USAF Ups Risk for Housing

At a House Appropriations subcommittee hearing last week, Gen. Norton Schwartz, Chief of Staff, acknowledged that USAF 2011 budget request accepts “some risk” in trying to balance financing new mission construction and replacing substandard housing. The service currently has roughly 13,000 inadequate single family homes out of a total of 53,000 houses. USAF expects to reduce the inadequate inventory to zero by 2016. There are 65 inadequate dormitories out of a total of 885, but the expected end date for zero substandard dorms is 2017—two years beyond the DOD goal. Schwartz emphasized: “You could do dormitories faster, but maybe you’d have to slow down family housing. And this is trying to get to the sweet spot with all of the entire inventory.” For both family and single airmen housing, said Schwartz, “We intend to do better in the next [budget] cycle.” (Written testimony)