U.S. Senator Jerry Moran said Friday there have been conversations in which the Army is being pushed to expand the number of troop brigades at Fort Riley.

Moran told a Town Hall meeting audience in Junction City that the brigades the Army is looking would be tank and assist brigades. “The Army is expanding. NDAA ( proposed National Defense Authorization Act ) will increase the end strength for our military, and will allow for additional brigades to be placed across the country. At military installations the question will become is Fort Riley one of those places that gains from another brigade, and perhaps two.”

Moran told JCPost he thought officials would know if it is going happen by the end of the year, but he did not know how long it would then take the Army to reach the necessary end strength up to the size needed to provide the personnel for the brigades.

Moran informed the audience for the meeting at the American Legion Post 45 home that there is no language in the proposed bill as it came out of the Armed Services Committee that requires a BRAC ( base realignment and closure ). “But there is still a lot of push by the Department of Defense for a BRAC to occur sometime in the future. And again we want Fort Riley to be in a position to have nothing but success in a round of BRAC.”

Moran noted that people still remember the 4,000-plus people that the environmental assessment during the last round of Army troop number reductions, and this area is known for hospitals, schools and housing.