USA — Second phase of security guard conversion begins in August

SAN ANTONIO, Texas — Next month, the Army will begin the sec­ond phase of con­vert­ing near­ly 3,100 instal­la­tion access-con­trol-point secu­ri­ty guard posi­tions from con­trac­tor to fed­er­al-employ­ee sta­tus at 46 loca­tions in the con­ti­nen­tal Unit­ed States, Hawaii and Alas­ka.

Mar­vin Williams, a secu­ri­ty guard with Costal Inter­na­tion­al Secu­ri­ty, checks an iden­ti­fi­ca­tion card at the entrance to the U.S. Army’s Detroit Arse­nal in War­ren, Mich. Source: Steve Ball

The first phase, which must be com­plet­ed by Sept. 30, has seen 1,702 job announce­ments being adver­tised at 28 gar­risons. The sec­ond phase, which will be com­plet­ed by July 26, 2011, will con­sist of the remain­ing 18 gar­risons and 1,397 positions. 

Over­all, Instal­la­tion Man­age­ment Com­mand is fill­ing 3,099 open­ings for guards need­ed at every gar­ri­son, except those aligned under Base Realign­ment and Clo­sure or those tran­si­tion­ing to joint bases where anoth­er ser­vice is the lead agency. 

The con­ver­sion is being made due to con­gres­sion­al man­dates and the expect­ed loss of a waiv­er estab­lished after 9/11 that allowed the Depart­ment of Defense to con­tract secu­ri­ty guard ser­vices at mil­i­tary instal­la­tions in the U.S., said Craig Shrein­er, branch chief of phys­i­cal secu­ri­ty for IMCOM. 

Even though the employ­ment cat­e­go­ry of these guards will change, the ser­vice they pro­vide sev­en days a week, 24 hours a day will not. 

“Through­out this process, we will ensure a well-coor­di­nat­ed tran­si­tion that con­tin­ues our sup­port to the mis­sion, Sol­diers and Fam­i­lies, and Army com­mu­ni­ties,” said Shreiner. 

The group-two con­ver­sion involves instal­la­tions belong­ing to IMCOM’s North­east, South­east and West regions. Those 18 loca­tions are: 

Adel­phi Lab­o­ra­to­ry Cen­ter, Md.
Fort Ben­ning, Ga.
Fort Bragg, N.C.
Fort Belvoir, Va.
Fort Det­rick, Md.
Fort Gor­don, Ga.
Fort Hood, Texas
Fort Jack­son, S.C.
Fort Lee, Va.
Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.
Fort Meade, Md.
Fort Myer/Fort McNair/Henderson Hall, Va.
Fort Ruck­er, Ala.
Fort Stewart/Hunter AAF, Ga.
Wal­ter Reed Army Med­ical Cen­ter, Wash­ing­ton, D.C.

Once job announce­ments are made, all qual­i­fied appli­cants — includ­ing con­trac­tors cur­rent­ly hold­ing such posi­tions — are encour­aged to com­pete for the open­ings, Shrein­er said. 

“Addi­tion­al­ly, vet­er­ans’ hir­ing pref­er­ences are in place,” Shrein­er said, “and pre­vi­ous expe­ri­ence with mil­i­tary secu­ri­ty work is some­thing we value.” 

For more infor­ma­tion, vis­it the Army’s Civil­ian Per­son­nel On-Line site — www.cpol.army.mil — or USA Jobs — http://usajobs.opm.gov/ — and use the key words “secu­ri­ty guard.” 

Source:
U.S. Depart­ment of Defense
Office of the Assis­tant Sec­re­tary of Defense (Pub­lic Affairs)