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County leaders give airport $65,000 for slope study, fees
By Justin Goble
Though legal wrangling over the Jackson County Airport continues, commissioners have decided to move forward with stabilizing the slide-prone area.
County officials appropriated $65,000 for the Jackson County Airport Authority Monday night (Nov. 6) to help pay for a study to determine what actions, if any, can be taken to stabilize the airport’s slopes. The vote was 4-1, with Commissioners Tom Massie, William Shelton, Brian McMahan and Mark Jones voting in favor of the allocation, while Joe Cowan voted “no.”
According to McMahan, the entire $65,000 will be taken from the county’s contingency fund.
County leaders have stipulated that JCAA members must use $45,000 as a 10-percent match to obtain $450,000 of the funds being held for the local airport by the N.C. Department of Transportation’s Division of Aviation. That money will be used to conduct a feasibility study determining what, if anything, can be done to stabilize the land. After the study is complete, whatever funds remain will be used to begin the stabilization project.
Commissioners asked for a similar study in 2005 in the wake of a slide at the airport. That study was never completed.
According to county Manager Ken Westmoreland, that $450,000 comes from funds that have been frozen since 2005 when Sen. John Snow (D-Murphy) pushed a bill through the General Assembly that prevented the Jackson County Airport Authority from entering into any contracts. At the same time, Snow was instrumental in persuading state DOT officials to freeze funding allocations to the local airport.
The remaining $20,000 commissioners allocated Monday is to be set aside to cover any legal fees for the pending lawsuits against the airport.
While the other commissioners stated they had confidence in the current airport authority members and wanted to move forward with fixing the problems at the airport, Cowan said he didn’t see why more taxpayer money was being spent on the property.
“I’m confident in the current Airport Authority, but I’ve often said that I don’t want to put more money into it,” Cowan said. “I cannot in good conscience vote to put more money into an airport that serves such a limited amount of people – maybe less than 1 percent of the taxpayers.”
The decision came after a 4 p.m. Monday closed session, during which commissioners met with Hendersonville attorney Sharon Alexander, who is representing the county in the current lawsuit; county attorney Paul Holt; and Division of Aviation Director Bill Williams. According to Massie, who spoke with The Herald Tuesday (Nov. 6), that closed session was needed because commissioners had not been able to speak with Alexander or Williams about the county’s best course of action in light of the ongoing lawsuit.
“Our attorney advised us not to make a grant to the airport or to make the transfer of the animal shelter,” Massie said. “So we just wanted to see what we could do to protect the county without jeopardizing our position.
“We didn’t want to talk about anything that didn’t fall under the purview of a legal issue,” Massie said. “We were very worried about that. If it could have been easily done in open session, we would have done so. While I still don’t think we’re a party to this lawsuit, I do think it’s time to act on this.”
The lawsuit in question was filed last year by attorney Eric Ridenour of Sylva, who represents adjacent property owners R.L. Ammons and Dewayne Pruett. Ammons’ and Pruett’s suit name as defendants both Jackson County and the Jackson County Airport Authority and contend that slope failure at the airport atop Berry Ridge near Cullowhee is threatening their homes and property.
The lawsuits also allege that county officials and the authority share responsibility for addressing problems caused by the landslide and ask for fair market value for their property along with damages and interest.
In the aftermath of the 2005 slide, the Airport Authority engaged Sylva contractor Paul Lewis to clean out a neglected drainage ditch above the Ammons’ property and repair damage to their driveway.
According to Westmoreland, officials are hoping that the study and any measures needed to stabilize the airport will be part of a permanent settlement between the county and the plaintiffs in the lawsuit. That’s why closed-session discussions were required, he said.
“It all goes back to a provision in the mediation discussions we had a couple weeks ago,” Westmoreland said. “It’s part of Ms. Alexander’s legal strategy in working with the Airport Authority’s attorney and with the attorney representing Pruett and Ammons.”
Speaking to the Herald Tuesday, Shelton, who put forth the motion to appropriate the funds, said commissioners have wanted to address the problems at the airport for some time. However, the lawsuit has “tied their hands” in terms of moving forward, he said.
“Basically, four days after we took office, this lawsuit was filed,” Shelton said. “The airport has been an ongoing problem for 30 years, and the bottom line is that we have a problem with stability up there. If we lose the lawsuit or the Airport Authority ceases to exist, the airport comes back to us. If we wait until then to do something, we’d have to expend a lot more money to correct the problems. The match money won’t be available for long, and the Airport Authority needs it pronto. We have a liability there, and we need to fix it. We can spend a little now or a whole lot more later.
“It will cost us more to shut it down than it will to stabilize that land,” Shelton said. “So we’re trying to take care of this problem while protecting the taxpayers. It’s really a case of ‘pay me now or pay me later.’ ”
According to JCAA Chairman Greg Hall, airport officials will use the money to go ahead with the study as soon as possible.
“Certainly the study will come first,” Hall said. “The repair of the slide areas is second. It could take all that money. It could take less.”
Hall also said the appropriation was a first step towards the county and the airport working together to defend the lawsuit.
“It’s wonderful,” Hall said. “I’m delighted about it. While we have separate representation, I feel like at this point we’re starting to stand together. We were on the verge of running out of money, so it was nice for them to put forth that 10 percent match. The fact that they set aside $20,000 to help us with our legal fees as well was absolutely huge. It was just what we needed, and right in the nick of time.”
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