After 30 years of military life on the move, Vicki Briggs’ husband, Col. Lee W. Briggs, is retiring from the U.S. Army. During the past three decades, the Briggs family has seen much of the ground the Army occupies, places like Texas (three times), Germany, Colorado, Kansas, Virginia, Oklahoma and Hawaii.

The parents of five children, now aged 30 to 22 years, the Briggs family lived off-base at most of those places, with Oklahoma and Kansas being the exceptions. What they and families like them have experienced during the past three decades is of particular interest to the U.S. military a great deal these days, particularly the varying qualities of life for Army families as they are transferred from one military post to another.

The military leadership understands more than ever these days the role of the communities surrounding its military installations, especially since most of its active military families live off-base. The Department of Defense evaluates the communities because, among other things, it cannot afford to lose too many of its best people to the private sector because they are unhappy with the standard of living in the communities where they are assigned.

Col. Briggs is finishing his career as an administrator overseeing 10 Army hospitals at the Great Plains Regional Medical Center, including the Brooke Army Medical Center at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, where the Great Plains office is located. When Briggs retires next year, the couple will settle in San Antonio, where they started when Lee Briggs went through basic training.

Vicki Briggs remembers the places where they couldn’t buy a house and where they could. The first house was in the Denver area, a small one, at a time when her husband was promoted to second lieutenant.

“The rank has a big effect in Denver,” Mrs. Briggs recalled.

They were able to buy a home later in Virginia, too.

“But we had to live 20 miles from Washington, D.C., to find housing we could afford. It was a long commute,” she said.

“There are huge differences in prices for good quality houses” across the country, Mrs. Briggs noted. “In California, you can’t buy one. In Washington, D.C., it is difficult to buy on a military budget. Here in Texas, you can get a good house.”

Hawaii was the state where the Briggs family lived with the most expensive housing and cost of living. Living off-base, there was possible only because the Army paid a monthly cost of living allowance.

Even then, Mrs. Briggs said, she had to shop strictly at the military commissaries to make ends meet.

“Milk was $2 a gallon at the commissary,” she said. “If I went to a store on the island, it was $7.”

Budgeting was more difficult, too, when they lived in a state that had an income tax. Only seven states do not have one, and Texas is one of those. “We had to pay those taxes,” she said.

But the bigger concerns for the Briggs family as they moved from one state to another were not the economics, but the cost of health care and adjustments to different school standards.

The Briggs had access to military health care at most of the places where the family lived. Iowa was an exception.

“We had to go into the economy and pay more for our medical,” she said. “The (insurance) deductibles cost us quite a bit, especially with someone in our family who had a chronic condition.”

Uneven School Quality

Schools required an adjustment wherever the family went.

“One issue is that one school district is always more advanced or behind another school district,” Mrs. Briggs said. “The education does not flow [for the students]. The Midwestern states have superior schools. In Virginia, the standard was quite high, too. In other states, say like Hawaii, the schools brought in kids from the islands who did not speak very good English, and the standards were lower.”

This inconsistency in quality presents problems for military families, whose children often attend a half-dozen or more different schools by the time they graduate from high school.

“It’s very hard for students to go from one school district to another with lower standards,” Mrs. Briggs said. “It is even more difficult to go from one school district to one with higher standards. It puts a lot of stress on kids. Graduation standards are different, too. Some students may have to take another year of school. Some classes do not count toward graduation in another school, and the student has to take extra classes.”

Special education availability is uneven, too. The Briggs have one daughter who is autistic.

“Some school districts didn’t have anything to meet her needs,” she said.

The schools in San Antonio were a surprise, Mrs. Briggs added.

“When we moved here, we by heard word of mouth that the quality was low,” she said. “But our daughters said they had some of their best teachers here.”

Despite the challenges, Mrs. Briggs said varying standards of living is a larger problem for enlisted personnel living off-base.

“The officer ranks have enough money,” according to Mrs. Briggs. “It is a bigger burden for the enlisted people. The lower ranks get sent to dangerous places. The spouses can’t go with them.”

The Briggs story can be told thousands of times across the nation.

Every Place Has Its Advantages

“Many squadron members enjoy the Nebraska area because of its school system and the affordable housing. But they don’t like the high property tax rates,” said Capt. Trevor Williams, a spokesman for Offutt Air Force Base outside of Omaha. Nebraska has a state income tax, too, but some military personnel from other states can escape that if they declare their residency in a home state that does not require income tax payments if they are not living there. Military spouses employed in the private sector where their spouse is stationed must pay the state income tax, however.

As of last year, 4,796 of Offutt AFB’s 7,233 military personnel, or about 66 percent, live off-base, Williams said.

More than 80 percent of the 53,545 military families live off-base at the U.S. Marine’s Camp Lejeune and New River Air Station in North Carolina.

“The Marine Corps, like all branches of the service, offer a housing allowance set for the specific area,” said Sgt. Spencer Harris at Camp Lejeune. “For example, the Jacksonville (N.C.) housing allowance is $689 for a sergeant. It will vary for rank.”

In the U.S. Navy, Florida is a favorable site for families. For one thing, Florida does not have a state income tax.

“The cost of living is generally low, certainly lower than in California, Washington, D.C., or Norfolk, Va.,” said Ed Barker, media relations officer at the Navy Region Gulf Coast Public Affairs Office at Pensacola Naval Air Station.

“As anywhere, some schools are not as good as others,” Barker said. “In Florida, schools are graded by the state through student performance tests. I don’t believe we have any failing schools [in the Pensacola area].”

For the Briggs family, having lived in numerous states helped them decide where to retire. They selected San Antonio for two reasons, Mrs. Briggs said.

“We can afford a nice house here,” she said. “The second reason is the medical benefits that are here.”

Put those two reasons together, and you’ll have nearly the entire definition of quality of life for many military families.

David Hendricks is business columnist for the San Antonio Express-News.