Defense Secretary Mark Esper and the Air Force, Army and Navy secretaries met with military privatized housing owners at the Pentagon last week to discuss progress on privatized housing reform under the Military Housing Privatization Initiative (MHPI), according to a DOD news article.
The secretaries reinforced their commitment to working with MHPI partners to ensure issues are handled in a responsive, timely and professional manner, emphasizing health or safety issues. They also emphasized consistent affirmation of military families’ privatized housing rights, which will key in the soon-to-be-released MHPI Resident Bill of Rights, according to the article.
The leaders also discussed progress on collective actions established by DOD and their partners to address concerns raised by some MHPI residents, including:
- Establishing a resident Bill of Rights and common lease framework;
- Increasing transparency and reporting of service work orders;
- Enhancing ongoing oversight and leader engagement on the program; and
- Improving communication with residents at all levels.
Improved communication is already in place through expansion of installation leaders’ role in resident advocacy and dispute resolution, and the services share a commitment to ensure safe, high quality and affordable housing and communities where service members and their families will want to live, the report said.
MHPI is DOD’s largest public-private partnership with about 80 privatized housing projects encompassing more than 204,000 units located on more than 150 installations and averaging 93% residency over the last three years, according to the report.
DOD photo by Lisa Ferdinando
