Fort Bragg’s civilian employees are expected back to work Tuesday, after Congress reached a deal to end a government shutdown.
The agreement to resume normal government operations came midday, after thousands of local civilian employees were sent home as part of a furlough directed by the shutdown that began at midnight on Friday.
Local museums closed, some training was curtailed and services across Fort Bragg were reduced during the short-lived shutdown.
But leaders remain concerned that political deja vu could create a similar stalemate next month.
After failing to agree on a funding extension last week, Democrats and Republicans in the Senate agreed to a short-term funding bill, known as a Continuing Resolution, that would keep the government open until at least Feb. 8, according to reports.
The bill was then approved by the House before being sent to the White House for President Trump’s approval Monday evening.
Defense leaders have long criticized short-term funding fixes, which have become the norm in recent years. The lack of stable, long-term funding threatens readiness and modernization, officials have said.
On Monday, Fort Bragg’s approximately 20,000 civilian employees reported to work to learn whether or not they would be furloughed during the shutdown.
Thousands were sent home, including approximately 800 of the garrison’s roughly 1,200 civilian employees and 1,500 of U.S. Army Special Operations Command’s approximately 2,000 civilian employees.
The shutdown also led to the temporary closure of the 82nd Airborne Division War Memorial Museum on Fort Bragg. Officials with the Airborne & Special Operations Museum in downtown Fayetteville noted that the museum was closed Monday per its normal schedule, but said the museum would not have been able to resume operations amid the shutdown.
Elsewhere, units reported some canceled training, but officials for most said they were still working to grasp the impact of the shutdown.
One of the first victims of the shutdown was a planned airborne operation set early Saturday for Sicily Drop Zone.
An 82nd Airborne Division spokesman said 600 paratroopers were scheduled to jump as part of the monthly Saturday Proficiency Jump Program.
Lt. Col. Joe Buccino, a spokesman for the division, said officials are still evaluating the broader impacts to readiness caused by the shutdown. But he noted that many activities related to the nation’s Global Response Force — tasked with deploying anywhere in the world on short notice — were exempted.
Also on Saturday, a massive training exercise involving the North Carolina National Guard’s 30th Armored Brigade Combat Team and troops from North Carolina, South Carolina and West Virginia was halted as the shutdown went into effect.
The exercise, which began on Friday, involved 2,600 local soldiers and hundreds of military vehicles before it was cut short and troops sent home.
A spokesman with the NCNG said more than 1,000 of the state Guard’s 2,100 full-time employees were furloughed during the shutdown, but said state soldiers and airmen remained on call to respond to any state emergencies.
The canceled training will have a lingering impact for weeks, if not months, according to the National Guard Association of the United States, which lobbies on behalf of the Guard.
Maj. Gen. James Hoyer, NGAUS chairman, and retired Brig. Gen. Roy Robinson, the NGAUS president, said officials were forced to cancel training for more than 90,000 Guardsmen over the weekend.
In North Carolina, the exercise at Fort Bragg, known as Operation Hickory Hammer, represents a lost opportunity to enhance readiness as well as the loss of two days’ pay for Guardsmen slated to participate in the training.
"Training can be rescheduled, but it requires some complex choreography," NGAUS leaders said. "Training sites must be scheduled months in advance. Commanders have other plans for the months ahead. So do our families. And unlike in the active component, the needs of civilian employers must be considered.”
In all, roughly 50,000 full-time Guard soldiers were furloughed during the shutdown.
"Government shutdowns, stopgap budgets and spending caps are making it increasingly difficult to defend the greatest nation on earth,” the NGAUS said. “In order to plan, in order to keep our commitments to our troops and their families, and in order to maintain our readiness, we must have predictable, stable budgets. If Congress won't do this on an annual basis, it should move to a two-year defense-budget cycle. Our ability to protect lives and property at home and defend our nation's interests abroad in the years ahead may depend on it."
Other parts of Fort Bragg and the surrounding veteran community reported they largely were unaffected by the government closing.
At Womack Army Medical Center, which has more than 3,000 civilian employees, officials reported they maintained mostly normal operations, with the hospital and all outlying clinics and services continuing normal hours.
Officials with the Fayetteville Veterans Affairs Medical Center made a similar report.
VA spokesman Jeff Melvin said the VA was unaffected because of s having received advance appropriations for the 2018 fiscal year as part of the 2017 budget.
He said more than 95 percent of VA employees were reporting to work during the shutdown and that no local operations should be impacted.
Despite furloughs, Fort Bragg officials said identification card facilities, schools, Exchanges, commissaries and fast-food restaurants remained open on Monday.
Physical fitness centers also were not impacted. Nor were the post gates.
But, officials said, some child care facilities may have been scaled back because of the shutdown. And post commissaries were expected to operate on normal hours through Wednesday, at which time they would close pending further appropriations.
Fort Bragg officials said that police and emergency services remain fully manned during the shutdown, but warned that reduced personnel could impact a variety of services.
According to Fort Bragg’s Directorate of Family and Morale, Welfare and Recreation, services impacted by the shutdown included the post’s Law Enforcement Center Records Section, which conducts criminal background checks and provides copies of police reports; education services; and Equal Employment Opportunity Office.
In addition, all recreational access to training areas was suspended and there was to be no out-processing for permanent change of station moves unless a soldier was going to a deploying unit.
Officials said support to soldiers and families by the Directorate of Public Works for off-post housing issues also was suspended. And programs and services that will have reduced manning and therefore additional wait times will include victim advocacy, financial readiness, the Exceptional Family Member Program, family advocacy programs, the Soldier and Family Assistance Center and the Throckmorton Library.
With the shutdown lifted, concern over future pay also is eased.
On Monday, the Department of Defense said service members and civilians would receive their next paycheck, for work through Jan. 19. But pending additional legislation, troops and civilians would not be paid for work during the shutdown.
The pay of military retirees and annuitants are not affected by the shutdown because they are not paid from appropriations.
Across Fort Bragg, officials repeatedly stated that training for future and ongoing missions would not be impacted by the short shutdown.
A spokesman for U.S. Army Forces Command, which oversees most of the training for Army units in the continental United States, said the Fort Bragg-based command experienced furloughs among its staff, but that ongoing Combat Training Center rotations in Louisiana and California were unaffected because units involved in those training exercises are preparing for upcoming missions.
At U.S. Army Special Operations Command, a spokesman said civilians involved in training soldiers continued to work during the shutdown. That includes civilians assigned to the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School, which trains Special Forces, civil affairs and psychological operations soldiers at Fort Bragg.
Military editor Drew Brooks can be reached at dbrooks@fayobserver.com or 486-3567.