Take a bundle of money, buy some new carpet, new furniture, new lights, new blinds, a new heating and cooling system, ceiling fans, drop ceilings and what do you have?

A welcome center worthy of its name, according to Sgt. Ronald Hawkins, assistant NCO in Charge of Fort Bliss' newly renovated facility.

"Before, this place looked like an old chow hall, which it is," Hawkins said. "These changes were done to make things better, to try to make it more of a positive environment for soldiers and their families. We're the first place they see when they come to Fort Bliss and the last place they see when they leave. With that kind of impact, the least we can be is professional."

Professional and a positive environment weren't descriptions one might normally associate with the Welcome Center in the past, according to Staff Sgt. Sheldon Bointy, who's being assigned to Fort Bliss for the third time. He previously arrived here in 1994 and 1996.

"It was dank in here before," Bointy began. "It's a lot cleaner and efficient now. You don't feel like you're processing into a dirty building."

Hawkins said the renovation began in late November and finished last week, except for some touch-up work. Offices got partitions and even the latrines were refurbished. All functions remained in the building during the renovation except for finance, which temporarily relocated to the main Finance Office.

Those other functions include inbound transportation, outprocessing, records, Tricare, vehicle registration and the El Paso County Tax Office, which processes Texas vehicle registrations, license plate renewals and title transfers as an on-post courtesy to soldiers and their families. The Welcome Center is open from 6 a.m. to midnight seven days a week so that soldiers can sign in and get an inprocessing schedule and lodging no matter when they arrive.

"Once they leave here, they could deploy immediately," Hawkins said of the one-stop facility. "If we're not efficient, they (soldiers) are not effective because they'll be worried about something.

Hawkins said his soldiers try to ease those concerns by going the extra mile when they spot a problem.

"If someone is missing something, our soldiers take the extra effort to get those documents," Hawkins said. "We've literally rebuilt 201 (personnel) files."

Now that their own building is rebuilt, the Welcome Center will have a ribbon cutting, on a date to be determined, to celebrate the improvements the renovation made possible.

Dan McKernan, a legal assistance officer with the Fort Bliss Staff Judge Advocate, briefs newly arrived soldiers in the renovated Welcome Center's main briefing room.