Camp Bullis and the surrounding area will undergo a joint land use study so military officials can determine how to improve interactions between the facility and nearby development. Photo by Beverly Simas

Military training base Camp Bullis and the surrounding area soon will undergo a study to determine how the community’s various components can work better together. The study also will evaluate the training base’s needs, which are now being somewhat compromised, officials said.

San Antonio City Council recently approved the study, demonstrating the importance of the city’s military installations, but council members aren’t the only ones who are concerned.

“Northside Neighborhoods for Organized Development strongly encourages the approval of the ordinance on the study,” said NNOD President Chuck Saxer. “Protecting San Antonio’s military installations and their missions is essential.”

The 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission stipulated that a Medical Education and Training Command for the military would be built in San Antonio. Currently, from 4,500 to 9,000 combat medics train at Fort Sam Houston; once BRAC is complete, there will be more than 27,000 trainees at the base each year.

“That will provide a two-fold increase in the amount of training provided at Camp Bullis,” said San Antonio Office of Military Affairs Director Robert Murdock.

Murdock said the post is used for various types of field training, and that training may be threatened by effects of residential and commercial development nearby.

So, San Antonio and the military will co-fund a joint land use study to ensure that encroachment does not cause Camp Bullis to close.

“The purpose of the study is to ensure a degree of compatibility between civilian developers and neighborhoods that border our military instillations,” Murdock said, “such that the military can continue to do their training and the civilian community can develop around the military installations.”

Camp Bullis faces four threats of encroachment. An anticipated increase in noise from more helicopters will likely bother neighbors, while lighting from commercial developments would blind trainees at night. The post is situated atop the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone, where development and training must be environmentally-sensitive, and finally, nearby development threatens to push endangered species onto the base, which would take away training space.

According to Murdock, the golden-cheeked warbler and two karst invertebrates reside near the base on land that is vacant now, but scheduled for development in the future.