Thursday, June 19, 2014

Pilots: Astoria Regional Airport (KAST) revamp needed; Committee recommends private operator

The Port of Astoria established the Airport Advisory Committee to advise on the future of the Astoria Regional Airport.

At Tuesday’s meeting, the committee gave its first major piece of advice: Turn over fueling, hangaring and other operations at the airport to a private fixed-base operator (FBO).

“I’ve always felt that we needed some sort of FBO there,” said Interim Executive Director Mike Weston, adding that he’ll need to review the committee’s report to see if it’s financially and legally feasible.

The hope is that private operation of the airport will improve its quality and lead to more activity.

The report from the committee said the Port, after paying various debt services for property and equipment at the airport, nets about $35,000 a year from aviation and jet fuel sales. But that revenue, it adds, is threatened by the possibility of Brim Aviation, the largest fuel consumer at the airport, providing its own. Lowering seafood quotas, the report added, threaten fuel purchases by fish spotters during their yearly surveys.

The committee is composed of local aviators, a U.S. Coast Guard pilot and a representative of airplane tug company Lektro.

Henry Balensifer, a Warrenton city commissioner and employee of Lektro, was recently appointed chairman of the committee. He told the Port Commission that the deal with an FBO would likely be revenue-neutral for the first few years, until interest in and traffic at the airport increases.

The most lucrative aspect of the airport’s operation is the fuel sales. The report said the Port has been selling about 100,000 gallons of jet fuel and 30,000 gallons of aviation gas per year. The report recommended a flowage fee of 31 cents per gallon from the FBO to help make the deal revenue-neutral.

The fuel farm was funded by loans from the state, which prohibits its sale to a third party. The committee’s report pointed to a licensing agreement as one mechanism to help the Port outsource fuel sales at the airport.

The idea of an FBO at the airport was broached recently by Brim, an Ashland-based company that provides helicopter launch services for the Columbia River Bar Pilots.

The airport’s last FBO was John Overholser, whose contract with the Port was terminated in 2008 so the agency could hire him as a part-time airport manager. But to lower labor costs, the Port laid Overholser off late last year.


Source:  http://www.dailyastorian.com

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