Reader responds to News-Herald article

Staff

Published Saturday, March 20, 2004

Editor, the News-Herald:

I would like to respond to your article concerning "FAA wants more info about airport," that was found upon the front page of the Suffolk News-Herald March 7, 2004.

I have read with great interest, the article that was run by the Suffolk New-Herald about my recent formal complaint against the City, to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and their request for more detailed information.

Additionally, after reading about the difficulty in obtaining "Public Information" from the City of Suffolk, I am keenly interested to see how much trouble I will encounter from our city administration, in my efforts to garner the detailed information requested by the FAA.

While I was aware of the need for such information by the FAA, I had hoped that after almost three years wait in the pursuit of these issues for airport development, the exercise might be moot due to progress expressed by city staff ....

Unfortunately I must state, that even given all of the fan-fare by the airport management and City Staff in some of your past articles that; "We will soon be braking ground for new facilities," the fact is that absolutely nothing has been done.

Perhaps the most representative example of how bad the management problem at the airport is; can be seen in the situation with the "Fighter Factory" located at our Airport.

This very interesting WWII Aircraft Restoration operation, intends to move most of it's operations and rare aircraft to Pungo Field, a small grass runway airport in Virginia Beach, due to a lack of available space or interest by our airport management in their needs.

It is a true wonder that our City Leadership holds such an unprofessional attitude toward the airport.

After inviting the public to our airport to: submit, enact, and fund business plans for airport construction, and after almost three-year wait; the City Leadership has not even decided the; what, where, or how such development will be done, if ever...

While do I believe there is great need to change the management paradigms of our City Leadership, I had hoped that with a small nudge and some heat on the subject to highlight our plight to the FAA, we might finally move forward with all of the City's plans and promises.

I must now admit that I was naive in such fanciful expectations, and this process would exhaust even Job's patients.

I truly had hoped that further fillings with the Federal Government would not be necessary; however, I now find that the complaint was the right step, to help resolve the lack of proper oversight of our valuable multi-million dollar airport.

To this end, I will be filing a notice to Mr. Terry Page, Manager of the Washington Airport District Office FAA, to express my intent to submit a very detailed and specific filing to highlight: Misappropriation and application of funds, Diversion of Funds, Non-aviation use of airport property without benefit to airport operations. I will also specifically describe the utter and complete failure to operate the airport in the interest of the public, as required by law and grant agreement for the millions of federal dollars spent at the facility.

Much of this information will have to be garnered from City records under the Freedom of Information ACT.

We shall see how difficult and time consuming this exercise is.

I would also have you specifically note that the planned and stated infrastructure construction discussed in your March 7, 2004 article, and as stated in several past articles months ago, has yet to even start.

Further, the City has yet to even decide: if, how, and when they might be ready to lease parcels for new businesses and individuals at our airport.

This total and significant failure to properly manage the airport would be hilarious, if it weren't so painfully evident that even to this very day, our city staff and most especially our City Manager, has no clue about the issues.

To this end; I will have to file several FOIA requests to get the City documents that the FAA has requested, for the detailed expansion of my complaint. I can only guess at how hard, if not impossible this effort will be, given the secretive culture of our city leadership, as it applies to citizen access to information.

This is a prime example of just how badly government can be managed.

Roger A. Leonard

Liberty Springs Road

Suffolk

---

WOULD YOU LIKE TO SHARE THIS STORY?

---