________________________________________________________________________Richard S. Kem
A:
Considerable and yet not so much. I think it is like on any large Army post, we've got those
kinds of contacts, but it may be different just because of our location. Fort Belvoir is in the
National Capital Region and is the subject of considerable visibility. We are absolutely in a
fishbowl here with everything we do. Also, then, we're small potatoes to the surrounding
community. When something happens here, we have immediate visibility with all the
national wire services and networks. When the Secretary of the Army and the Chief of Staff
put out their no-smoking policy, all the networks came down here to interview soldiers as to
what they thought of the secretary's policy. Now, as commander you might say, "Gosh, I
wish they'd find somebody else," but I'm local and I have soldiers, and the networks don't
want to go too far, so that's what happens. So, we make them available. When we court-
martial a doctor in our hospital, then we have the national wire services sitting there in the
courtroom with their cameras. The Washington Post runs a picture of a sergeant major whom
I removed, with all kinds of accusations, later to be proved invalid.
So, we get a very high visibility from where we are located. By the same token, though, it's a
big bustling metropolitan area with lots of things driving it, as opposed to a place like Fort
Campbell, Kentucky, a huge division installation much bigger than us but with small
surrounding towns where that commanding general knows congressmen and senators and all
the rest of it. Around here we don't quite attract that kind of interest unless it's potentially
something big.
My interaction with Fairfax County, which is the local jurisdiction around us, is a very
pleasant one. We deal with them professionally at all levels. The Fairfax County school
system runs our schools. We then interact with Hayfield secondary and middle schools as our
schools. We have two Fairfax district supervisors, that's the governing body of the county, in
our area. The greater part of the post, south post, has one supervisor. Another supervisor has
the northern part of the post. We have often had meetings with them or their staffs
concerning items of interest. On the one hand, one supervisor is very cordial, very much
wants to have a professional relationship. The other one takes the more old-time politician's
view that if you can hammer them, you get your news space and then work out the details
after the noise has subsided.
Our military police deal with county and state police continually because we have open
county and state highways that run through the installation. We have joint jurisdictions and
we have great cooperation with them. In fact, when we have our receptions and get-
togethers--there's a spring reception and fall reception--we typically invite the Fairfax
supervisors, the school boards to include the Fairfax County school superintendent, and the
police chief and his subordinate chiefs to those functions to maintain those kinds of
relationships.
Q:
You only get in somewhat hot water when you have things like the relocation to Fort Leonard
Wood, the Springfield bypass issues?
A:
That's right. At the congressional level, we got interest when we were potentially moving.
There are too many other acorns around, I guess, from that standpoint.
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