The Navy must provide unaccompanied housing to sailors with ranks E-4 and below, the sea service’s top enlisted sailor told a House subcommittee Wednesday.
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy James Honea appeared before the House Armed Services subcommittee on quality of life, joining the other top military enlisted leaders, including the senior enlisted advisor to the chairman.
Honea emphasized the unaccompanied housing issue, as the Navy is not allowed to offer it to sailors E-4 and below. That means those sailors do not have the opportunity to create a work-life separation like other sailors who can go to their own homes.
The National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2024 does permit the Secretary of the Navy to grant a basic housing allowance to sailors assigned to ships undergoing maintenance. This followed quality of life concerns for sailors attached to ships undergoing an extended maintenance period, particularly USS George Washington (CVN-73). Three sailors killed themselves within a week, with investigations revealing that one sailor’s death was linked to the inability to sleep on a ship undergoing construction.
While Honea thanked Congress for the addition in the NDAA, he said it needs to expand to the rest of the fleet.
On average, there are 800 sailors per aircraft carrier that have to sleep on the ship when it is dockside because there is not enough barracks space and the Navy cannot give them a housing allowance.
“That’s a number one quality of life concern of our sailors who are currently on deployment that are in that situation, is when we return from deployment, ‘am I going to continue to live on this ship or I’d be able to find a barracks room and move into a bed and have separation from this workplace?'” Honea said.
Honea’s opening remarks focused on the Gates Commission, which laid out the pillars needed to maintain an all-volunteer force, now 50 years old. In Honea’s opinion, there are pillars that need to be strengthened, like housing, and there needs to be a new one: military family readiness.
This pillar would address spousal employment, something that is hindered by the constant moving required by military service, as well as the lack of child care due to a demand that the current supply cannot meet.
“Sailors and spouses cannot focus on their careers if they’re worried about the care that their child is receiving, or unable to find or afford it,” Honea testified.
Child care, spousal employment, pay and medical access are issues that have plagued the military for years now. Honea, now in his second year as MCPON, has spoken about pay and medical care access as top issues that sailors have brought him.
