The BRAC vote specified that closure of Deseret — or a change of mission to conventional weapons — could not occur until after the facility finishes its current mission to destroy chemical weapons and thereby comply with international treaty obligations, and not until after completion of a "comprehensive study."

The decision to close Deseret will ultimately come down to the Army, which will conduct a study. And it could still decide to close the facility.

Closure of Deseret would cost the military $4.37 million, but it would save the Army $356.4 million over 20 years. Some 248 personnel would have lost their jobs.

Tooele County Commissioner Matt Lawrence said the County Commission had asked BRAC members, "in a very general way," to take a closer look at keeping the depot open. That proposal carried no scientific or environmental studies or any specific details, but it said using the depot as a conventional weapons incinerator despite the initial costs could perhaps be an ultimately more cost-effective way of destroying the weapons — including weapons currently being stored at the Tooele Army Depot.

"It would be very expensive," Lawrence said. "However, it looks like the longer they go, the more I think the Army is realizing that if the window is being closed on blowing up munitions, the more practical and safe way of destroying old munitions would be incinerating. If that's the case, then it would be worth looking into converting that plant."

And keeping it open would also help the county in a basic way: job retention.

"We're just looking to save jobs," he said. "If it stays open, then we've got jobs and people paying taxes, and that's what we're looking at."

BRAC also voted on one aspect of Hill Air Force Base's realignment, resulting in minor changes to its overall mission. Today, BRAC will vote on closures of other Air Force bases that could shift additional missions to Hill.

Wednesday's vote means five high-end engineering jobs will move from Hill to Eglin Air Force Base in Florida. Additional Hill realignments are scheduled today.

And another BRAC vote could impact Tooele Army Depot. The commission voted unanimously to keep open the munitions depot at Hawthorne, Nev., near Reno. Closure of that facility would have resulted in a shift of some missions to Tooele.

But BRAC staff told the commission that TAD simply does not have the storage capacity for the quantity of munitions stored at Hawthorne, although it could handle demilitarization missions. And they questioned why the top-rated munitions depot in the nation was targeted for closure in the first place.

"It doesn't make a lot of sense to us that they would keep (Hawthorne) open," Parker said. "And we disagree with the claim that Tooele could not handle the load.