Newport housing residents report maintenance, management problems

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Newport housing residents report maintenance, management problems

ArmyTimes.com - Springfield,VA

By Jowers

Staff writer

http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-2135820.php

The breezes from scenic Narragansett Bay could do nothing to mask

the stench of carpets saturated with dog urine.

That wasn't the only surprise awaiting the Army colonel and his

wife, who had just walked into their home for the first time in July

near the Naval War College, a multiservice school in Newport, R.I.

The toilet was clogged with feces, pubic hairs were all over the

bathroom and layers of grime and filth covered the kitchen.

" It was disgusting, " said Kathy, the colonel's wife, who asked that

only her first name be used.

She and some other residents are still upset about the condition of

their housing when they moved in this summer. She and six other

wives, mostly spouses of O-5 and O-6 students at the war college,

complain that the landlord for their privatized military housing,

GMH Military Housing, is not responsive to their repeated

maintenance requests.

" If this is the way we're being treated, what's happening to

enlisted families? " Kathy said.

But GMH says that when it took over the military housing at Newport

in November 2004, it inherited a mountain of maintenance problems in

units that had not been renovated in decades, and has been doing its

best to play catch-up ever since.

Meanwhile, tenants say the Navy has backed out of the picture. When

their housing was under military control, Newport tenants could

bring housing issues to the chain of command. Now, " Navy Housing

says there's nothing they can do, " said Maddox, wife of a

Navy lieutenant commander.

Whose responsibility?

A survey by an independent company of Newport residents, a copy of

which was obtained by Military Times, shows that tenant satisfaction

dropped 4.7 percentage points in the first year after GMH took over

in late 2004. In contrast, tenant satisfaction has increased at

seven other GMH-run communities in the Navy's Northeast Region.

Navy officials, who had the results of the survey in hand as early

as March, did not respond to questions about why they did not take

action earlier.

In a written response to other questions, they said their role has

decreased significantly since GMH became property manager of the

housing communities in the Navy's Northeast Region. But, they

added, " We continue to work collectively with our partner to ensure

the quality of life of our military families continues to remain a

top priority. "

Officials acknowledged that the issues at Newport are " a cause for

concern, " and said they have conducted site visits and have talked

to residents to identify areas that need more attention.

Senior Navy officials are due to meet with GMH representatives in

October to review proposed revisions to maintenance and management

plans. The Navy will also sponsor " partnering " sessions with GMH and

Navy staff to improve communications.

Joe Sikes, director of the Pentagon's Office of Housing and

Competitive Sourcing, said that while he has not looked at the

Newport situation in depth, " from the reports I've received, it

sounds like there's a housing office that does not understand its

responsibility. "

" I've been told the Navy Installations Command " is working with the

base to figure out what the problem is, " he said.

GMH is an " excellent " partner at the many other locations where it

has agreements with the military services to build, renovate,

maintain and manage military housing, Sikes said.

He also noted that the services do have some leverage if a company

does not hold up its end of the deal. For example, Navy officials

said their privatization deals include an incentive fee that is paid

based on the quality of maintenance services and residents'

satisfaction with those services.

Inherited problems

Complaints about GMH are not universal, even at Newport. Suzanne

Mckechnie, the wife of an Air Force colonel, said GMH replaced a

broken dishwasher " in a timely manner. "

And residents interviewed in New York at Fort Hamilton, Mitchel

Field and Mitchel Manor — other privatized military housing

properties run by GMH — also praised the company's quick response to

maintenance calls, even at odd hours.

Mark Lavin, vice president of project management for GMH, said the

company is aware of all the issues raised at Newport, and admits

some problems have fallen through the cracks, mainly because of

their sheer number.

When GMH took control of the 1,351 units at Newport almost two years

ago, it was hit with 3,500 maintenance requests in just the first

three months, partly because the company encouraged residents to

resubmit work orders they had previously lodged with the local Navy

housing office, said GMH spokeswoman Kathy Grim.

Lavin said GMH workers have found that the homes, which have not

been renovated for decades, often have hidden problems that have

been uncovered while addressing other comparatively minor

maintenance requests.

For example, unconnected and leaking pipes have been found behind

walls, exacerbating an already-prevalent mold problem. In one home,

beneath a urine-soaked carpet and pad, workers found another layer

of older carpet over a pad that had been glued to the floor, Lavin

said.

" We are working to improve what we were left with, " he said. " The

housing is tired. "

GMH is hiring more maintenance workers, a quality-assurance

supervisor to ensure homes are ready for new tenants and a customer

relations person to randomly check on tenant satisfaction and follow

up on negative comments, he said.

The company also is taking some homes " off line " for four to six

months to do whatever is needed to fix their problems, said Lavin,

who vowed that all the homes will be fixed " within the next two to

three years. "

That effort will play out in addition to the other renovations and

construction envisioned in the original master plan for privatizing

the Newport housing. The plan calls for all work to be done by 2010,

with the current stock of 1,351 units due to be cut to 869, although

officials said that number could change.

While GMH struggles to bring the Newport housing up to speed, some

residents have had enough.

Navy wife Sherri said she and her husband lived for seven

weeks in the Fort area of the Newport housing run by GMH. She

said workers were at her house every week to fix problems that

should have been addressed before they moved in.

The " straw that broke the camel's back, " she said, was the mold

workers found behind walls in a bathroom — the second area of black

mold in their home.

GMH had installed new carpet in their unit before they arrived, but

they didn't address the mold in the house that was making her family

sick, she said.

At one point, she became so angry that she made up a sign depicting

GMH as " Grossly Mismanaged Housing, Fleecing the Fleet, " taped it to

her van and parked it outside a meeting of GMH and Navy officials.

" At the beginning of all this, I asked my husband to leave the war

college and to get out of the Navy — forget retirement, " she said,

even though he has been in uniform 17 years.

The s chose to move onto the local economy. GMH refunded them

a month and a week of their rent.

Air Force spouse Sheri Zachary and her husband were the previous

tenants of the s' unit, and had allergic reactions to the

mold. But she said there were other problems, too.

" I called weekly for more than two months about a broken

dishwasher, " she said. " I didn't get a repair on my oven until I

threw a temper tantrum. "

That was the day before Thanksgiving, she said.

Prior to the repairs, she said, " It would have taken a week to cook

a turkey in that oven. "