Current Status
Over the succeeding years the Air Force declared much of the land surplus and disposed of it. With successive divestitures of real property and reductions in permanent party military, civil service and contractor personnel assigned to APAFR, many of the facilities constructed during the 1950s have been turned over to the State of Florida. The state's Department of Corrections operates the Avon Park Correctional Institution (APCI) on site for adult male offenders utilizing former USAF dormitory/barracks facilities, while the Department of Juvenile Justice operates the Avon Park Youth Academy for low to moderate risk juvenile offenders/delinquents utilizing former base housing. The last major divestment in 1983 brought the range to its current size.
Other facilities at APAFR that continue to be maintained by USAF and that are outside the core operational mission include morale, welfare and recreation (MWR) facilities, primarily camping, boating and hunting facilities for active and retired military personnel. Multiple military functions occur at the range, and numerous WWII period structures remain and some continue in use by range personnel. Public access to the Avon Park AFR is temporarily suspended due to the heightened security requirements for Department of Defense installations.
In April 1993, the Florida Highlands Chapter of the Air Force Association erected a three-blade propeller memorial next to the former base headquarters building in tribute to the many military personnel to have served at this facility.
Read more about this topic: Avon Park Air Force Range
Famous quotes containing the words current and/or status:
“I have come to believe ... that the stage may do more than teach, that much of our current moral instruction will not endure the test of being cast into a lifelike mold, and when presented in dramatic form will reveal itself as platitudinous and effete. That which may have sounded like righteous teaching when it was remote and wordy will be challenged afresh when it is obliged to simulate life itself.”
—Jane Addams (1860–1935)
“Anthropologists have found that around the world whatever is considered “men’s work” is almost universally given higher status than “women’s work.” If in one culture it is men who build houses and women who make baskets, then that culture will see house-building as more important. In another culture, perhaps right next door, the reverse may be true, and basket- weaving will have higher social status than house-building.”
—Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen. Excerpted from, Gender Grace: Love, Work, and Parenting in a Changing World (1990)