New ESC executive director is home at Hanscom

  • Published
  • By Chuck Paone
  • 66 ABW Public Affairs
HANSCOM AIR FORCE BASE, Mass. --  Rich Lombardi, who came aboard as executive director of the Electronic Systems Center this week, is happy to be back where he started bagging groceries some 35 years ago. 

Now the top civilian employee of a 12,000-person product center, Mr. Lombardi reminisces fondly about his days as a high school student stationed at Hanscom who earned his spending money working at the base commissary. 

"In as much as any military brat can ever say a place is home, this, for me, is home," he said. "This is where our family settled, and Bedford is where I attended and graduated high school, so having the chance to come back is very special." 

His father, Norm, began what would become his final active-duty Air Force assignment at Hanscom in 1971, when Rich Lombardi was in eighth grade. Norm Lombardi stayed on at Hanscom in various capacities - active-duty, civilian and contractor - for 33 years, finally retiring in 2004. 

"I've already heard from so many people here who worked with and remember my dad," Mr. Lombardi said. 

Many at Hanscom also recall Mr. Lombardi's mother, Glenna, who worked at Hanscom until her death in 1988. 

And many remember Mr. Lombardi himself. Following his 1980 Air Force commissioning, he spent four years at Eglin AFB, Fla., and then returned to Hanscom in 1984, where he would spend the next four years in various jobs.
 
"All three of us - my mom, my dad and I - were working here during that time," he said.
Mr. Lombardi, during his tour at Hanscom, took on some big responsibilities, but the first task assigned to him upon his 1984 return was guarding safes.
 
"On my very first day in ESC/OC, they were moving the safes from various temporary buildings to Building 1305, which had recently been constructed, and they needed someone to keep eyes on them as they were being transferred," he said. "So being the new guy, I drew the assignment." 

Mr. Lombardi, who possessed a degree in accounting from the University of Lowell, just up the road from Hanscom, gradually moved from program analysis and cost estimating to program management, ending his Hanscom tour as the PM for the Ultra High Frequency Satellite Terminal System. 

During various assignments at other bases, including Andrews AFB, Md., Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, and Kelly AFB, Texas, he broadened his skills and experiences by taking on tough staff assignments and special project challenges. The complex merger of Air Force Systems Command and Air Force Logistics Command into what's now Air Force Materiel Command was one of those. 

In conjunction with other duties, Mr. Lombardi also devoted five years to base realignment and closure actions at Kelly. There, rather than simply shuttering the facility, the government opted for a public-private competition for the propulsion workload at the center, which provided opportunities for portions of the work to remain in San Antonio or transition to another air logistics center. 

"Much of what we were trying to do had never been done before, so we had to experiment and learn as we went," Mr. Lombardi said.
 
When he finally completed his work at Kelly, in 1998, Mr. Lombardi was selected to attend Air War College, but he'd been accepted for a class starting in 2000. 

"I was wondering and quite honestly kind of scared about what the Air Force had in mind for me in the interim, but as always, they had a plan. I was told to head to Maxwell Air Force Base (Ala.), where I became a department chair at Air Command and Staff College," he said. "It was a great experience because I got to meet and interact with the neat, up-and-coming majors in the Air Force, many of whom are senior colonels now."
 
He said he often runs into them still, and that many are quick to remind him of his days as their instructor. 

"Some of them remember a certain paper, and they still want to argue about the grade I gave them, and I say, 'look, you just have to let it go.'"
 
After completing Air War College in 2001, Mr. Lombardi was on his way to a logistics assignment at Tinker AFB, Okla. Then he received a 5 a.m. phone call. 

"It was Blaise Durante, and when I answered the phone, still half asleep, he asked if they'd starting shipping my stuff yet, and I said 'no." 

Mr. Durante was then the deputy assistant secretary for Management Policy and Program Integration in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, or SAF/AQ as it's more widely known. Mr. Lombardi had worked for him twice before in his career, when Mr. Durante was also an active-duty Air Force officer.
 
Soon after that call, Mr. Lombardi set out for Washington instead of Oklahoma. There he would serve as chief of the Program Integration Division within SAF/AQ and then as the deputy to Mr. Durante. In the midst of all this, he retired from active-duty in 2004 and began working as a civilian. In 2005, he joined the Senior Executive Service, and in February 2007 he became the Air Force's budget investment director. 

In that job, he "got to work directly with [the Office of the Secretary of Defense] and to walk congressional staffers through our investment decisions, and of course the chance to interact with many different Air Force people and organizations," he said. "So I really enjoyed my 18 months there." 

But when he got the call offering him the chance to come back, both to acquisition and to Hanscom, he jumped at the opportunity. 

His only trepidation: filling the shoes of his predecessor, Fran Duntz, who retired in August. 

"I've known Fran for years and have worked very closely with her on a number of issues and always had great respect for her. She is just a great person," Mr. Lombardi said. "And I can tell that the people here really had great admiration and affection for her." 

Mr. Lombardi said that he's looking forward to getting out to the wings and meeting people. He also said that, while he's familiar with the monetary aspects of most ESC programs, he needs to "learn about the technical nuances." 

"Acquisition is hard stuff and you really have to pay attention to the details," Mr. Lombardi said. "It's a lot of work, but you've got to have some fun doing this job, too." He also stressed that it's important to let people balance their personal lives with work requirements. 

Taking his own advice, Mr. Lombardi recently added some balance to his own life, getting married over the Columbus Day weekend. 

"When I turned 50 earlier this year, I made a bucket list," he said. "It was all the things I'd never done before but wanted to do. One was seeing a Yankees-Red Sox game in Yankee Stadium, which I took care of over the Fourth of July weekend this year.
"Another thing I'd never done was get married, so I thought I should do that too, and luckily I've met the perfect person," he said with a broad smile, mentioning his new wife, Marianne, whom he'd met in D.C. 

The couple has purchased a home in Tyngsboro, Mass., near to the homes of his father and his stepmother, Pat, as well as his brother and sisters and their families, enabling a long-awaited family reunion.
 
"It really feels good to have the chance to come back," he said. "Marianne and I are excited about being part of the Hanscom community, and it's great to be back at Hanscom, which really is home for me."