Fort Worth’s Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base is a major economic power and a direct or indirect source of more than 47,000 jobs in Tarrant and surrounding counties, state Comptroller Glenn Hegar said June 27.
Hegar is touring Texas bases and their home cities to present the results of a study of the economic impact of the military on Texas. The Texas Military Preparedness Commission (TMPC) asked for the study last year.
The comptroller estimates that the Joint Reserve Base contributed $6.6 billion to the Texas economy in 2015 while supporting about 47,000 jobs. It also injected more than $2.6 billion in disposable personal income into the area.
“This economy is so much more diverse than it used to be,” said Hegar.
Military employment in Tarrant County grew by 6 percent between 2010 and 2014, according to figures from the comptroller’s office.
Across the state, the comptroller’s study found that the state’s 15 major military installations generate $136.4 billion in economic activity and $81.3 billion in gross domestic product each year, supporting more than 800,000 Texas jobs and creating $48 billion in personal income. Across the United States as a whole, military-related employment as a share of total employment is 1.4 percent. In Texas, the share is 1.5 percent.
Fort Worth was the second stop on what Hegar called his “Good for Texas Tour: Military Edition.” A Fort Bliss stop kicked things off on June 8, followed by the Fort Worth visit. Other stops on the tour: Fort Sam Houston, Lackland and Randolph Air Force bases, June 29; Fort Hood, July 6; the Corpus Christi Army Depot, Corpus Christi and Kingsville Naval air stations, July 11; and Dyess and Goodfellow Air Force bases, July 14.
“All of us who grew up in Fort Worth realize the true importance of our base and I think everyone in Texas does,” said Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price, who also participated in the news conference at the Fort Worth Club.
Naval Air Station Fort Worth Joint Reserve Base sits on 2,300 acres and originally opened as Tarrant Field in 1932. It was later named Carswell Air Force Base in honor of Fort Worth native and Texas Christian University graduate Horace S. Carswell Jr., who was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his refusal to abandon a heavily damaged B-24 Liberator bomber over China on Oct. 26, 1944.
Carswell Air Force Base was targeted for closure by the U.S. Department of Defense Base Realignment and Closure Commission in 1991, prompting a strong and coordinated effort by local citizens and officials to keep the base open.
Ultimately, the Department of Defense closed Naval Air Station Dallas, transferred its mission to Fort Worth and created the nation’s first joint reserve base for Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Army and Texas Air National Guard reserve units.
Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, the Fort Worth-based aeronautics segment of Lockheed Martin Corp., shares air space with the base. Lockheed also uses the Naval Air Station runway and employs 13,700, a point emphasized by Hegar and Price.
Price said the base is indispensable to city prosperity and national security. She recalled the roars of B-52 bombers flying out of Carswell when it was a Strategic Air Command base. “It is the sound of freedom,” said Price. “We should never take for granted what it does to our economic base, either.”