A group of concerned citizens working to preserve Black Moshannon State Park is considering legal action to ensure the park's protection from the prospective relocation of a National Guard Aviation Battalion to Philipsburg's Mid-State Airport.

Debate between the Department of Military Affairs and the Department of Environmental Resources began last summer when the affairs department announced plans to relocate the 104 Aviation Battalion of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard from the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Airport.

The citizens' group began to band together around September to determine a plan of action to save the park and surrounding forest lands adjacent to the airport. DROP - Don't Ruin Our Park - was officially formed in January.

DROP contends the guard's scheduled May relocation is a misuse of state forest lands. The group is concerned with several factors, including sewage and waste disposal, wetlands protection and erosion control, said DROP member Tom Ruscitti, a State College resident.

On Friday, members of DROP issued a statement regarding the Memorandum of Understanding between the Department of Military Affairs and the Department of Environmental Resources that was released earlier this month.

The MOU represents an understanding about the terms of the relocation, Ruscitti said.

"State officials say the MOU is enough to protect the park and will force the guard to operate in a safe manner," Ruscitti said. However, DROP is concerned with the legal aspect of the document.

"(The MOU) provides no legally enforceable reassurances (that) the Black Moshannon State Park and surrounding State Forest Lands will be protected from harm from National Guard operations," DROP's statement reads.

Ruscitti said DROP consults a team of lawyers for information. "We're prepared to file suit if necessary."

"DROP feels that the National Guard is violating the National Environmental Policy Act," Ruscitti said, explaining that the DMA did not recommend an Environmental Impact Statement based on the findings of the second Environmental Assessment the Guard published in late January.

An unofficial assessment was released last June.

Patty Wells, the vice president of DROP, said the group wants a proper environmental analysis of the relocation and its effects.

"The (environmental impact statement) is the better document. It's more detailed and clear because it includes public scrutiny which an (environmental assessment) does not," she said. "It's essential that an (environmental impact statement) is completed."

Ruscitti said the National Environment Policy Act, which was passed in 1969, requires an environmental impact statement to identify possible environmental dangers whenever there is a change in land use.

The problem of noise, however, is probably DROP's biggest concern. Ruscitti said the relocation will bring an intolerable noise level to the area.

The guard is moving 16 twin-engine CH-47 Chinook helicopters and one single-engine UH-1H Huey to the temporary facilities the airport is providing for their use, and will eventually construct permanent Army Aviation Support Facilities, Ruscitti said.

Ruscitti said that unlike turbo-prop airplanes, helicopters are not designed to be quiet.

"(The helicopters) have a rotor blade slap," Ruscitti said, describing the staccato beating of the helicopter blades.

The number of DROP members is substantial and growing and the group plans to continue writing letters to the "people who make the decisions," Ruscitti said, stressing the group's desire to keep the issue in the public eye.

DROP has two main goals, Ruscitti said: attempting to influence decision makers to not approve the site for the relocation and insuring that the law is upheld in the Guard's project.

Ruscitti said the MOU indicates that a decision has been made by the state, but the issue hasn't been settled on a federal level by the National Guard Bureau in Washington.

"The misuse of state forest land and the abuse of state parks is very much a regional issue," Ruscitti said.

Wells said her main concern lies in the idea of future expansion.

"They guard will be using a total of 50 acres to build a hangar, an armory and above ground storage tanks, among other things," Wells said. But she stressed that the issue has not been resolved.

"A decision should be made federally by next week," she said. "I really feel this is an important issue - this is something that is going to affect the future."