The Adhoc airport committee of Iron County
met on February 3, 2011. They decided to
continue seeking information concerning the
establishment of a new private airport for the
Iron County area.
To do so they appointed a subcommittee to
recommend a presentation to be made to the
Iron County Board of Commissioners in support
of their position that Iron County can get a grant
funded airport to provide local industrialist owners
with a better and SAFER place to fly their planes
into Iron County.
The meeting was attended by a representative of
U.S. senator Carl Levin, and newly elected State
Senator Casperson. The local media except the
Iron County Doings was NOT in attendance!
Associate editor Ben Smith, who attended the
meeting, also published this article on his web
page at IronCountyVoice.
The adhoc committee spent the entire evening
explaining their position that a new private airport
was needed to accommodate the larger planes of
the local business owners that wished to fly their
JETS or TWIN engine airplanes into Iron County.
During the meeting comments made by members
of the public were attacked routinely by members
of the adhoc airport committee. The only piece of
information received by the committee without
rancor was when this reporter submitted his
credentials.
The committee was unclear as to whether any
funding was still available from a previous grant
to study an airport location. This reporter was told
by a committee member (John Faccin) that I knew
how to get the information (USE THE FOIA
process) that I had requested.
The meeting was attended by three members of
the public plus the representatives of and the
elected senator. The committee is planning on
telling the county commission of their desire to
build such an airport for the benefit of the local
industrialists
Submitted by Ben Smith
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Editor's Comments:
This was the second meeting of the newly appointed
Airport Committee. The last meeting produced one
page of official minutes that appear to have taken 15
minutes of meeting time. It would be nice to have had
a legitimately thorough set of minutes for the remaining
hour and a quarter that the meeting
took.
It sounds as though this committee was configured to
produce a rubber stamp solution to the desires of two
or three businessmen who are seeking public funds for
their own convenience.
The only questions that are important in these regards is
whether or not the plane owning businessmen will fold up
their tents and move their businesses elsewhere of they
don't get their way.
The answer is, probably not. Hovey Companies is locked
in by contract to renovations for two buildings in Iron
County. They are not unlike the courthouse and hospital
renovations in that relatively little local employment is
implicit in their projects.
Oldenburg Group has a factory in Iron River that would
impose a significant cost to relocate. They have a relatively
new contract that precludes them from moving at this time.
Is it crucial for Oldenburg and a few others from corporate
headquarters to visit the Iron River facility frequently?
Probably not.
Krist Oil is Iron River based. If they moved corporate
headquarters to Eagle River or Kingsford, how much of a
difference would it make in local employment? Probably
insignificant. The Krist Oil management isn't stupid, they
would retain everyone they could even if they moved.
Other than the concerted effort by the three businessmen
to get Iron County to do their will, there's no real incentive
for our public body to become involved in this airport
project at this time.
On the other hand, if the three businessmen were to
contract with Iron County to completely fund all maintenance
and security all objections to a new airport would be disappear
with the posting of a sufficient bond to provide for contract
bound agreement covering the first ten years.
Unfortunately that's not likely to happen.
Bill Vajk
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