Proposal for Test Site plant is undecided

Benjamin Grove

Saturday, Dec. 3, 2005 | 9:24 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- One year after Government Printing Office chief Bruce James floated a proposal to locate a high-tech document production plant at the Nevada Test Site, the idea is still stuck in a study.

James, a Nevadan who took over the agency in 2002, proposed last December that the remote, high-security Test Site would be the perfect place for a GPO facility that would produce security and intelligence documents, as well as a new generation of "electronic passports" complete with computer chips. It also would serve as a second digital printing center for Federal Register and Congressional Record documents.

The new Nevada plant was to be humming as early as July 2006, according to a GPO "strategic vision" unveiled in December 2004.

But the proposal is caught up in a comprehensive real estate review commissioned by the GPO as it seeks to move out of its massive eight-story, red-brick headquarters in downtown Washington into more modern facilities. The entire agency under James has been undergoing a transformation from the government's paper-document printing operation to a digital document center.

The GPO in September 2004 hired The Staubach Company, a real estate consulting firm led by former National Football League star Roger Staubach, to conduct the $750,000 study. Part of the study is complete, and a headquarters relocation plan has been sent to Congress.

But the GPO's proposal for a new remote facility -- such as the one proposed for the Test Site -- will not be presented to Congress until the first quarter of next year, GPO spokeswoman Veronica Meter said.

Meter declined to say why plans for the new plant had stalled. A Staubach spokesman did not return phone calls Friday.

Meter could not say whether it is likely the Test Site will be considered the best location for a new plant. She declined to say how many other sites might be under consideration for it.

But she added, "Bruce James would like to see this get done in Nevada. Right now we are going through a planning process as required by Congress."

James is a Lake Tahoe resident who retired a millionaire after 30 years in the printing business.

The Nevada Test Site, home to above- and below-ground nuclear tests from 1951 to 1992, is now home to bomb-legacy clean-up programs as well as counter-terrorism training.

Benjamin Grove can be reached at (202) 662-7436 or at grove@ lasvegassun.com.