The planned closure of the National Guard armories in Mangum and Frederick will likely cause some economic pain, but it's not going to hurt for at least the next three or four years.

And it's not writ in stone yet, said Capt. Paul Harris, the officer in charge of the Oklahoma National Guard 1st Battalion, 171st Field Artillery. "It's all dependent upon the BRAC approval by the president," Harris said.

Under the realignment plan, developed by the Base Realignment and Closure Commission, 3,711 Oklahoma National Guard members would be relocated from 53 armories and maintenance facilities slated for closure, and some $243 million would be poured into construction of seven new Armed Forces Reserve Centers in Norman, Oklahoma City, Muskogee, McAlester and Broken Arrow and on Vance Air Force Base and Fort Sill Army Post.

Harris predicts that Mangum and Frederick -- whose armories are on the chopping block -- will mostly feel the pinch from the absence of business from soldiers who serve one weekend a month and participate in annual training exercises, as well as a loss of electricity and water usage.

"It will be a slight blow," Harris said, "but it won't be a major company move."

Maxine Thomason, program manager of Mangum Main Street, could not put a finger on just how Mangum would be affected by the closure of the armory, which is owned by the state and, in fact, holds a prestigious place on the National Register of Historic Places. Built of locally quarried stone between 1935 and 1937, the armory was added to the register in April 1994.

"It's just really kind of caught us flatfooted," Thomason said of the announcement by Oklahoma's adjutant general, Maj. Gen. Harry M. Wyatt III, on Aug. 17 that the Mangum armory's mission would be phased out.

Harris oversees 346 soldiers whose mission is, if and when they are called upon, to provide deep fire from a multiple launch rocket system. He oversees armories in Altus, Mangum, Frederick, Hobart, Clinton, Elk City and Weatherford. Of the seven, only Mangum's and Frederick's are slated to be closed.

About 35 soldiers are assigned to the Mangum armory, Harris said, and about 40 to the Frederick armory, including 24 soldiers from the 90th Troop Command, which provides launcher maintenance for the unit.

"It's really been an effort between the Guard and the civilian leadership," Harris said of the process leading up to the decision on which armories would be closed.

The realignment plan will likely begin around 2010, Harris said, adding that no changes would occur in the armories' missions until the reserve centers are built.

The armories slated for abandonment under the proposed plan will likely be turned over to local governments or state agencies that will find new uses for them, Wyatt told The Associated Press last week.