Airport committee to mull over options
A proposal call that was put out to anybody in the private sector who may be interested in investing in the Niagara District Airport closes at the end of January, says Niagara Falls CAO Ken Todd.
Todd updated city council Tuesday evening about recent work undertaken by an airport liaison committee comprised of the three mayors and three chief administrative officers from the airport-owning municipalities, as well as the airport’s general manager and manager.
“We have just recently undertaken, first of all, a complete environmental assessment on the airport — that was the condition of any transfer to the Region, they said that had to be done first. That has now been completed,” he said.
“We’ve done a complete evaluation of the assets at the airport — that was just completed last month. The third item is we put a proposal call out to anybody in the private sector that may be interested in being a partner in investing in the airport, so that is closing at the end of the month.”
Once that final piece is complete, Todd said the committee can make an “informed decision” as to further discussions with Niagara Region, “or whether we want to look at getting into private ownership completely, looking at a partnership with the private sector, or a partnership with the Region.”
“We needed to get those three things completed and as of the end of this month they’ll be done and we’ll be reporting back to council in the next couple of months,” he said.
“I know we’re a little behind schedule, but there was a lot of work that needed to be done to get us to that point.”
Todd’s comment came after Coun. Wayne Thomson asked for an update on his motion, which was approved by council last March, giving the Region notice that prior to the municipality’s 2018 budget, council would make a decision with respect to pulling out of the airport.
Todd said the city gave the Region notice of city council’s motion.
Thomson’s motion came after regional councillors voted against paying for an environmental assessment of the land at the Niagara District Airport in Niagara-on-the-Lake and Niagara Central Dorothy Rungeling Airport in Pelham.
That effectively blocked Niagara Region from assuming control.
The environmental assessment was a condition of the Region taking over.
In September 2016, the Region’s public works committee agreed in principle that the upper-tier municipality take over operations.
The plan passed at full council on Sept. 22, 2016, but was amended to insist the lower-tier municipalities pay for the environmental assessment.
The issue of that environmental assessment returned to regional council, and a vote on waiving it ended in a 14-14 tie.
Because it was a reconsideration of something previously passed, it needed the support of two-thirds of council.
In north Niagara, St. Catharines, Niagara Falls and Niagara-onthe-Lake fund Niagara District Airport.
In south Niagara, Welland, Pelham, Port Colborne and Wainfleet pay the cost of operating the Dorothy Rungeling Airport.
Thomson said he supports the environmental assessment “if that’s what it takes to move this forward.”
During an interview with the Niagara Falls Review, Todd said during the latter part of 2017, the committee recommended to the three respective councils — Niagara Falls, St. Catharines and Niagara-on-the-Lake — they undertake the environmental assessment and business evaluation “so that we knew what the airport asset was worth.”
He said the associated cost was split three ways between the three municipalities on a proportionate basis, based on population.
“We all shared in that and what we wanted to do is we wanted to make sure that the environmental assessment, the business evaluation were done before we made any decisions or before we could go any further to have further discussions.”
Todd said the committee is in the process of seeing if there’s any private-sector interest in partnering with them on the airport, but that’s only one potential option.
“There is an opportunity to transfer all of the assets to the Region. There’s an opportunity on the second option for the three municipalities and the Region as a new partner to continue on, so there would be four of us, instead of three. The third option would be that the three municipalities could take on a private-sector partner to come on board with us, and the fourth option would be that we just do an outright sale to the private sector and let the private sector run it.”
He said once the private expressions of interest process concludes at the end of January, “we’ll have sort of the three pieces of information we need to have on hand in order to then proceed.”