Flying over the southern Sierras, you can look down on the quaint, rural California town of Tehachapi. It appears to be a storybook village, glistening like a jewel in the valley below, surrounded by spectacular mountain peaks. But what you cannot see from 8,000 feet is the political division that exists.
Tehachapi Municipal Airport began as a dirt strip in the 1930s and now finds itself, some 70 years later, struggling to survive. Pilots who used the airport in the early days of aviation often dodged golf balls pitched across the airstrip by local duffers. It was a multiple-use facility, enjoyed by many. Eventually the golfers found another playground and left the landing strip to aviators and their flying machines.
As small GA airports went, Tehachapi had a good reputation among dedicated enthusiasts in the 1970s and 1980s. The city was also alive and bubbly. There were clothing stores, a couple of family-owned groceries, the post office, a local drugstore, and other retail businesses in the downtown area.
In the late 1980s, however, subtle changes began to take place. Retail businesses died out and most stores closed. In hindsight the political climate may have been ambivalent, even offensive to entrepreneurs and land developers. Likewise, the airport deteriorated and lost its luster, but was kept alive by spirited pilots.
Tehachapi's airport came under direct supervision of the city council when Kern County deeded the facility to the City of Tehachapi in 1981. The airport was a diamond in the rough - a mystery, little understood and less thought about. Only airport users recognized the value of such a facility to the community.
Since then, the airport has proven to be a vital asset. A critically injured child was recently airlifted to an urban hospital. Tehachapi also serves as a reliever airport for Meadows Field in Bakersfield when it is socked in by tule fog. Under these conditions, aircraft carrying freight for FedEx, DHL, and UPS divert to Tehachapi. For several days following the 1952 earthquake, aerial transportation was the only means of getting into or out of Tehachapi.
When the airport was transferred to the city, an airport commission was established and it conducted routine airport business. Controversial issues were unheard of. Jim Roberts, a flight instructor who served on the commission from 1985 to 1993, recounts: "The airport commission never had much clout; and in those days, we didn't have the issues we have today. We didn't see the [city's accounting] figures, and we weren't informed on [FAA and California Department of Transportation] grants and how the city was managing the budget. We didn't know they were taking grants and expensing them. We didn't know about their fuzzy math."
As time went on, the taxiway and runway were improved through FAA grants; however, little more was accomplished until 1998, when a pilot-controlled runway lighting system was installed. Then in 1999, a Caltrans low-interest loan allowed the replacement of an antiquated manual fuel system with an automated self-service system.
All seemed calm until the March 2000 airport commission meeting. Eyebrows furrowed over a memo, written by Airport Manager Neil Browning to City Manager Jason Caudle, concerning 19 hangars that were without leases. The memo explained that if the city took over the privately owned hangars, it could rent them for 24 cents a square foot per month, or current hangar owners could sign a new lease at 18 cents per square foot per month. This was an increase of more than 500 percent over the 3.5-cent terms of the existing ground lease. Almost all of Tehachapi's hangars are privately owned and situated on ground that is leased from the city.
"The taxpayers should not have to support the airport for ‘a few rich boys and their toys,'" the city manager said. The city subsequently reported that the airport's operating fund was deficient $380,000. Later, the city discovered accounting errors and reduced the deficit to $350,000, but was unable to identify expenditures to support the suspected debt. A local pilot organization, the Tehachapi Society of Pilots, requested verification of the alleged deficit, but the city manager said that the debt had accumulated over a period of years and supporting documentation could not be found.
The city council subsequently vowed to bring fiscal responsibility to the airport by appointing council members to two vacant airport commission seats. Title 11, a city ordinance governing the airport, prohibited council members from also sitting on the commission, but the council amended Title 11 to allow these appointments. By mid-2000, city officials and airport users were at an impasse, and two longtime, multiple-term, anti-GA councilmen were up for reelection - one was the mayor.
Faced with the threat of extinction, pilots united under the Tehachapi Society of Pilots banner and established an unprecedented war chest to elect one of their own to the city council. Supporters strategized a door-to-door campaign throughout the city. Residents were amazed that pilot-candidate Gene Vickery would knock on their doors, shake their hands, and ask for their votes.
Prior to becoming a city council candidate, Vickery devoted considerable time and effort toward public education, using video presentations so that taxpayers could better understand the value of the airport to the community and the role it plays in the national transportation system. He used the AOPA video, Local Airports: Access to America, and an airport economic impact study, also based on an AOPA model, showing that the airport contributes $2.66 million per year to the local economy.
When the last vote was cast, Vickery had won by a landslide. Both councilmen were unseated - one by the 47-year veteran pilot and the other by a sympathetic businesswoman.
Shortly thereafter, the two council members resigned from the airport commission. A revision to Title 11 that would again preclude sitting council members from also sitting on the commission was taken under advisement.
The hangar-lease issue was resolved at a meeting on March 19, when the city council approved a new lease that did not increase base rental rates. Browning, the airport manager, said he proposed the increase to help fund airport improvements. He also said that the city's accounting treatment of depreciation caused the deficit - since eliminated - in the airport's operating fund. But Browning is upbeat about the airport, which he said is operating in the black for the first time in 20 years, and is encouraged that the airport now has support on the city council.
Looking to the future, potential hangar owners are once again considering Tehachapi as a home base. Two NASA employees - both Lockheed SR–71 pilots - are interested in purchasing an existing hangar.
A $600,000 FAA grant was recently approved that would allow the runway to be widened and new lighting to be installed on the runway and taxiway. Pilots have also suggested that the airport's infrastructure could be developed with FAA grant assistance. The question remains unanswered, however, whether the city is willing to provide the required 5- or 10-percent matching funds for either of these projects.
The Tehachapi Society of Pilots and other airport advocates are optimistic that the half-dozen local pilots who moved their airplanes to more friendly airports will return to Tehachapi. On the domestic front, hushed bickering brightens Tehachapi's storybook-village appeal - both from the air and at ground level.
