The Metropolitan Military: Homeownership Resistance to Military Family Housing in Southern California, 1979-1990

Despite its dependence on military investment, large segments of the Sunbelt have always expressed ambivalence toward military housing. From 1941 to 1973, real estate interests served as the primary resistance to the construction of military housing; however, during the 1970s, due to economic changes, tax revolts, New Right fiscal and social policies, and the transformation to the all-volunteer force (AVF), opposition to military housing transferred from real estate interests to homeowners. From 1979 to 1990, the Navy’s attempt to construct military family housing in San Diego encountered angry homeowners who resented the tax exempt status of housing and accused military households of overburdening school infrastructure, reducing property values, and spreading social dysfunction. Demographic changes resulting from the AVF yielded more families and greater ethnic and racial diversity, which failed to align with suburban norms and thereby marginalized service households socially and politically. </jats:p

The Privatization of Military Family Housing in Linda Vista, 1944–1956

From its creation as a military housing development to its ultimate transformation into private housing, Linda Vista, in San Diego, ran the ideological spectrum—ranging from a foil for alleged communism, to a repository for proto Right Wing conservatism—simultaneously revealing burgeoning sunbelt politics and the conflict between the housing needs of military families and the anti-public housing ethos of the city's political class. Though the Navy required such projects to house its service personnel and their dependents, the city and many residents sought to eliminate public housing. Linda Vista also demonstrates the intersection of military housing, race, and local politics. For the left, it served as a fortress of political support in the 1940s, but by the 1950s, Linda Vista came to be a Republican stronghold. Ultimately, Linda Vista's shift previewed the New Right conservatism that Sunbelt metropolises would promote in the latter half of the twentieth century.</jats:p