off power.

[Nbadan]

^^They have no intention of cutting off power.

I did post 'May', right?

[xrayzebra]

There is no "MAY" in CPS statement. Just "They Wont". And have no intention of
cutting off power. Typical dimm-o-crap.

[Nbadan]

Then why would CPS send cut-off notices?

[thispego]

CPS better watch their backs

[SpursWoman]

Then why would CPS send cut-off notices?


Automatically generated notices, I'd imagine.

[xrayzebra]

Correct SW. But let the "know it all" find it out for himself. It was all in the
paper yesterday and the day before. But he is to busy reading all the left wing
blogs to read the local paper.

[Nbadan]

No, I read the article, but the Express-News rep is less than dubious. My point is, why would CPS send out notices that have no teeth? Couldn't they just have sent a friendly reminder instead? And don't use the lame 'automatic notices' bit, I worked on system like this and I know how easy they are to bypass.

[xrayzebra]

Give it up dan. They were computer generated. It said so in the article. So you
didn't read it very close. You screwed yourself one more time. Now go back and
play with your Reynolds wrap. Maybe next time you will win the contest.

[Extra Stout]

No, I read the article, but the Express-News rep is less than dubious. My point is, why would CPS send out notices that have no teeth? Couldn't they just have sent a friendly reminder instead? And don't use the lame 'automatic notices' bit, I worked on system like this and I know how easy they are to bypass.
Yes, of course CPS has an automated "friendly reminder" mailer in their system just for outfits like Fort Sam Houston.

Or maybe that highly motivated workforce would swoop in and intercept the automated notices, and put in little personalized notes with hearts over the i's.

I hear CPS is working on radio broadcasts that can be picked up by tinfoil hats reminding folks like you to pay their bills.

[Nbadan]

So what's next? CPS sends out disconnection notices that carry a disclaimer :unless your a member of one of our fine military bases, then feel free to disregard this notice? The bigger question here is why is it that bases are having trouble paying their bills when we are spending almost half the money we pay into taxes on some form of national defense, incuding another 'emergency spending bill' for Iraq of close to 90 billion dollars?

[Nbadan]

War bill getting paid while lights go out at Army posts
By Liz Austin
Associated Press


FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas — While billions of military dollars are being spent on the war in Iraq, some Army posts back home can’t afford to pay the electricity bill or cut the grass.

The Army’s Installation Management Agency is $530 million short of what it needs through Oct. 1 to fund the garrisons at the 117 installations it oversees in the United States, Europe and Asia, agency spokesman Stephen Oertwig said.

Garrisons are basically the city halls of Army installations, providing services such as garbage removal, shuttle buses, mail delivery and firefighting.

The crunch is forcing garrisons to drastically curtail services except those essential to the war on terrorism and the health and safety of soldiers and their families.

Fort Knox in Kentucky closed one of its eight dining halls for a month and laid off 133 contract workers. Fort Bragg in North Carolina can’t afford to buy pens, paper or other office supplies until the new fiscal year starts in October....Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio hasn’t been able to pay its $1.4-million monthly utility bill since March, prompting the energy company’s automated computer system to mail out 1,300 disconnection notices for many of the post’s administrative buildings....

Army Times (http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-1921938.php)

It's the family of the troops who have to make up for the shortfall. Meanwhile, according to some estimates, the Pentagon cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions," Rumsfeld admitted (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml)

[xrayzebra]

[B]War bill getting paid while lights go out at Army posts
By Liz Austin
Associated Press



Army Times (http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-1921938.php)

It's the family of the troops who have to make up for the shortfall. Meanwhile, according to some estimates, the Pentagon cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions," Rumsfeld admitted (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml)

Well, once again Dan acts just like the group her represents by his lies and
crap. No GI or his family is having to make up any shortfall, nor is any
family going without electricity. For goodness sakes Dan, read the
dumb article. Will you?

[boutons_]

July 6, 2006

Budget Woes Hit Army Posts Nationwide

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 8:27 p.m. ET

FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas (AP) -- A diversion of dollars to help fight the war in Iraq has helped create a $530 million shortfall for Army posts at home and abroad, leaving some unable to pay utility bills or even cut the grass.

In San Antonio, Fort Sam Houston hasn't been able to pay its $1.4 million monthly utility bill since March, prompting workers in many of the post's administrative buildings to get automated disconnection notices.

