The State’s commission designed to help keep military bases in Missouri is meeting Thursday in Jefferson City, amid the backdrop of the Base Realignment and Closure Commission voting on which bases nationwide will be kept and which will close. The Chairman of Missouri’s Military Preparedness and Enhancement Commission, Dalton Wright, says while what his group is doing is important to help keep military operations and jobs in this state, it might not make any difference for this round of closures, or in the future, no matter what is done. Wright points out that Missouri doesn’t have a bad environment for bases, it just wants a better one. He stands by his decision not to pursue an angle other states are looking at, that the Pentagon cannot close a National Guard facility without that state’s Governor’s permission. Wright says the military could leave a facility in place but refuse to fund its operation. And, Wright says the State won’t be able to run Guard bases on its own.
