WASHINGTON – Senators from Arkansas, Iowa, Illinois and New York are teaming up to drive additional work to U.S. Army Arsenals in their states.
The lawmakers recently introduced the Army Arsenal Strategic Workload Enhancement Act, which is intended to bring military contracts to the arsenals from the Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard and Marines.
“We need to keep Pine Bluff Arsenal healthy,” Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., said Wednesday.
“The Pine Bluff Arsenal is an asset to maintaining our nation’s strategic industrial capability. Providing opportunities through public-private partnership will ensure the facility and its employees remain ready when called upon to serve our national security needs,” said Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark.
Pine Bluff Arsenal is the only place in the Northern Hemisphere where white phosphors munitions – such as smoke grenades — are filled. The infantry commonly uses smoke grenades to mask troop movements.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
“There are still critically important things that Pine Bluff provides the military,” Pryor said.
The legislation, which was introduced last Wednesday, would require the Army to create a five-year strategic plan to increase workload at the arsenals and ensure that the arsenals are considered for military contracts across the Department of Defense and not just from the Army.
Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Mark Kirk, R-Ill., Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, are pushing the bill to support the Rock Island Arsenal, located near Davenport, Iowa, on the Illinois side of the Mississippi River.
Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., signed on in support of the Watervliet Arsenal near Troy, N.Y.
Rep. Robert Schilling, R-Ill., and David Loebsack, D-Iowa, have co-sponsored a companion bill in the House. They also added a provision to the 2013 Defense Authorization bill that would direct the Pentagon to identify the critical manufacturing capabilities provided by arsenals and determine the amount of work that is required to maintain them in peacetime.
“It is absolutely critical to keep the industrial base warm and ready in order to secure its future,” Schilling said.
The House planned to begin debate on the defense bill later Wednesday.