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[David_Rubenson@rand.org (David Rubenson)]

I disagree with your assessment on a "Real Politics" basis.

Past Congressional willingness to allocate large BRAC cleanup budgets has
been motivated by the need for a political response to the economic
dislocations of base closure. This, more than concern about environmental
cleanup, has been the driver for cleanup budgets. As time has passed,
communities have adjusted to (or been forced to accept) the loss in jobs
and there is a reduced sense of political crisis. As urgency diminishes,
so too will BRAC cleanup budgets.

The key to ensuring adequate cleanup budgets is to offer something
exciting; some means of breaking out of what may appear to some as a never
ending process. An experiment that "reinvents government," demonstrates
the ability of locals to manage their own cleanups, uses cleanup to create
local jobs, etc..

An exciting idea is more likely to stimulate concern about environmental
contamination than any concern that detailed regulatory protocols are not
being met.

I think that's the hard reality.