Anniston optimistic about airport partnership despite FAA fine

Apr. 17—Anniston faces a potential $1.56 million fine for alleged safety violations at the city's airport, but Mayor Jack Draper says he doesn't expect the fine to derail a plan to get other local governments involved in running the airfield.

Draper and other members of the city council want to hand the city-owned airport over to a multi-government, independent airport authority — something city officials see as a fix for some of the airport's woes. Draper said Thursday that the Federal Aviation Administration fine isn't likely to turn potential partners away.

"The city will be on the hook for that, not an airport authority," Draper said. "Even if an airport authority were created, the title is still vested in the city."

Anniston Regional Airport, an airfield with a 7,000-foot runway south of Oxford, isn't within Anniston city limits, but it is the property of the city. Local officials speak of it as a valuable resource that has yet to be properly put to use, but it's not hard to imagine it as an albatross around the city's neck.

The airport got its start as a grassy airfield in the 1930s, but grew in importance as Fort McClellan began bringing more people to Anniston. By 1966, when the terminal was built, the runway was paved to its current 7,000-foot extent, long enough to land even the heaviest of large aircraft.

Commuter flights from the airport ended around the time Fort McClellan closed in the 1990s, and Anniston Regional now sees primarily private and military flights.

The city has had trouble maintaining it to the standards of the Federal Aviation Administration. FAA inspectors in March 2020 took the airport to task for cracked runways, staff who were too few in number and undertrained, a mislabeled emergency fuel shutoff valve and other alleged safety violations. This month, the other shoe dropped: The FAA wants to levy a $1.56 million civil penalty against the city for its failure to fix those problems.

City officials say those fixes are either done, underway or on the way. Most significantly, they expect to begin work in early summer on resurfacing of the runway, a project that would resolve concerns about cracked asphalt. City officials plan to meet with the FAA in what amounts to an appeal of the fine.

But Draper believes the city is going to need help if it intends to fix the problem long-term.

"The city of Anniston, we don't have the money to keep up an airport like that," he said.

Draper's plan is to create an airport authority to run the airport — an independent governing board with members appointed by local governments. Give other local governments some say in the running of the airport, the theory goes, and those local governments may also be willing to support the airport politically, or even with an infusion of resources.

Draper won't say which local governments he's talking to about the potential multi-government authority, saying that confirmation should come from the cities themselves. But the Anniston mayor has spoken to perhaps the city's most important potential partner.

"We've talked about it recently," said Alton Craft, mayor of Oxford, Anniston's neighbor to the south. Craft said he thinks the idea is promising — and that it may go over better than last time.

Anniston had an airport board in the 1980s and 1990s, but it was a city board, answerable only to Anniston. Faced with mounting costs, Anniston officials proposed annexing the airport property into the city to collect more tax revenue, according to past accounts in The Star.

But the airport doesn't touch city limits — Oxford lies between the Model City and its airfield — and an annexation would have required a vote in the Legislature. Oxford officials were none too happy with that plan, and the annexation effort ultimately died. Anniston disbanded its airport board in the late 1990s.

Craft said the mood is different now. Local governments have cooperated on other major projects, he said, most notably the East Metro Area Crime Center, a police intelligence center in a building near Oxford's City Hall.

The EMACC has been able to pull in major federal and state grants, he said, largely because it's applying on behalf of multiple governments, not a single city of 21,000 residents.

"We've learned in the past: the more the merrier," Craft said.

Craft said bringing aviation-related businesses to the airport would likely be good for Oxford. Expanding traffic there would too, he said, though he doesn't hold out hope that the airport will grow enough to host regular passenger service.

"I don't think you're ever going to be looking for giant passenger business," he said. "Not this close to Birmingham and Atlanta."

Both Craft and Draper said the airport authority idea is still in the negotiation stage, without a single government having officially committed to it. Craft said he believed only two or three governments are involved in that conversation so far. That may mean that smaller local cities haven't yet been brought on board.

"No one has talked to me about it," said Weaver Mayor Wayne Willis. "All I know is what I read in the newspaper."

If Weaver were asked to join in on an airport authority, Willis said, he'd have to think about it before lending his support. His main concern: Would the city be responsible for paying fines like the one the FAA levied against Anniston?

Craft said he's less worried. He believes the FAA will relent if Anniston can make its case that it is addressing the airport's problems.

Still, the poposed fine will at least delay the discussion on forming an authority.

Draper said working out the issue of the fine is the top priority. "We need to get farther down the road in terms of resolving the issues with the FAA," he said.

Capitol & statewide reporter Tim Lockette: 256-294-4193. On Twitter @TLockette_Star.