Failure to comply; airport grant revoked

Let'sgoflying!

Let'sgoflying!

Touchdown! Greaser!
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Dave Taylor
Have heard constantly for many years now, ‘don’t comply with grant assurance mandates, expect FAA to rescind any grants (or not renew)’.

Egregious cases like Meigs aside, how often is this happening and under what circumstances? Ie what were the alleged violations?

I’d also like to exclude instances involving wealthy local governments that could keep up an airport w/o the fed’s help.
More interested in rural and remote airports esp where aviation has a very practical need like mine.
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
Have heard constantly for many years now, ‘don’t comply with grant assurance mandates, expect FAA to rescind any grants (or not renew)’.

Egregious cases like Meigs aside, how often is this happening and under what circumstances? Ie what were the alleged violations?

I’d also like to exclude instances involving wealthy local governments that could keep up an airport w/o the fed’s help.
More interested in rural and remote airports esp where aviation has a very practical need like mine.
Click to expand...

It depends on the airport and the type of grant and the length of obligation. Some obligations, like grants for purchasing property, never expire. Google St Clair Airport (K39, Missouri) for more reading than you'd ever like on how challenging it is to close an airport. Their congressional delegation eventually put forward legislation passed into law that allowed them to close the airport.
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
how often is this happening and under what circumstances? Ie what were the alleged violations?
Click to expand...
They're technically called grant assurances and as mentioned above can be rather complex depending on the type grant, etc. The link below will give you an idea of the different type of assurances that are required in general. I don't believe its relevant whether the local entity is wealthy or not as its more a matter of "cheap" money like other Federal grants. Same on the private side who can also qualify for some of these grants. But some of the reasons I've seen where federal money is pulled is due to lack of required follow up and using the money for "other" purposes. Perhaps find that website that lists GA airports that have recently closed and research their local news to see if lack of funds was the cause.
https://www.faa.gov/airports/aip/grant_assurances/media/airport-sponsor-assurances-aip-2020.pdf
 
There are some rural airports refusing FAA funds because it’s a cost sharing arrangement and the FAA’s standards are to costly - cheaper to do what they want.
 
Only if said airport accepts money from the fed. My home drome is self funded, even though it’s owned by the city. It eliminates these issues, but also creates others in different ways. It’s a doubled edged sword.
 
In some of the podunk communities there should never have been grants made because they were objectively unable to demonstrate self sufficient status.
 
Clip4 said:
In some of the podunk communities there should never have been grants made because they were objectively unable to demonstrate self sufficient status.
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Most small airports are not self-sufficient, most depend on at least some funding from the sponsoring entity. There is simply too much infrastructure and not enough revenue. The wording of Grant Assurance #24 is:

It will maintain a fee and rental structure for the facilities and services at the airport which will make the airport as self-sustaining as possible under the circumstances existing at the particular airport, taking into account such factors as the volume of traffic and economy of collection.

Basically they want the airport to be charging reasonable fees and rent. They don't want the community to be giving things away for free and wholly dependent on the FAA funding to pay for things, which the FAA doesn't pay for routine operations and maintenance cost.
 
Clip4 said:
In some of the podunk communities there should never have been grants made because they were objectively unable to demonstrate self sufficient status.
Click to expand...

can we compare to other forms of transportation?
Are highways & streets self-sufficient?
 
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