Follow-up On The Cannon Coup; Tucson Cheerleaders Pushed Hard For New Mission For Their Airfare Base While Clovis Was Quiet In Face Of Cuts

It will be 350 military members plus their families moved from Cannon Airfare Base in Clovis to Tucson's Davis-Monthan Base. The Eastern NM News, which we quoted, had reported upwards of 500 personnel could be gone but the final count (for now) is 350. Still, that's 5 percent of the Airforce personnel at Cannon. Here's more from the eastside paper on the Cannon hit:

News reports from Tucson state that lobbying efforts by Arizona's Congressional representatives and a city of Tucson lobbying group may have influenced the Air Force's decision to place the new AFSOC wing at Davis-Monthan to replace the A-10 operations. Cannon AFB officials were silent on the loss of aircraft and personnel. 

Here's a sample of the Tucson cheerleading over Davis-Monthan's new mission that is reminiscent of what happened in Clovis in 2005 when Cannon was threatened with a closure:

The Tucson community wouldn’t be the same without the Davis Monthan Air Force Base,” said Jay Bickley, the President of the DM 50, an organization of business leaders formed in 1986 in an effort to protect DM from closure. “They are truly enjoined.” This time there was no similar effort in Clovis to stop the cuts. The entire move was kept quiet by the congressional delegation until it lost to Arizona. Clovis officials are downplaying the impact even though others fear that the cuts could be just the beginning of the downsizing of Cannon. 

We covered the story extensively on the Monday blog, including the blow it represents to the NM Congressional delegation. Among the responses we received was this from Kathryn Carroll, a former Tucson resident now living in Las Cruces: 

When I read your Monday column regarding the raid on Cannon, I was reminded of the controversy in 2015 when I was a resident of Tucson. This 2015 article from Tucson's Arizona Daily details how the Davis-Monthan Airfare Base lost out to Cannon to become a Special Operations Wing and grew and prospered while M-D did not.

Today the will of the local residents to keep Cannon in Clovis apparently is not as enthusiastic as it was in the past, or, as you suggest, they didn't get the support from their representatives in Congress.  

The 350+ military members and their families who will be transferred will find a huge change in their lifestyles - from the higher temperatures, to finding affordable off-base housing and the overall cost of living. 

The really sad thing is that it will make a huge difference to the local economy in northeastern New Mexico, but it will make no difference to the economy of Tucson, just a change of operations. Davis-Monthan will never be in danger of closing. It's a critical training center for the Air Force. 

PAYING FOR SPACEPORT

Several readers said the entry on the July 26 blog from the Alamanc of American Politics examining the southern congressional district needs to be clarified. They cite this passage regrading the NM Spaceport:

Virgin Galactic, a company started by billionaire Richard Branson, leased land near White Sands to build the nation’s first commercial spaceport (called Spaceport America). Despite initial setbacks, the $218 million facility has grown more active, with several dozen rocket launches. NASA has tested several new technologies, as have the Italian Space Agency and several American aerospace companies. . .

The readers said the entry made it appear Branson's company actually paid for the Spaceport. They point out the $218 million came from a voter-approved tax in counties near the southern NM facility--not from Virgin Galactic.  

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(c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2023