YOKOTA AIR BASE, Japan — No current plan exists to relocate U.S. civilian employees and some military personnel into off-base housing, Yokota officials said Monday, contrary to a letter DODDS-Pacific sent its employees March 25.
"There have been no proposals or discussions of plans to move civilians off base," said base spokesman 1st Lt. Tanya Bryan.
In the letter addressed to Yokota educators and obtained over the weekend by Stars and Stripes, Nancy Bresell, director of Department of Defense Dependents’ Schools-Pacific wrote: "At Yokota Air Base, Japan, the recent release of information from the Master Plan (March 2009) of the Military Family Housing Office, revealed that by Fiscal Year 2011, all U.S. government civilians plus several hundred military families will be required to relocate to off base housing."
Bresell wrote that a 2005 agreement with the Pacific Area Director, Federal Education Association, required that all married educators teaching at Yokota schools to live in available on-base housing.
"This requirement no longer fits in with the Yokota MFH Master Plan," she said. "DODDS Pacific and the FEA have agreed to rescind the August 2005 MOU, effective immediately."
Yokota officials declined to comment further on the DODDS letter and reiterated that there is no such plan to move people off base.
Stars and Stripes had queried Yokota officials on the matter for the past two weeks after several readers inquired about rumors that civilians were to be ordered to move off base. Not until they were shown Bresell’s letter on Monday did Yokota officials respond.
DODDS officials did not respond by Monday night to queries about Bresell’s letter and the apparent conflicting information Yokota officials provided.
