The Base Realignment and Closure Commission has elected to keep White Sands Research Lab in New Mexico.

The decision, which was handed down Thursday, means 13 military members and 165 civilians will stay put developing and testing new defense technology. Many locals say they're glad about the announcement, that will keep an estimated $20 million dollars in the community. "I just wanted to go out and scream, We won it! We won it!" said Mayor ProTem Dolores Archuleta, who with a group of more than a dozen, rallied before the commission to keep the lab at White Sands.

Some say it was that group of supporters who convinced the commission not to move the lab.

"The cost is probably something that caused this to turn around and also they've been various comments made today that the testimony before the commission in Clovis," said Larry Furrow, White Sands Missile Range Public Affairs Chief, "Also included the fact that much of the work they do could not be done anywhere else and needed an open air laboratory like they could here at White Sands Missile Range."