The January victory in keeping Meigs Field (CGX) open in Chicago was only the start of a busy year. Over the ensuing months your association and AOPA Legislative Action have been quite busy with myriad other airport issues surrounding closures, discriminatory practices, funding, and precedent-setting federal legislation. Airports, as we all know, are essential components of a vital general aviation transportation system; we need places to land our airplanes. As my predecessor John Baker used to say, "We haven't left one up there yet!"
There are 17,000 landing facilities in the United States for helicopters, seaplanes, and fixed-wing aircraft. In 1969 there were almost 7,000 public-use airports in the country, and today they number just over 5,000. We are losing one airport per week in America, primarily privately owned, public-use facilities. There are many reasons for this, but in many cases it's aging owners who have spent their lives supporting a private airport for others to use and are now buckling under to the temptation of substantial dollars from land developers for their valuable property.
One such owner, William B. Wilson, AOPA 164811, had spent much of his life developing Brandywine Airport (N99) and an industrial park in West Chester, Pennsylvania, just outside of Philadelphia. Shortly before Wilson was to make a deal with developers that would have closed his airport, Len Blair, AOPA 942780, active in the real estate business, agreed to purchase the property. Blair developed a unique plan to establish a nonprofit organization — made up of local pilots — that would purchase the airport for $2.4 million. The 10-month process culminated in the New Brandywine Airport Club's raising the necessary funds to manage the airport and build needed hangars.
Willoughby, Ohio, lies on the outskirts of Cleveland, and here Lost Nation Airport (LNN) has been under threat of closure by the town's mayor. Our hope had been that the county would take over this fine facility for GA, but when that fell through, the city indicated that X's would go on the runway ends on September 30. Airports such as Lost Nation that are not privately owned often accept federal funds for construction, upgrades, and necessary repairs. This was the case with LNN, which had signed legal contracts with the FAA for more than $14 million. In exchange for those grants, the city agreed to operate the airport until 2015. In Federal District Court on September 26, just four days prior to the announced closure, AOPA and two other plaintiffs filed suit seeking a temporary restraining order to stop the city. Before the court could rule on the restraining order, the city responded that the airport would remain open. Airport supporter Representative Steven LaTourette (R-OH), AOPA, the FAA, city, county, and all interested parties are working toward keeping Lost Nation as an airport.
As in the case of Lost Nation, the federal grant assurance contracts issued under the FAA's Airport Improvement Program (AIP) set up a legal contract between the owner and the government: Use taxpayer dollars for construction projects and agree to operate the facility as an airport, under federal guidelines, for 20 years. These contracts are critical in our successful efforts to use the legal system, when necessary, to keep open a threatened airport.
A major scare hit us this past July, when two politicians attached Section 338 to the 1998 Transportation Appropriations Bill in the Senate. This last-minute addition prior to summer recess could have taken away the legal remedies available to us in battling airport closures. In an effort to shut down two airports in their home states, Richard-Gebaur Memorial near Kansas City, Missouri, and Bader Field in Atlantic City, New Jersey, senators Kit Bond (R-MO) and Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) — respectively — introduced the measure that would have allowed these airports to close, regardless of their grant assurance obligations.
AOPA immediately went into action and contacted members in both states, asking them to write the senators and express their dismay at this precedent-setting legislation. Members noted that these localities willingly accepted federal funds for the upkeep of their airports and indicated that this onerous provision reverses 20 years of infrastructure funding policy. AOPA Legislative Action staff members held numerous meetings on Capitol Hill, and I visited key legislators who might assist us in derailing this fast-moving legislation (remember, this was part of a funding bill for fiscal 1998, which began on October 1 — creating an urgency to get it passed). Section 338 was killed in the conference committee on the bill. Much of the credit goes to Representative Frank Wolf (R-VA), who clearly understood the negative impact this legislation could have on the national airport system and was instrumental in removing this measure. Whew!
There is great news in terms of airport funding for the coming year. AOPA Legislative Action has consistently sought more dollars for small airports. In recent years we have seen total airport funding drop from a high-water mark of $2 billion a year to just $1.45 billion last year. The Clinton administration proposed $1 billion for fiscal 1998, but Congress instead approved $1.7 billion, a 70-percent increase over the president's request and $240 million more than last year's amount. This allocates $354 million to general aviation airports, an increase of 24 percent over the 1997 level.
Through member surveys you have told us that saving airports ranks among the top three most important tasks for your association. We take this mandate seriously, and we will continue to devote significant resources to ensure that our nation's network of general aviation airports remains alive and well.
Related Articles
