Kirtland offers new housing program

  • Published
  • By 2nd Lt. Andrew Allen
  • By 377th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
KIRTLAND AIR FORCE BASE, N.M. --  

Kirtland Air Force Base’s Military Housing Office is managing a Rental Partnership Program to expand quality, community housing choices in an effort to alleviate the challenges for active duty to find affordable housing. RPP is allowing Airmen and their families to find competitive rate housing that is in line with their Basic Allowance for Housing levels.

Currently, privatized housing on Kirtland has a consistent occupancy rate of greater than 97% and most units have a waitlist of anywhere from one to eight months. This causes housing challenges for some Airmen leaving the dormitories as well as families moving to Kirtland AFB.

Margaret Burge, Kirtland’s military housing program manager, described the situation as a positive situation for both the Airmen and landlord.

“The benefit behind RPP is that we get to work with both the airmen and the property. Prior to that, there was no connection,” said Burge. “[Previously], if they had an issue with the landlord, they would come to us and we could only advise them just a little bit and send them to the base legal office, now with [RPP] we are able to work with both parties to try to come to some kind of resolution without getting lawyers involved”.

Burge’s predecessor initially set the RPP into motion, however after the Covid-19 pandemic, all of the contracts and legal work had to be redone and updated. Finally, after more than two years, RPP is operational and ready for use.

This specifically helps Kirtland’s Airmen, as Burge detailed.

“With the RPP program, the companies that are working with us will give us a discount”, said Burge. “They take into account the [Airmen’s] BAH, which has resulted in 21 different complexes within Albuquerque, Rio Rancho, and Los Lunas where we can put anyone right now and they can stay right at or just above their BAH.”

Finally, Burge stated that Col. Jason Vattioni, 377th Air Base Wing commander, Col. Megan Cornett, 377th Mission Support Group commander, Andrew Verdi, 377th Mission Support Group deputy director and the Kirtland Partnership Committee were instrumental in getting the program up and running.

“[I want to thank Kirtland’s leadership for] supporting us and providing contacts in the local community. Without our commanders’ help, we wouldn’t have the program up and running,” said Burge.

Despite the many challenges of finding quality homes, by utilizing RPP, Kirtland AFB takes a major step forward in improving the lives of Airmen and their families by providing more affordable and quality options for housing.