Homesteaders...don't we just love them...

Don't agree with the 30 day limitation! Some of us want to visit friends or relatives or even get out of the northern weather for longer than 30 days. when I come to FL I can't get all our doctors appointments done in 30 days.
What ticks me off is when 30% of your spots are filled by the same people for over 2 ,years and I can't make a reservation because it's too much trouble to run a reservation system.

I'm not saying you can only stay at a MWR FamCamp only 30 days but rather 30 days at any one base so stay at Patrick for 30 days then move over to McDill for 30 then you can move back to Patrick or on down the road. If you desire to stay in one place for the winter then buy a camping lot or into a resort and stay the winter then you can rent it out in the summer. But I don't think FamCamps were suppose to be a homestead area but rather a place for you to visit and relax. I'm not trying to be mean or nasty about this next comment but if you don't like the winters up north then move to the south and visit the north in the summer. No one ever retires and moves to the north they always move to the south or Arizona. Every time you stay at a FamCamp as a second home you are depriving some one else of their benefit to stay at that camp. That's my opinion and we all know what opinions are like. lol

I always favored the 30 days in......minimum 14 days out. I could even understand a 15 day or 30 day at a time extension policy as long as 20% of the campground spaces were vacant and available to travelers. I cannot believe that supposedly intelligent commanders are perverting the intent of military campgrounds like they are. I understand their need to make money but what good is a campground that only the local clique and homesteaders can use.

Macdill is the worst about this, and local clique "insiders" LOL!
It's the macdill famcamp way, call a year before around Halloweenand make a reservation for up to six months, cost you $100 but you won't have to rotate off your pad, it's what the snowbirders there do yearly, there's people at macdill thatve been doing this for 20+ yrs, they don't even own a truck to move their 5th wheeler anymore, they hire someone to move their trailer outta storage lot when they arrive and move it back to storage when they leave.

Worse at macdill is how these reservation snowbirds will be gone for weeks, even months during their reservation going home or elsewhere and others will can't use a pad/hookups cuz the reservation snowbirder is squatting on a pad not actively there???

Macdill needs commander who will end the mafia/local clique favoritism/discrimination of outsiders. Also need more than one campground host as well as the job should be one season and done, not a lifelong job as that's why "Tom" (campground host at macdill) doesn't care and is worthless.

Key west does it fair IMO, you rotate onto pad or opt out for dry camp to avoid rotation, no limited stays either like so many others seemingly impose on those not favored by management.

Hawkeyewife wrote: It would be great if the military embraced this lifestyle for folks that are looking for a minimalistic (or as my daughter puts it, smaller carbon footprint) way of life. Think of how much less PCS costs would be if even 10% of AD families were given this option? We have four kids and moved from our five bedroom base house (where we paid full BAH plus additional utility costs that varied not based upon consumption but a rather arbitrary billing system based upon comparison of homes in our community which could be occupied or unoccupied) into a 425 sq ft fifth wheel two years ago. We will retire here so PCS costs won't be saved in our case but we are in a much better financial place having downsized before retirement than after.

Command should be moving you back into quarters, 4 kids should not be living/growing up in a fifth wheel when the gov pays for your family to have proper housing. A service member and a spouse with two pets yes, not kids though.

At macdill there's warrant officer female who has four kids elementary school aged kids who lived in a bunkhouse 30 foot pull behind till she sized up to a toy hauler fifth wheeler when she got her taxes 2017, she paid off a BMW before she sized up to the fifth wheeler which isn't as creepy as her four kids sharing a bunkhouse and her living on the dinette folded down, that was a total CPS case there as that's illegal actually; both boys and girls having to share a bedroom over toddler ages.
It's creepy people like this is why us senate is ending BAH allowances and going to a receipts/reimbursement system soon as they're tired of seeing this child abuse; that's what it is when you have 4 kids growing up at a famcamp in a trailer/RV when the service member is paid good money to provide quarters for its dependant children and they choose to let kids suffer cramped living conditions in transient housing areas; what famcamp is essentially.

Personally I'd like to see a rule like the pet rule of two pets & two kids and absolutely no homesteading with kids living in famcamps period, short term vacationing families I can see but kids yelling and screaming, running around famcamps unsupervised creating disruptions gets old fast. Met those gramma/grammas types who are raising their grandkids in famcamps, worse than active duty types doing this bad behavior.

First I'm not from the north. Second I'm a full-timer. When I return to my home base I need to be there for a time longer than 30 days, due to medical appointments, etc. The FAMCAMP at my "home base" unquote has almost 90 spots. They cannot, for reasons they are unable to explain, maintain a reservation system. They used to have certain spots that were for like 3 day stays maximum but they did away with that. this whole thread started about homesteaders and had turned into bashing anyone who stays more than 30 days. WTF?