Fort Bragg in North Carolina can't afford to buy pens, paper or other office supplies until the new fiscal year starts in October.

And in Kentucky, Fort Knox had to close one of its eight dining halls for a month and lay off 133 contract workers.

''Every time something goes away it impacts a person ... a soldier or their family or one of our civilians,'' said Col. Wendy Martinson, garrison commander at Fort Sam Houston, which has 27,300 military and civilian workers. ''I'm charged with taking care of them, not taking things away from them.''

Garrisons function as the city halls of Army installations, providing services such as garbage removal, mail delivery and firefighting. The Army's Installation Management Agency is $530 million short of what it needs through Oct. 1 to fund garrisons at the 117 installations it oversees in the United States, Europe and Asia, agency spokesman Stephen Oertwig said.

The skyrocketing cost of fuel is partly to blame, and it also is costing more to pay civilians in Asia and Europe, Oertwig said. Another major factor is the practice of funding the war through spending bills outside the annual budget.

As Congress spent months debating the supplemental spending bill, the Army had to divert money from the Installation Management Agency's budget to cover the cost of the war, Oertwig said.

The Army often diverts operations money for other programs, in times of war and peace, said Jeremiah Gertler, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The supplemental spending bill usually replenishes those funds.

This year, though, most of the defense money in the $94.5 billion bill was earmarked for the war, leaving little to pay back operations accounts, Gertler said.

Military officials could have asked for more money to ease the garrison budget crunch, but they knew a bigger request would have created a bigger fight in Congress, he said.

''The Pentagon is reluctant to ask for any more than they need for the war because it all looks like it's going to the war and becomes a very controversial bill,'' Gertler said.

( however, the Repugs have no reluctance is eternally asking for tax cuts for the super rich and corps, refusing to collect $100s of Ms in royalties for oil/gas/coal leases on federal lands and waters, etc, etc. You want values? Follow the Repug money. )

But military analyst Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution said money management seems to be the larger problem. The Defense Department spends about as much on maintenance and operations as it does on weapons and personnel combined, he said, so there should be more than enough for the bills.

''It makes me worry if the Pentagon can't do its accounting well enough to find money for its electric bills,'' he said. ''It just boggles my mind a little bit.''

( the military knows it will get $400B year in and year out, where's the motivation to economize or for close accounting? )

The legislation Congress approved June 15 included $722 million for the Installation Management Agency, to be split among its installations.

Martinson still doesn't know how much Fort Sam Houston will get, but she expects it will be enough to pay the electric tab. A spokesman for CPS Energy says the company understands the problem and won't turn off the lights any time soon.

However, it won't save the jobs of about 100 contract workers Martinson had to let go.

And it won't make it easier for her to scrounge up the dollars to buy chlorine for the pool where soldiers' kids take swimming lessons or feed for the horses that carry soldiers' caskets to their graves at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery.

The new funds also won't change the orders the Installation Management Agency issued in early June to freeze civilian hiring and fire temporary employees, reduce cell phone, pager and government vehicle use and reduce, cancel or defer contracts.

Staff Sgt. Mark Barclay, 35, a small group leader with the Army Medical Department Noncommissioned Officer Academy at Fort Sam Houston, said he hasn't really noticed the cuts but is ready to adapt to them.

''All that happens is you just make do with what you have and try to get the best training for the soldiers,'' Barclay said.

Oertwig expects the austerity to last for at least another year and a half.

''Every day we're looking at what are those services that are required to keep the Army going and where can we get efficiencies,'' Oertwig said. ''We're looking to get a dollar's worth of service out of 90 cents or less in some cases.''

That alarms U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith, a Republican whose district includes Fort Sam Houston.

In a letter to Army Secretary Francis Harvey, Smith said he worries the budget crisis will affect Fort Sam Houston's ability to accommodate the 11,000 additional personnel being sent there starting next year by the Base Closure and Realignment Commission.

''That Fort Sam cannot even pay for basic post operations is, frankly, Mr. Secretary, a disgrace,'' he said.

------

Associated Press writer Estes Thompson contributed to this report from Raleigh, N.C.

------

On the Net:

Installation Management Agency: http://www.ima.army.mil

[Guru of Nothing]

I have a new fantasy - Col. Wendy Martinson.

PLEASE, no pictures.