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The options available to public agencies by statute in applying for surplus property are as follows:

Public Airport. Surplus property for public airport use may be deeded to a public agency without consideration upon recommendation of the Federal Aviation Administration.

Public Health or Education. Surplus property for these uses may be acquired by public agencies by deed from the Department of Health, Education and Welfare at a public benefit allowance of up to 100%.

Public Park or Public Recreation Area. Surplus property for
these purposes may be acquired by a public agency by deed
from the Department of the Interior at a public benefit allow-
ance, or discount, of up to 100%. The park or recreation
use must be continued in perpetuity.

Historic Monument. Property determined by the Secretary
of the Interior to be suitable for use as a historic monument
may be deeded to a public agency by the General Services
Admin. without monetary consideration and in perpetuity.
Wildlife Conservation. Property for this purpose may be
transferred under certain circumstances by the GSA to the
State agency for wildlife conservation without consideration.
Negotiated Sale. Property required by public agencies for
other than the specialized purposes cited above may be

acquired from the GSA at the fair market value determined by GSA.

Negotiated disposals to non-Federal public agencies are based on fair market value determined by GSA from appraisals performed by professional appraisers. Determination of fair market value in this way normally required 30 to 90 days, depending on the size and complexity of the facility.

An explanation statement of the circumstances of each disposal by negotiation must be submitted to the Committees on Government Operations of the Congress in advance of each disposal when the property involved has a fair market value in excess of $1,000.

GSA is required by law and Executive Order to assess the potential environmental impact of any disposal of real property in order to avoid adverse effects and restore or enhance environmental quality to the fullest extent practicable. Environmental approval may require an extended period of time and does require a minimum of 90 days following the submission of a draft environmental impact statement to the Council on Environmental Quality.

Surplus properties not disposed of to public agencies or institutions are ordinarily offered for sale by GSA regional offices, after advertising, on a competitive bid basis.

COMMUNITY IMPACTS

Overview

Military base activities exercise a significant influence on many regional economies. Base closure or realignment announcements inevitably create strong community apprehension. Many of these fears can be allayed, however, when the impact of a military installation on the surrounding community is fully understood. The influence of a Defense activity is substantially different from that of a private industrial plant. This difference can be attributed to five major causes:

Military Personnel Work Force. Military personnel assigned to a DoD facility are not drawn from the local labor area and are not even reflected in the regional employment statistics maintained by the States and the U.S. Department of Labor.

Military Spending Habits. The availability of post exchanges and commissary facilities substantially reduces the local spending impact by military personnel. Furthermore, the spending habits of junior officers and enlisted personnel also tend to diminish this local impact.

Civilian Payroll Impact. While the influence of military spend-
ing on any local economy is often low, the impact of DoD
civilian salaries on a regional economy has been found to be
unusually strong. The comparatively high wages and the
stability of civilian employment at the military facility are
substantial contributors to the strength and stability of the
local economy.

Local Procurement. DoD procurement is made largely
through contracts on a national scale; thus, it has little
effect on local purchases as compared to most industrial
plants.

Selective Impacts. The operation of Defense facilities can have substantial impact on such key sectors as residential housing, specialized small businesses, and school operating budgets, but generally will have little overall impact on other local economic indices such as total retail sales.

DoD facilities sometimes represent the largest single employer in a community. It is in these instances where Defense activities exercise their greatest influence on area economies. These influences can be seen in:

Personal Expenditures.

Local personal expenditures by the base military personnel
and the DoD civilian work force represent a source of indirect
business stimulus and service sector employment. Most
notably, this impact is felt in banking, transportation, real
estate, automobile sales, utilities, motels, retail sales,
restaurants, and local government. These locally induced or
indirect employment levels in a regional economy have been
measured by statistical or econometric models for a wide
range of specific military facilities or regions. These several
models use a "multiplier" relationship between the change in
service sector employment within the regional economy.

Considerable differences exist among communities. Large cities like Boston and San Francisco are often "self contained" with a high proportion of personal expenditures made locally. Naturally, these large centers can absorb employment impacts more easily than can small centers. In smaller communities, such as Brunswick, Georgia, a significant portion of personal expenditures may be made outside the locality, thereby diminishing the multiplier effect of personal expenditures on the locality's economy.

Research on this problem has disclosed considerable variance in the regional multiplier effects of DoD civilian employment and a marked difference between the indirect employment influences of DoD military and civilian personnel.

Impact studies indicate that about 40% to 50% of the base military payroll actually enters the local economy due to substantial individual purchases through the post exchange or the base commissary. In the case of training facilities, the proportion of local expenditures by military personnel has been found to be as low as 29%, with considerable travel being observed by the younger trainee population.

has been calculated in the range of .662 - .667 for personnel assigned to operational facilities in the U.S. and .068 for personnel assigned to training facilities based on the military salary levels prevailing prior to 1968. Thus, the loss of 100 military jobs eventually results in the loss of approximately 66 local service jobs. The payrolls of military personnel assigned to shipboard duty is often expended outside the locality an important influence in reducing the multiplier influence of military personnel in Hawaii and other coastal installations.

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The local expenditure and employment impact for DoD civilian personnel has been far more significant. On a state-wide basis, the employment impact of defense expenditures has been found to vary between .2 and 3.0 (exclusive of the direct DoD employee himself) with a mean of 1.53 supporting sector jobs. This overall average civilián employment multiplier suggests that the loss of 100 civilian jobs at a DoD facility will result in the eventual loss of 153 local support jobs.

Local Procurement.

The purchase of operating supplies, equipment, and even food products for DoD facilities is made through national rather than local sources. Local procurement expenditures generally range from 4. 2 to 4.9 percent, as reflected in base Operations and Maintenance accounts. Local procurement is commonly limited to perishable products such as milk, or to local base maintenance costs such as contract repair or utilities. Defense facilities do not require the extensive supporting services of small machine shops, blueprint firms, and spare parts suppliers which are essential to most private industrial plants.

• Housing.

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The most significant local influence of defense facilities beyond their primary and indirect employment impact is in the area of residential housing. In the case of eight communities experiencing base closures between 1964 and 1968, professional real estate appraisals of the local housing markets indicated that local residential sales virtually ceased following the closure announcements.

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