McClellan JPA News: Schneider named VP of Association of Defense Communities

McClellan's Miki Schneider named as VP of Association of Defense Communities

Among the stacks of maps and planning documents, tucked in the back corner of the JPA Headquarters building, you’ll find Miki Schneider moving from task to task with her calm demeanor among what to others would be a bewildering array of responsibilities. Her official title is Director of Planning and her responsibilities include review of all environmental documents related to the 18,000 acre former Fort McClellan. If you are a developer interested in land use planning, or if you work for the city managing zoning and planning, or a state agency coordinating plans regarding base development, you will no doubt be talking to Miki. In addition, she works with legal contracts for lease and sale of real property; attends community meetings for the Restoration Advisory Board (RAB) and participates with the BRAC Cleanup Team (BCT).

If that list isn’t enough to overfill a work week, Miki recently became Vice President of the Association of Defense Communities. It is an important role because for more than 30 years the Association of Defense Communities (ADC) has been the voice of communities dealing with the challenges and opportunities of active and closed military installations.

McClellan's Director of Planning, Miki Schneider, named as Vice President of the Association of Defense Communities.

Today the organization has more than 1,200 members nationwide and serves to unite the diverse interests of communities, state governments, the private sector and the military on issues of base closure and realignment. Miki is only the second female to fill that position.

Her involvement with ADC began just a month after she began working for the JPA nine years ago. The JPA director at the time told her that she should attend an upcoming ADC meeting and she has been working with them ever since. She has been an ADC board member for the past 8 years and served as treasurer for 6 years. Through the ADC, Miki developed contacts with people from all branches of the military.

“But it is more than a networking site,” says Miki. “It is also an important source of information.”

For defense communities, understanding the complex and important issues they face is not an easy task. ADC has a comprehensive approach to increasing the knowledge of its members including a weekly newsletter, original research, a library of original publications, and a just-a-call-away clearinghouse of information.

Beyond the written information, ADC provides technical assistance to defense communities through forums and conferences. Defense communities facing realignment of their military installations share many of the same issues involved in dealing with installation closure. In many cases, local communities depend on the jobs and support the bases provide to the local economy. Recently, Miki has joined a team of ten ADC board members that lecture at bases being considered for closure. These lectures provide information on how various sites have adjusted to changes brought on by the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process, whether it is base closure and redevelopment, partial privatization, environmental cleanup, or expansion of mission.

Through her work with the ADC, Miki adds to the depth of knowledge already required for a complex job. As an ADC Board member and because of her work at McClellan with one of the most challenging environmental cleanups of BRAC bases, Miki was asked to testify before the BRAC Commission in 2005. According to Miki, "It was an honor and a big responsibility to sit in that hot seat and talk about environmental cleanup on closed military bases."

Of her work with ADC, Miki adds, “This organization has been a huge benefit to my work at McClellan over the last 8 years. It has provided information and contacts that we would otherwise have had to pay for.”