WESTFIELD — At the Wellness Center at the Barnes Air National Guard Base, employees stock shelves with donated groceries, military members stop to ask for help and families grab supplies for the week.
“I’m like the Walmart greeter,” said Brad Caney, the readiness specialist for military members and their families at the base in Westfield, home to the 104th Fighter Wing. “I try to give that welcome when someone comes in, because they could be coming in happy, or they could be coming in distressed.”
Caney has a unique role at the base. He is classified as a Title 5 employee, working both as a federal civilian employee and as a member of the military.
It’s a status that’s not unusual at places like Barnes.
He is a part of the roughly 15% of National Guard members in Massachusetts who serve as both military personnel in the Air National Guard and as civilian employees under the U.S. Department of Defense, according to June data collected by the Defense Manpower Data Center, a subsection of the nation’s defense department.
“I took a pretty good pay cut to come over here. But for my mental well being … it felt better for me to do this job,” said Caney, who left an insurance job on the “outside” to work at Barnes.
On a drill weekend, when military members participate in trainings, Caney suits up and leads the base’s Fatality Search and Rescue Team, which recovers the bodies of people who have died in a disaster and returns them to their families.
On weekdays, he wears civilian clothes while working at the Wellness Center, where he points military members or their families in the right direction, whether they need a mental checkup, support on issues or a boost in morale.
He receives two separate pay statements for each of his roles, though both are housed under the Department of Defense.
The center offers a therapist, a psychiatrist and support staff to help military members through anything they need assistance with.
“Those are some of our biggest things: financial needs, employment needs, housing needs. We help with that,” Caney said.
The center also creates wellness events to boost the morale of members and their families throughout the year.
Civilians are employed in different ways at a military base. Some, like Caney, are in dual-status positions. Others are either retired from the military or are civilians with no military background.
Melanie Casineau, who works in the public affairs office at the base, has been there since 1998 — first as an active Guard member and now as a civilian.
Jobs for former military personnel who are now civilian employees range from working at the Wellness Center to IT and cybersecurity to public affairs, she said.
People interviewed about their work on the base offered a simple reason for coming to work here: serving a greater purpose.
Most people don’t come for financial reasons, said Casineau.
“This base has a story, where the culture of family is really the main focus for us,” she said, explaining that being in the military, “we’re all used to the long haul … overcoming obstacles and just kind of staying with it until it gets better. People stay here.”
In a conference room in the communications building, Shaun St. Clair explained his role with the wing’s cyber security office. He is a third generation military member.
When he joined the military in 1999, he began working in a video department, shooting events and air shows at Barnes, he said.
“I did six years as a Guard member,” he said. He left in the early 2000s before re-enlisting in 2014. He got a full-time job in the communications department in 2017.
St. Clair also has a Title 5 position, working in cyber security as both a military member and as a civilian employee.
“I’m kind of behind the scenes making sure that (we’re in) compliance,” he said, referring to Air Force and Department of Defense standards.
He, like Caney, rejoined the base because he missed the camaraderie. “You meet a lot of good people, learn a lot of good skills here,” he said.
For Caney, Casineau and St. Clair, coming back to work on the Barnes base was like a “return home” because they had worked there earlier in their careers.
“I knew the people and I knew the place,” said Casineau. “It wasn’t much of a learning curve.”
For Jesse Cleland, a California native who joined the Navy and later the Reserves, becoming a civilian employee of the Air National Guard was a change of pace.
“These are dream jobs for a lot of people, and you get to watch them go play every day,” he said.
Cleland is a knowledge management specialist and joined the communications department last June. He is a full-time civilian employee.
Prior to this role, he’d been working as a consultant off-base for a few years, including with companies like Deloitte and MassMutual.
This job at Barnes allows him to bring an outsider perspective to his colleagues and challenge the way things are traditionally done, he said.
And, he said, his team welcomes those ideas.
“Even when the things I might be doing might make more work for them for a brief period, they seem at least willing to try and learn and get better,” he said.
Caney and St. Clair still work as military employees, so when it’s a training weekend, once a month, they’re both in uniform for their units — Caney on the Fatality Search and Rescue Team and St. Clair in the communications department.
Cleland isn’t required to come in. Still, sometimes he chooses to — either to network, gain new skills or celebrate his colleagues.
“It’s a one team, one fight kind of mentality,” he said.
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