Reservists' bosses get up close at Fort Polk
By William Cole
Advertiser Military Writer
ALEXANDRIA, La. — The National Guard yesterday flew 28 employers to Louisiana on a KC-135R tanker to see some of the final stateside training that the 29th Separate Infantry Brigade will receive before the unit heads to the Balad and Baghdad areas of Iraq next month.
Richard Ambo • The Honolulu Advertiser
The Employer Support for the Guard and Reserve "bosslift" is one of several held each year, paid for by either the national or Hawai'i chapters.
Honolulu Police Chief Boisse Correa helps unload soft drinks from the KC-135 tanker aircraft that flew local employers and government executives to Fort Polk, La., as guests of Employer Support of the Guard and the Reserve. The group will visit with Hawai'i reservists training there.
Among those on the four-day trip to Fort Polk, La., and the Joint Readiness Training Center are Honolulu Fire Chief Attilio Leonardi and Honolulu Police Chief Boisse Correa.
Leonardi has five helicopter pilots in his department. Four are in the Hawai'i National Guard or Army Reserve.
Three were activated for duty overseas — and then the Guard came calling for a fourth. If Leonardi had lost that pilot, the department's helicopter rescue services would have been seriously hampered, he said.
Leonardi, a Vietnam veteran who deployed in 1968 when the Reserve's 100th Battalion, 442nd Infantry was called up, sought a waiver for the pilot and got one.
"The Guard was very accommodating," Leonardi said. Maj. Gen. Robert G.F. Lee, head of the Hawai'i National Guard, was personally involved.
The case shows the trickle-down effect here of the biggest call-up of Hawai'i reservists since Vietnam.
With about 2,500 Hawai'i Army Guard and Reserve soldiers preparing for deployment to Iraq, businesses and government are having to make do while formerly weekend warriors fight, or prepare to fight, the nation's wars on two fronts.
Lee said such soldiers will account for 55 percent of U.S. forces in the region.
The state's Department of Education and fire and police departments are among those with the most employees heading to Iraq.
Correa said 200 of his 1,800 police officers are in the Guard or Reserve; 49 have been activated.
"So far, we've been doing OK," he said. "It hasn't made a major impact, but if it goes any farther, it will."
Officers are cross-trained, there are contingency plans, and gaps can be filled. But if more are called up, some changes would have to be made.
"Maybe instead of five-day classes, we have three-day classes for certain programs," Correa said. "Some people doing investigative work would maybe have to be moved over to patrol."
Leonardi has four members of his department at Fort Polk with the 29th and nine who are already in Iraq or Afghanistan. About 58 of 1,140 members of the Fire Department are in the Guard or Reserve.
Advertiser staff writer William Cole and photographer Richard Ambo traveled to Fort Polk, La., for a report on the Hawai'i National Guard's 29th Separate Infantry Brigade. The soldiers are undergoing combat certification at the Army's Joint Readiness Training Center in advance of a deployment to Iraq.
"The problem is, we can't replace them (temporarily). It takes us seven months to train a recruit," Leonardi said.
With the troops
Depending on the needs of a station, off-duty firefighters might have to be called back at time-and-a-half to round out rosters.
"It costs the city a few dollars, but we're also part of the effort to support what they (the soldiers) are doing," Leonardi said.
That extra pay is offset by the temporary elimination of salary as Uncle Sam picks up the tab.
Leonardi knows firsthand the hardship of making the switch from weekend to full-time warrior.
"I know what the families are going through. I know what we went through (in Vietnam). It's the same process," he said. "We feel for the troops and what they have to go through — all the paperwork and having all your affairs in order before going to a combat zone."
Among the employers on the bosslift trip, Clinical Laboratories of Hawai'i has four employees now at Fort Polk.
Mauna Kea Resort on the Big Island has six. Safeguard Services has nine.
Hawai'i Air Guard Lt. Col. Ann Greenlee, executive director of the Hawai'i Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve and executive officer for the 154th Wing, said the goal of the program is to provide a firsthand look at the professionalism of the citizen soldiers and increase employer support "so they want to hire us."
Some employers seek out reservists out of patriotism.
"We have some employers who call us and say, 'We're looking for workers. Do you have anybody who would be interested in the jobs?' " Greenlee said.
Gary Rockwood, director of human resources for Mauna Kea Resort, has six employees activated out of 1,200 workers. Four work in grounds maintenance, one is a pool attendant, and one is a steward.
Supervisors aren't thrilled that they will be gone for 18 months or longer, but Rockwood said: "They will have their jobs when they return. I've told every one of them."
Rockwood wants to check on the training and equipment of his people at Fort Polk and make sure they are OK.
"I'm very happy to do this. I'm looking forward to it," he said. "I'm a retired Army colonel. If I could, I'd volunteer myself. I know what these guys are going through. I spent two years in Vietnam."
The Guard selected those with the most employees for the Fort Polk trip. The "bosses" paid $375 for lodging and meals.
Lee, the head of the Hawai'i Guard, said that in about 10 days, 100 soldiers from the 29th will be heading to Kuwait as an advance party. Most of the soldiers will convoy to the Baghdad and Balad areas in February and officially start their mission, and a year in Iraq, in March.
Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-5459.
