Helena Approves Airport Authority Authorization, Assessment Negotiations Continue

Jun. 23—The Helena City Commission approved Monday its half of a joint city-county resolution reauthorizing the Helena Regional Airport Authority for the next 10 years.

The previous 10-year resolution was set to expire July 1, and City Manager Rachel Harlow-Schalk initially presented the reauthorization process to the city commission as an opportunity to address some grievances it had with the airport, chiefly a backlog of unpaid assessments totaling more than $300,000.

An internal memo from Harlow-Schalk indicated city staff has raised concerns the airport has neglected to pay about $344,000 in assessments owed to the city and county. The delinquent payments stretch from 2019 through 2020.

"It is a substantial amount," the city of Helena Finance Director Sheila Danielson said during an April 14 city administrative meeting.

The memo cited street maintenance and stormwater assessments among the more notable delinquent assessments.

Though the new resolution reauthorizing the airport authority does not specifically require the airport to remit payment of the overdue assessments, section 5 of the resolution was amended to require an annual review of all city and county imposed fees and assessments, services provided by the city and county, and use of the authority's facilities by the city and county.

Those payments are required by law, but City Commissioner Andres Haladay said the passage of the new resolution Monday was a missed opportunity to re-enforce those requirements.

"I don't see how this solves that problem based on the conduct, unfortunately, since we've enjoyed a pretty nice symbiotic relationship with the airport over the years," Haladay said during Monday's meeting. "I don't see how a 10-year (resolution) solves that in this circumstance since it's sort of a 'trust us; we'll solve it,' but heretofore there was no sort of meeting to actually discuss it. It was just a flat 'no.'"

In previous discussions between city and county leadership, Harlow-Schalk proposed signing a two-year resolution to give the parties involved time to research solutions while leaving the door open for those solutions to be included in a new resolution will before 2031.

"The reason for the two-year period was to allow enough time to really study and evaluate the best method moving forward of assessing the amount of cost that the city invests into the property and its management of the streets across those airport lands as well as leasing and other improvements that go on on that property," Harlow-Schalk said during Monday's meeting.

Still, the city manager is confident solutions can be reached behind the scenes.

Harlow-Schalk said in an interview Tuesday evening that good faith negotiations are ongoing.

"That doesn't mean they're going to pay (the overdue assessments)," she said. "It'll be a while before there's resolution."

Helena Regional Airport Director Jeff Wadekamper told the Independent Record previously that the airport authority has been advised not to make the payments as the Federal Aviation Administration considers it a diversion of revenue, possibly jeopardizing the federal aid the airport has received and plans to receive for infrastructure improvements through the FAA's Airport Improvement Program.

Since 1982, Helena Regional Airport has been the beneficiary of about $100 million of AIP funds, including $10 million for the runway upgrade project that wrapped up this month.

"We want to bring this to a resolution," Wadekamper said. "We want to continue to be good partners with the city and county."

Harlow-Schalk said Tuesday the airport authority did send city staff an email making their case for how best to deal with the overdue payments.

"I don't have a position on it at this point because we haven't completed an analysis," she said. "At face value, we don't agree with it, but we're looking into it further."

She said the city has hired third party legal counsel to assist city staff in the matter.

The Lewis and Clark County Board of County Commissioners is expected to pass its half of the joint resolution during Thursday morning's county commission meeting.

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Visit the Independent Record (Helena, Mont.) at www.helenair.com

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