Hollister City Council members, airport commissioners and
airport tenants all raised concerns Monday about a proposed new
airport layout plan.
HOLLISTER
Hollister City Council members, airport commissioners and airport tenants all raised concerns Monday about a proposed new airport layout plan.
Airport Manager Bill Gere said the plan, which outlines possible development, could open the door to more outside funding. But many speakers at Monday’s council meeting complained that glider facilities and a new California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection air-attack base have been left out.
“This airport layout plan here is not the plan we have been working with for the past few months,” said Reno DiTullio, assistant chief with CalFire’s San Benito-Monterey unit.
According to a city staff report, the Airport Advisory Commission recommended approving the layout plan. But three commissioners – Douglas Hooton, Fred Meyer and Allen Ritter – said the document had been changed.
“We never recommended this plan,” Meyer said.
After hearing from a number of unhappy airport users, the council followed City Manager Clint Quilter’s suggestion and called for a special airport commission meeting. At that meeting, airport commissioners and staff should iron out discrepancies between the plan approved by the commission and the one presented to the council.
“I’m not willing to vote on this until we have all the information,” said Councilwoman Pauline Valdivia.
Mayor Doug Emerson also said council members hadn’t been given enough information in their agenda packets. Those packets included the layout map (labeled “Sheet 1 of 12”) but lacked any supporting documentation, including the remaining 11 pages of the plan or airport commission meeting minutes.
“It’s very difficult to listen to this up here and not have an answer,” Emerson said.
Bill Dickert, director of sales and marketing at ABVision, defended leaving the air-attack base off the plan. Dickert’s company wants to develop corporate hangars on the land targeted for CalFire’s new base, and he noted that the city and the fire agency have yet to sign a lease.
“There’s no need to show provision for leases that aren’t signed,” Dickert said.
He added that the city needs to make sure it isn’t ignoring possibilities for economic development.
Before the meeting, Gere told the Free Lance that the plan identifies the land Calfire and ABVision both want as an area whose development will be determined by a “request for proposal.”
The Hollister Municipal Airport’s layout plan was last updated in 1999, Gere said, while the Federal Aviation Administration recommends revisions every three years. If the FAA approves the new layout plan, the airport will be eligible for many new funds, which could be spent on building new taxiways and laying more pavement for helicopters, he said.
Hollister submitted a layout plan to the FAA shortly before Gere started as airport manager in 2005, but the FAA demanded substantial revisions, he said.
“They were rather upset, to put it nicely,” Gere said. “They felt an awful lot of things weren’t keeping with FAA policy.”
The new plan addresses the FAA’s concerns, he said.
Local developer Ken Lindsay, who owns the Airpark Business Center at the south end of the airport, also told the Free Lance he’s satisfied with the document.
“The better the airport and the more facilities it has – it’s just always a benefit,” Lindsay said.
Local glider pilots, on the other hand, were vocally dissatisfied about being left off the plan.
“We feel directly targeted by Bill Gere and we feel harassed and we feel discriminated against,” said Drew Pearce, owner of Bay Area Glider Rides.
Councilman Brad Pike, whose district includes the airport, said he’s disappointed the facility has become such a divisive issue.
“I’m pretty frustrated with myself and also the process,” Pike said. “We’ve got to be on board as a team here.”
