More Stimulus Money Coming to Georgia

Millions in additional stimulus dollars are heading to Georgia. The Department of defense received close to 6-billion dollars to fund construction projects here at homes as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Georgia's military bases will share in close to 130-million dollars of that money.

The money is separate from the stimulus funds the state is getting. Bert Brantley is with Governor Sonny Perdue's office. He says the money will flow directly to federal installations.

"Those funds will obviously be spent in the economy. They will improve federal buildings. They will go to improving the way the efficiency of some of those buildings, some energy projects, and be spent on defense projects as well, which is good for our economy."

Many of the projects are focused on making the military more energy independent. DOD construction planned in Georgia includes a 10-million dollar barracks renovation at Ft. Benning, 14-million for a new utility building at Ft. Gordon, and a 4-million dollar runway at Robins Air Force Base.

Boeing Jobs Safe For Now in Macon

(Courtesy Boeing)

A United States Air Force contract means job security for 500 Boeing employees in Macon.

Workers at the Macon plant make part of the fuselage for the C-17 aircraft. The components are then shipped to Boeing's Long Beach, California facility where they are assembled. The 2.9 billion dollar contract is to purchase 15 planes.

The giant transport plane is used to carry equipment, supplies and personnel. The contract will keep the production line moving until August of 2010. During the presidential campaign President Barack Obama expressed his support for the aircraft.

The additional planes should also create more work for Robins Air Force Base in Warner Robins where the C-17 is maintained.

F-15 flies using synthetic fuel

Robins Air Force Base is testing synthetic fuel in its F-15's. This is the first high performance aircraft to use a blend of jet fuel and a natural gas derivative. The substance has already been tested in cargo planes and bombers and performed well.

Pilots say the planes, flying close to 15-hundred miles per hour, flew normally as they crisscrossed Middle Georgia for close to an hour. The Air Force plans to test the fuel in other planes soon. The Robins Air Logistics Center in Warner Robins is responsible for maintaining the Air Force's fleet of F-15's.

Robins AFB could land new software center

360 jobs are a step closer to coming to Middle Georgia. A Senate and House Appropriations Committee has approved the plan to build a new Logistics Center at Robins Air Force Base in Warner Robins. The center would add 80,000 square feet of new floor space to accommodate a 30 to 40% increase in software workload at the base in the next two years. The project would cost $21-million dollars.