On base housing changes hands, stays the same for residents

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Chase Hedrick
  • 14th Flying Training Wing Public Affairs
COLUMBUS AIR FORCE BASE, Miss. --  Pinnacle Family of Companies and its affiliates along with Hunt Companies and its affiliates have concluded negotiations to transfer all ownership and development responsibilities of privatized military housing from Pinnacle to Hunt as of Aug. 1.

Residents of on base housing should see little to no changes during the transition.

"Everything should be seamless, the biggest change residents will see from this is only a uniform change," assured Kessler Cowans, community director for The Landings at Columbus.

Ms. Cowans said that Hunt and Pinnacle are taking extra steps such as hiring all of the current employees currently working at The Landings to make sure the change is a smooth as possible. In a letter from Todd Zylka, vice president of operations for Hunt, that promise was made directly:

"At HMC (Hunt Military Communities), we are excited to take over the day-to-day management responsibilities for these properties and are committed to providing the highest-level of customer service and standard of home to our military service members and their families. We will work tirelessly to ensure the transition is as seamless as possible," stated the letter.

Ms. Cowans said that throughout May 2011 Hunt will be bringing in specialized transitional teams to evaluate exactly which changes will be needed, and which will not.

Columbus Air Force Base is not alone in this transition. In the letter from Hunt it was noted that seven other bases will have homes transitioned at a total of 5,391 houses.