As the force transforms to effectively counter emerging threats, so too must the Army’s installations.

“The homeland is no longer a sanctuary,” said Brandon Cockrell, deputy assistant secretary of the Army for energy and sustainability. “So, if the homeland is not a sanctuary, then the installations that are in the homeland are no longer a sanctuary, and if installations are the Army’s home, to me, this is where it gets personal.”

Today, installations face a range of threats, including cyberthreats, physical threats and threats related to natural disasters and energy demand, Cockrell said April 17 at a Hot Topic on transforming Army installations hosted by the Association of the U.S. Army.

Citing Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George’s transforming in contact initiative, an Army acquisition leader said that installation transformation will represent a “fundamental shift.”

“Transformation at speed and scale requires a fundamental shift in the mindset of the Army,” said Sgt. Maj. Robert Haynie, senior enlisted adviser to the assistant secretary of the Army for acquisition, logistics and technology. “We must take a relook at our current processes and embrace the new technologies and our contracting authorities to drive modernization.”

Carefully allocating funding as installations modernize has been a complex process, said Command Sgt. Maj. Jimmy Sellers, senior enlisted leader of Army Materiel Command.

“The most challenging thing we have to deal with is being able to allocate the amount of resources that we receive and put it in the right place,” Sellers said. “I kind of describe it as a big piece of the island that we have to cover, and we only have a certain amount of resources to cover all of that. So, how do we do that?”

One modernization area of focus is islanding, where an installation can produce its own energy for a given time. Following a natural disaster or an attack on the grid, islanding ensures the Army can continue to perform its mission and provide community support, Cockrell said.

The Army should reaffirm its commitment to modernizing its installations to bolster readiness and care for soldiers, their families and local communities, Sellers said.

“Not only is this personal, it's serious,” Sellers said. “I think we have to be very committed and reaffirm our commitment to … our Army installations. … This entire year, we should be looking at ways in which we bring the communities closer to the installations, the way in which we still provide security and the way in which we still take care of our families.”