Goodfellow Air Force Base Boosts San Angelo Economy
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It’s almost like a city in itself.
The average weekday population at Goodfellow Air Force Base is more than 6‚500. And, like a city, it’s always on the move. In 2009, Goodfellow is pursing the addition of a new mission and opening new off-base housing.
The new mission involves training cyber warriors and may bring as many as 800 students and 60 instructors to the selected base. Cyberwarfare involves defense against attacks on crucial computer systems and outside the military. Goodfellow is competing with a base elsewhere in the country for the assignment.
Meanwhile, more than 100 Goodfellow Air Force Base enlisted personnel and officers are moving into brand-new off-base housing that is larger, more attractive and more family-friendly. The $45 million project begins the process of shifting all of Goodfellow’s permanent housing (except the residences for the highest level of command) off the base. In addition to the 133 single homes and duplexes being built off base, 10 new homes will be built on base for senior command. In all, future plans call for 229 homes to be built on the new site, which borders the south bank of the Concho River.
None of the new residences contains fewer than three bedrooms, and many have four. The residential community includes playgrounds, soccer fields and basketball courts. Work on the project, called The Landings at Goodfellow, will be complete by the end of August 2009.
The project, like so much of what Goodfellow does, is good for San Angelo. Local residents make up nearly 40 percent of the approximately 300 construction jobs, and 80 percent of the workers are Texans.
Goodfellow’s relationship with its home city of San Angelo is enviable.
The base’s economic impact on San Angelo was estimated at an impressive $356.7 million in 2008. Part of San Angelo since the early 1940s, Goodfellow’s specialization is in intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance training. The base is also widely considered the premier training site for Department of Defense firefighters.
