DATE: Saturday, July 26, 1997               TAG: 9707260410

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B3   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN AND JACK DORSEY, STAFF WRITERS 

                                            LENGTH:   72 lines

OFFICIAL: NAVY SMOOTHS HORNETS' DEPLOYMENTS

The Navy will shuffle deployment schedules for F/A-18 Hornet squadrons based in Florida in order to smooth the transfer of pilots, support personnel and thousands of family members to Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach next year, a senior defense official said Friday.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said any Hornet pilots and crews deployed to the Mediterranean from Cecil Field, near Jacksonville, this fall with the aircraft carrier George Washington will return to the Florida base when their six-month sea tours are finished.

Once home, they'll be given ample time to find new homes in Virginia and then moved, the official said.

``No one's family will be moved'' during their deployment, the official promised. And when they're moved, families will have sufficient time to settle in Hampton Roads before their Navy members are ordered on any new deployment, he added.

The Navy plans to close Cecil Field and relocate 10 Hornet squadrons - some 175 fighter jets - to Oceana beginning next year as part of a series of base realignments ordered in 1995. The first squadron is supposed to arrive in May, with the last one coming in a year later.

The official's promise that family needs will be ``embedded'' in decisions about the moving schedule appeared calculated to head off complaints by U.S. Rep. Owen B. Pickett, D-2nd District, over delays in the Navy's submission of an environmental assessment of the transfers.

The environmental impact statement, including a review of the effects of exhaust emissions and noise from the additional jets on residential areas near Oceana, must be approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency before transfer orders can be issued.

Pickett has been pressing the service to complete work on the statement quickly so that it can be approved before the George Washington departs. It would be unfair to pilots, crews and families to deploy the squadrons from Florida this fall amid uncertainty about where their homes will be when they return, he has argued.

Pickett could not be reached for comment Friday.

The official said work on the impact statement continues in Washington, where Justice Department lawyers have raised 10 areas of concern about the Navy's plan. The department would have to defend the service in court, should the impact statement be challenged by environmentalists or residents opposed to having the additional jets in the area.

Navy officials are thought to be especially wary of a possible challenge by local governments and businesses around the Marine Corps Air Station at Cherry Point, N.C. Most of the Hornets coming to Oceana originally were slated for transfer to Cherry Point, where authorities viewed the influx of planes and people as a potential economic bonanza.

None of the Justice Department's concerns about the draft statement are considered serious enough to threaten the transfer, the official said. The lawyers withdrew four of their concerns after meetings with Navy personnel, and the service is revising the report to address the attorneys' other points.

The report must examine all available alternatives to moving the planes to Oceana, the official said. Delays so far stem in part from extra work the Navy has done to look at moving some of the jets to a base in Key West, Fla., an alternative that apparently had not been fully explored previously.

Once the Navy publishes the environmental study, it will be at least 4 1/2 months before regulators finalize their ruling. That delay includes a 45-day public comment period on the initial draft and an additional 90 days before a final decision is effective.

Meanwhile, some squadron members at Cecil Field are beginning to complain about conditions there as the base slowly shuts down. Minor repairs are not being made to some buildings because there are no funds, they say.

``Life is getting uncomfortable there,'' said one source who asked not to be identified. ``The squadrons are being told to tighten up on their spaces and move planes closer together so they can begin closing some hangars.

Cecil Field is to be turned over to commercial interests once it is vacated by the Navy. The service may not complete its withdrawal from the facility until 2001.

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