IF NAVY STATION SHIPS OUT : Officials Unsure About Future of Military Housing

Local Navy officials said this week that it may be months before they know how the proposed closure of the Long Beach Naval Station would affect nearly 800 naval housing units in San Pedro.

“I don’t think anyone will have an answer to that . . . until the (base closure) list is finalized by Congress,” said Lt. Cmdr. Steven Chesser, spokesman for the Long Beach base.

With the naval station expected to be closed, but the Long Beach Naval Shipyard likely to be spared, Chesser and Defense Department officials said Navy officials will spend the coming months deciding where the base’s 16,000 men and women will be assigned and what to do with 2,139 housing units from San Pedro to Huntington Beach.

The housing includes 763 two-, three- and four-bedroom units at four locations in San Pedro: the 245-unit junior officer and senior enlisted personnel housing off Western Avenue built in 1964, the 140-unit Taper Avenue housing built in 1965, the 78-unit White’s Point housing off 25th Street constructed in 1966, and the 300-unit housing project at Palos Verdes Drive North built in 1988.

Noting that the naval base has twice before been closed by the Pentagon, most recently in 1974, some officials theorized that the Navy may attempt to keep most of the housing it has in Southern California.

Even if that does not occur, they said, the continuing operation of the Long Beach Naval Shipyard, with 4,100 workers, will require the Navy to maintain most of the 2,139 housing units locally.

At the same time, officials noted that the Air Force Space Systems Division in El Segundo has long been searching for additional housing for its personnel. At present, the Air Force has 574 housing units in San Pedro and has determined that it needs another 250 units, though not necessarily in that community, said Ed Parsons, spokesman for the space systems division.

“If the Navy decides to offer us a portion of their housing in the San Pedro area, this would provide a partial solution. . . . However, this will not be the total answer,” he said.

One Defense Department official, who asked not to be identified, said Navy officials have estimated that they will need 1,200 of their existing units for continuing operation of shipyard and other local facilities. And based on preliminary studies, the official said, those units the Navy would relinquish would either be too distant or too run-down to be of interest to the Air Force.

“What (the Air Force) would want, we understand right now, is what (the Navy) would want to keep,” the official said.

But that official and local Navy officials cautioned that any public discussion of what might happen to the naval housing is premature.

“I don’t want to give a rough estimate of the housing needs (because) right now, our plans are not definite enough to do that,” said Lt. Cmdr. John Snyder, staff civil engineer for the naval station.

Snyder noted that in addition to the shipyard, Navy officials expect to need housing for other personnel assigned to local facilities including the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station and the Long Beach Reserve Center.

Lt. Cmdr. Chesser added that current plans call for local Navy officials to develop a proposed closure plan that will be presented to base supervisors next month. From there, the plan would go to Navy officials in Hawaii and then to the Pentagon before presentation to Congress.

“So there is no way of saying now when or how it (the closure plan) is going to happen,” Chesser said.