Atlanta airport under investigation

ATLANTA — Federal authorities are investigating whether Atlanta’s airport illegally diverted money to the city.

The Atlanta JournalConstitution reports the Federal Aviation Administration sent notice of the investigation to the city of Atlanta, which owns and operates Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.

The FAA also subpoenaed airport invoices from 2016 through mid-2018.

The notice, filed Thursday, says the city acknowledged that invoices totaling more than $100,000 “were wrongly paid from airport funds” and reimbursed the airport.

Federal regulations prohibit spending airport money on anything other than the airport’s capital or operating costs, and the FAA could withhold federal funds if it finds unlawful diversions of revenue.

The FAA’s investigation notice cites a newspaper report that the city may have used airport money to pay legal fees to respond to a federal corruption probe into Atlanta City Hall. After that article, the federal agency opened an inquiry into the possible misuse of airport revenue and requested records on legal expenditures. The airport submitted heavily redacted invoices and other documents in response.

The FAA said in its investigation notice that it has already determined the city “may have made ineligible payments to law firms from airport revenue accounts,” but it could not make conclusive findings because of the extensive redactions.

The agency said the city “on multiple occasions” has refused to comply with FAA requests for unredacted invoices involving legal fees.

The city has 30 days to respond to the notice.