Local guardsmen to go to Fort Bragg, N.C.

A send-off for the troops will be Wednesday in Cleveland.
AUSTINTOWN -- As many as 55 Ohio Army National Guard members based here are being sent to Fort Bragg, N.C., home of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division.
"They'll be taking the place of active-duty MPs at that base," said Sgt. Mike Urbanek of the Ohio Army National Guard's 838th Military Police Co. in Austintown.
Urbanek would not say exactly when the troops will go to Fort Bragg, which is outside Fayetteville, N.C. A send-off celebration is set for 10 a.m. Wednesday at the Brook Park Armory in Cleveland, he said.
Other deployments: The Austintown unit, based at the Youngstown Armory on Victoria Road with about 150 members, previously sent 30 to 40 of its members to the 135th Ohio Army National Guard Military Police Co. in Cleveland and about 15 to a National Guard company in Toledo. All of them are expected to go to Fort Bragg.
In addition, the Austintown company has about 35 members working with the Federal Aviation Administration for security at Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport, Cleveland Hopkins International Airport and Akron-Canton Regional Airport.
The FAA has asked the U.S. Department of Defense to coordinate use of 5,000 National Guard members to strengthen airport security.
Urbanek said he did not know how long members of the 838th would be on the airport duty.