FORT CAVAZOS, Texas —The Installation Transportation Office manages the shipment and storage of household goods for service members, civilians and their family members. They played a pivotal role in assisting those whose goods were affected by a fire March 2 in Killeen, Texas.
The fire burned a long-term storage facility and impacted another warehouse in front of it, affecting 198 service members in total. Before the fire was even extinguished, members of the ITO were out, attempting to survey the damage and learn more about the situation.
“(A quality assurance inspector) got the contact information from the people on the ground,” said Paul Dominguez Rivera, chief of personal property operations, Transportation Division, Army Field Support Battalion-Cavazos. “It took three days to clear the scene for us to be there. So actually, on March 5 is when they first allowed us to go on the ground and see the scene.”
Once they were able to enter the scene, Dominguez Rivera and a team of quality assurance inspectors began determining what was salvageable. They compared a list with the storage facility manager to confirm losses, then the next step was contacting the 198 service members impacted.
“I created a list with all the phone numbers of everybody and emails,” Dominguez Rivera said. “The (407th Army Field Support Brigade) commander said, ‘We’re not going to be 100% until every single service member has been contacted via phone.’”
Not only were local service members affected, but members overseas in South Korea and Germany were impacted as well.
“Everybody was involved to assist us, contacting the people we couldn’t contact,” Dominguez Rivera said. “HQDA (Department of the Army Headquarters), ASC (Army Sustainment Command), Army Personal Property Lead Element, III Armored Corps — we all came together and sent out mass emails to everybody.”
Within days, every affected service member received an email. Phone calls were completed mid-April.
Shortly after the fire, the Emergency Family Action Center was organized, bringing together organizations, programs and offices to assist the 47 service members impacted locally.
“We had USAA here,” Dominguez Rivera said. “They actually set up in the ITO. We had ACS (Army Community Service). We had Family Advocacy Program counseling downstairs. We had Army Emergency Relief. We had a bunch of support here for service members that were here to help them throughout the process. That went on for about a week.”
ITO also made themselves available to continue assistance for local Soldiers and assist the service members not at Fort Cavazos, creating a phone line for them to call to receive help.
While there were many shipments lost, several loads were unscathed, with 29 service members able to receive their household goods located in front of the storage facility. Some crates impacted by the fire were also still viable due to a restoration process.
“Sometimes those crates — some of them had the soot going in there,” said Angela Rodriguez, a quality assurance transportation assistant with the ITO. “We didn’t want to deliver property that way. So that went through a process where they cleaned it and then went through a deodorization process.”
While ITO has assisted many of the service members, they continue to help service members file claims for their lost household goods.
Service members can file an initial claim with the transportation service provider, along with the Army.
“Long-term storage — if you’re deployed — it’s going to be six-months storage, one-year storage, you file directly with the local agent, the company Scobey; they don’t have a GBL (government bill of lading),” Dominguez Rivera said. “If you are an inbound (and) outbound shipment, that is not long-term storage. You’re going to file directly with TSP (transportation service provider). So we created two handouts to provide depending on your claim that you’re going to file.
“Both (long-term and short-term storage) can still file with the Army after filing with (the TSP or local agent),” Dominguez Rivera continued. “If (the service members) accepted their settlement and it’s $20,000 and they believe their stuff is worth more, they can both still file with the MCO (Military Claims Office, or Center for Personnel Claims Support), but it will be depreciated value.”
Dominguez Rivera said his team has put in a lot of work toward this effort.
“I’m super proud of the work everybody did,” he expressed. “Everybody put in a lot of hours. We divided these (contacts) sheets among multiple employees downstairs. They started calling, calling, calling every single service member. Whoever they couldn’t get a hold of got voicemail and voicemail again. They called every single day until they got a hold of them.
“I think we all handled it from a place of understanding, because we’re all either veterans or military spouses, and we’ve all been in that situation before as far as PCSing (permanent change of station),” Rodriguez said. “So it was important to remember that human aspect of it. And then, there were other situations, because during that timeframe, there was even other situations of fires happening in personal homes. That service member came, and you could just see on his face the devastation.
“It was a really important thing to have AER here, ACS here and the counseling available for not only the service member, but for their spouses as well,” she continued, “because it’s property, but it’s something that they build together as a family, and those are their memories, and they’re everything that they had in their home to remind them of all those moves, all those transitions and in their career. So that was the important thing — to not only help them with the process, but to have that human understanding.”
This incident showcased the partnership within the military community, Dominguez Rivera said.
“This was a perfect example of everybody — civilians, green suiters — working together, putting aside positions, (doing) anything to help the service members,” he said. “Every single agency worked together. That’s the first time I experienced every single agency working together like that. So it was awesome to see.”
Service members still needing assistance with claims or their goods can call 1-800-521-9959 extension 2 or visit the ITO 8 a.m.-3 p.m. weekdays at the Copeland Soldier Service Center. Visit home.army.mil/cavazos/units-tenants/installation-transportation-office for more information on ITO.
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