Air Force base keeps housing expenses in check, says GAO

Lawmakers need not worry that an Air Force base in Florida pays exorbitant fees to house reservists, according to a new report from the General Accounting Office.

Officials at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Fla., have kept the cost of temporary housing for reservists in check by negotiating flexible lease terms with providers of off-base lodging, GAO researchers found. Base rules also require lower-ranked reservists to double up and share apartments.

The Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces requested the report (GAO-04-296) to address concerns that MacDill was paying above-market prices to house reservists. In response to the committee's request, GAO reviewed MacDill's lodging arrangements and compared them to those on other military bases.

MacDill experienced an influx of temporary reservists following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Since that time, the base has housed more than 3,000 active duty personnel, reservists and National Guard members. To handle the surge in temporary residents, MacDill has lodged roughly 1,700 short-term and extended temporary duty reservists in off-base apartments and hotel rooms, according to the GAO report.

MacDill contracting officials entered into "blanket purchase agreements," which are similar to charge accounts and are used to obtain supplies or services needed on a regular basis, with off-base apartment and hotel owners, GAO noted. These flexible agreements helped curb expenses, the report concluded. For instance, many of the agreements allowed MacDill to avoid paying security deposits and exempted the base from penalty fees if reservists had to vacate rooms early.

As of September 2003, MacDill paid daily rates of $44 to $93 per person for hotel rooms and $55 to $93 per person for off-base two-bedroom apartments. These prices were within, and in many cases lower than, those allowed by the agency, GAO noted.

Base officials also obtained housing prices comparable to those that private sector companies received for comparable lodging. MacDill actually got a better deal than typical private companies because the base ordered some reservists to share two-bedroom apartments, GAO found.

Specifically, base rules required officers at or below the rank of lieutenant colonel and enlisted personnel at or below the rank of chief master sergeant or sergeant major to share lodging. Under this rule, 600 of 800 reservists living in off-base apartments shared housing.

GAO also compared housing arrangements at MacDill to those at Fort Bragg Army Base, Pope Air Force Base, Fort Hood, Fort Dix, McGuire Air Force Base, Dover Air Force Base and Fort Meyer. "Our review did not find any one [housing] approach that stood out as being more cost-effective than other approaches where shared lodging was required," its report stated.

MacDill officials agreed with GAO's findings.