March 26, 2009The Hancock Air Base used to be a pleasant neighborhood where troops stationed at the base could live with their families. It was known as the Hancock housing area. The neighborhood was once home to more than 5,000 soldiers and their families and had a church, a gymnasium, and fields where children could play. Today, the neighborhood is a ghost town. Abandoned buildings, shattered glass, and fallen telephone poles are all that is left of the housing area. For nearly 25 years, local businesses along East Taft Road have been forced to operate with the run-down structures rotting diectly behind them.
When the base was closed 25 years ago, most of the soldiers moved out. By 1995 all military families had moved out. The city bought the property from the Air Force in 1999 with plans to demolishish all 77 of the structures and build a proposed third runway for the airport. But funding for the proposal was denied becuase the city could not prove that the airport was growing at a rate that required a new runway. Since then, just about every building in the housing area has been tagged with graffiti and has had its windows smashed out.
Mr. C's Hairstyling has been located next to the abandoned housing area for 30 years. Owner and founder, Dan Cavallo remembers when the base was a lively community and even had its own little league baseball program for all the children. "This was a city within a city, they had every availability of any kind of commodity that they needed inside of that base," Cavallo said. The city wants to use the federal stimulus plan to raise money for demolition. But for now, the run-down housing area will remain a ghost town.
Jason Dumas
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