Defense: Contracting Out Housing Expected to Help Reduce Shortage of Quarters
The Navy will add 588 units of family housing to San Diego County under a deal that has put thousands of military apartments in private hands.
Lincoln Property Co. of Dallas took over management of 2,660 existing units Aug. 1. The company will run them for 50 years, then return them to the Navy.
Lincoln’s partner , Bethesda, Md.-based Clark Realty Capital , will develop new housing for sailors and Marines, and maintain the old housing. Together the companies have raised $260 million for the project.
The Naval Facilities Engineering Command awarded the companies an exclusive right to negotiate for the job last summer. Terms of their final deal were not immediately available.
The military chose private sector partners to see if they could run the housing more efficiently than the military, and build quality housing faster, said Lt. Phil Rosi, a spokesman for the Navy’s Southwest Region.
Much of the new housing will be in Point Loma.
Clark is now finishing demolition work at the south end of the former Naval Training Center to make way for 500 units.
The south end of the base was not transferred to the city of San Diego, which is redeveloping the remainder of NTC. That project is spearheaded by the Corky McMillin Cos. of National City.
The Point Loma military housing complex will be a group of Spanish-style townhouses, with four to six units per building. It will include a clubhouse and a pool.
Doesn’t Look Like Barracks
“It doesn’t look like a block of barracks,” said Joe Schafstall, a Clark executive in Maryland. “It looks like a neighborhood.”
Clark should begin turning the Point Loma apartments over to the military in the third quarter of 2002, he said.
Clark’s other big construction project will replace one of the county’s older military housing developments, the 1953-vintage Cabrillo Heights complex on Serra Mesa.
Demolition at the 812-unit complex is still a couple of years away, said Rosi. Ultimately, that site will have 900 new units.
Clark’s Schafstall said his company will coordinate the construction schedule so the Navy doesn’t suffer a decrease in military housing.
The developments represent some relief for San Diego’s tight military housing situation.
Long Waiting List
The military has 9,015 family housing units at 49 sites in San Diego County, said Rosi. Nine of the complexes are on military bases.
Some 6,000 people are on waiting lists for that housing, Rosi said.
The Navy estimates it needs 4,142 new housing units to meet demand, he added.
The 2,660 units now in private hands are spread among 19 sites. They house the families of enlisted personnel rather than officers.
These represent the “first phase” of the public-private housing venture, Rosi said. The Navy will see how the arrangement works and could put more of its housing in the private sector, he said.
Clark’s Schaftstall said another 3,000 units of San Diego’s military housing could easily be turned over to private hands.
