Air Force selects offer for privatized housing at Shaw Published Aug. 28, 2010 By 010810 SHAW AIR FORCE BASE, S.C. -- The U.S. Air Force has announced that it has selected Forest City Military Communities, LLC, of Cleveland, Ohio,as the highest ranked offer in its effort to privatize military family housing at four bases in the continental United States: Shaw and Charleston AFBs, South Carolina, Arnold AFB, Tennessee and Keesler AFB, Mississippi. The Air Force Southern Group Housing Privatization Project, a deal valued at $270 million in development costs, will result in the demolition of all existing military family housing units at Shaw and the construction of 630 new housing units over the next 4 years. Under the deal, the Air Force will lease up to 306 acres of land at Shaw as part of a 50-year transaction, and convey 681 existing inadequate housing units and other improvements to Forest City. Forest City will in-turn demolish all 681 existing units that are in poor condition and construct 630 new units that will exceed the current standards for military housing within the first three years of closing the deal. The Air Force selected Forest City as the housing referral office on the project through a competitive solicitation process led by the Air Force Center for Engineering and the Environment, headquartered at Lackland AFB, Texas. "We feel that Forest City offers the most advantageous business case to address quality development, long-term sustainability, competitive financing and the construction timeline for the bases in the (project)," said Al Fennigkoh, AFCEE project manager. Forest City Military Communities, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Forest City Enterprises, Inc., has an established record of providing housing development and management services for the military. Forest City's current military privatized housing portfolio consists of approximately 12,000 homes in Hawaii, Colorado, Washington, Illinois and Tennessee managed under the Navy's and Air Force's housing privatization programs. Assuming the Air Force and Forest City reach successful closing, in early 2011 the existing houses at all four installations will become property of Forest City Military Communities Southern Group, LLC who will own and operate the rental housing development for military families. They will finance, plan, design and construct improvements in the development and maintain the housing units for the duration of the 50-year lease period. The Air Force's housing privatization effort has been successful at 43 installations in the continental United States with almost 70 percent of family housing being privatized, totaling approximately 38,000 units. Privatization has eliminated nearly 35,000 inadequate units Air Force-wide and is providing an average of 500 new and renovated homes per month. In 2009, 4,087 new homes were built and 2,654 were renovated. Beyond this project, the Air Force is looking to privatize approximately 14,000 additional units at 16 installations over the next 2 years. The Military Housing Privatization Initiative, originally authorized by Congress in the 1996 National Defense Authorization Act, has given the Air Force the ability to partner with the private sector development community to provide quality homes for Airmen and their families faster than traditional military construction programs. For general information regarding the Air Force housing privatization program, please visit: www.afcee.af.mil/resources/housingprivatization/index.asp, or you may contact Mike Hawkins, AFCEE, at 210-536-3072 or email mike.hawkins@brooks.af.mil. For information about Shaw AFB, contact the 20th Fighter Wing public affairs office at 803-895-2019 Monday through Friday from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.