Feedback Fridays

Feedback Fridays is a weekly forum that aims to connect the 502d Air Base Wing with members of the Joint Base San Antonio community. Questions are collected during commander’s calls, town hall meetings and throughout the week.

If you have a question or concern, please send an email to RandolphPublicAffairs@us.af.mil using the subject line “Feedback Fridays.” Questions will be further researched and published as information becomes available.

Personnel Issues

Q. The Army education office at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston is allowed to give testing for the Defense Language Proficiency Test, or DLPT, on their government computers, but the Air Force education office cannot. This is due to the Network Enterprise Center. Are there any plans to troubleshoot this so that testing will be available?

A. I'm sorry to hear you were having trouble with DLPT testing at the JBSA-Fort Sam Houston Air Force Education Office.

Due to changes to the JBSA-Fort Sam Houston Network Enterprise Center network policy, the computers in the Air Force education office lost their ability to provide service to members without a Common Access Card, or CAC, provisioned to work on the Army network.

The Air Force education office is working with the NEC to rectify the differences between the Army and Air Force Education Office computers to allow DLPT testing for all members at the Air Force education office location, regardless of where their CAC is provisioned.

While this capability is being corrected, DLPT testing is still available for everyone at the Army Education Office. Due to the high volume of testers at the Army location, an appointment is required in advance.

Q. An article recently published in the JBSA Legacy stated which businesses off base were "off limits" to all military personnel, and if they were found in one of these establishments, there could be judicial punishment.

Does this policy/regulation apply to retirees and family members? I have seen articles in the Military Times that the Department of Defense will go after retirees if they break any article of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Is it true that this can happen to retirees?

A. Thank you for your question! Retired members of the armed forces are still military members and are still subject to court-martial jurisdiction. This means they must obey the order not to visit places on the off-limits list – or face possible prosecution under Article 92 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice for failing to obey the order.

Dependents, on the other hand, who are not active duty military members or retired members, are not subject to prosecution under the UCMJ and are not legally bound to follow the order.

Dependents still benefit by avoiding places on the list. This is because the list is based on rigorous investigation by the JBSA Armed Forces Disciplinary Control Board and a final determination by the JBSA Installation Commander that a place poses a significant risk to good order and discipline, health, morale, welfare, safety, and morals.

We cannot allow military members to face those risks, and dependents should not put themselves at risk.

Installation & Facilities

Q. Are there any plans in the near future to repaint the parking lines at the Brooke Army Medical Center parking lot?

A. Thank you very much for bringing this issue to my attention. Our Civil Engineer team, whenever possible, accomplishes a majority of our parking lot striping in house.

For larger and/or more complex efforts, such as the BAMC parking area, we have to employ contract support which takes additional time and effort to plan, coordinate, fund, and execute. CE recently conducted an assessment of the lot and concurs that new striping is required; however, there is presently no project planned.

Our CE team will start planning efforts and will try and resolve as quickly as time and resources allow.  

Q. Would it be possible to install parade ground signs along/near Bong Avenue at JBSA-Lackland? Visitors are a bit confused searching for the parade ground during Basic Military Training graduation day and pull into the parking lot behind building 1052.

When going to and from the parking lot, we can always tell when someone is lost and we don't mind pointing them in the right direction. Signs with arrows would help guide visitors and eliminate the confusion.

A. Thank you for your suggestion to help assist the families and friends of our future Airmen in finding the BMT Parade Field. We would not want them to miss the honored tradition of the Basic Military Training Graduation Parade.

In response to your idea, our Civil Engineers have engaged with the 37th Training Wing to identify optimal placement of additional signage to best inform our many visitors. Once we have determined the appropriate location(s), our engineers will have new signs fabricated and placed.

Q. We spend a lot of time up at the Canyon Lake boat and recreational vehicle facilities and the Jacobs Creek Park Road off Route 306 is in dire need of repairs. The asphalt has broken away so much that you can barely fit one vehicle on the entire road.

Last year, I damaged my boat trailer tires when I went off in to the dirt and I'd like to not have that happen again this summer. Is this road part of Joint Base San Antonio property or belong to the city?

A. We appreciate your feedback, and understand your concern regarding the safety of our Canyon Lake customers. JBSA only owns and maintains a small segment of Jacobs Creek Park Road, while the majority including from FM 306 up to the JBSA property line, as well as pavement within Jacobs Creek Park, falls under Comal County.

We do not currently have any plans for this fiscal year to do repairs on our segment of the road, and we are not aware of any upgrades or repairs planned by the county, however, our community initiatives team will engage with Comal County to see if there is any potential to make improvements to the roads and we will synchronize efforts for our own portion at the same time.

These improvements would likely come sometime after this summer's busy season at the earliest.

Miscellaneous

Q. What would be the best way to try and either add another intramural sport to the base or possibly even a base team? From my knowledge, there isn’t either one in regards to tennis.

A. Thank you for your interest in intramural sports which enhances fitness and unit cohesion. The 502d Force Support Squadron is always interested in customers’ suggestions to enhance or adjust their programs as the need and trends change.

Please work directly with the Fitness Center Director at your location who will evaluate the request, conduct some surveys and put the program into place as determined to best support the request.  

Q. There are lots of rumors going around about the Army taking back Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston and the Air Force going away. Can you please put this rumor to rest once and for all? Thank you.

A. Thank you very much for your question. Last summer, the service secretaries requested a review of Joint Basing which resulted in "deep dives" for five out of the 12 joint bases, including Joint Base San Antonio. The primary area of concern included resources (funding for installation support and manpower), information technology systems and governance.

The Center for Army Analysis, or CAA, conducted the "deep dive" for JBSA. The CAA analyzed two feasible courses of action: (1) Maintain JBSA and implement recommendations to improve the Joint Base construct; (2) Dissolve JBSA or separate Fort Sam Houston from JBSA.

Earlier this month, the service secretaries agreed to implement COA (1) maintain JBSA and leverage the Tri-Service (Army, Air Force and Navy) Working Group to implement the recommendations identified in the CAA study.

This is a great opportunity, and we remain committed to working with our sister services to improve JBSA through implementation of the CAA study recommendations for our mission partners, family members and the communities.