Corresponding with this extension, the Army is rescheduling public meetings on the draft environmental impact statement for October. Additional newspaper announcements will be made this fall.

In a news release issued this morning by the Army's Environmental Command based at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., Tad David, an Army deputy secretary overseeing environmental issues, said: "The extension of the public comment period will allow the stakeholders in multiple community locations full and ample opportunity for a thorough review of this important unit station analysis."

The 595-page draft environmental impact statement was produced in response to a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruling that the Army had not fully complied with federal environmental law and did not adequately analyze alternative locations outside Hawai'i for the Stryker brigade.

The environmental draft does not specify a preferred location. Instead, the draft states that the proposed action is to home-station permanently the Stryker brigade "in a location that meets national security and defense policy guidance," provides for training and a "high quality of life" for soldiers and their families, and facilitates the rapid deployment of the unit worldwide.

Three Hawaiian groups — 'Ilio'ulaokalani Coalition, Na 'Imi Pono and Kipuka — filed a lawsuit in 2004 charging that the $1.5 billion Stryker project would damage Native Hawaiian cultural sites and harm endangered species and their habitats.