Heres my speech today... “For time and the world do not stand still. Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or the present are certain to miss the future.” John F. Kennedy I come here as a private citizen who represents the silent majority, the citizens of Paulding County, who are busy at work and are unable to attend these meetings. I am not representing any outside interests or a large international company, such as Delta Air Lines. With that being said, I want to say thank you for taking a major step toward further diversifying Paulding Countys business community by introducing a stronger base for the aerospace industry, which yes includes commercial air service. The 2014FY budget for the Airport Authority is $293k and it’s only projected to collect $60k in fees this fiscal year. That means the remaining amount of $233k will be paid for by the tax payers of this county. We have an infrastructure asset that is being underutilized and I for one am glad the county has found a company, Propeller Investments, to partner with in an effort to make the airport cost neutral at first and profitable in the foreseeable future. This county cannot survive alone on the small amount of mom & pop companies and the retail businesses primarily located in Hiram. Our county officials obviously see this is the case. In 2013 25% of Georgias exports were from aircraft, aircraft parts, and aircraft engine manufacturing. This means the aerospace manufacturing industry contributed $7.8billion in revenue to the state. Passenger air service contributes to the local economy as well. Based on a GDOT economic study issued in 2011, there were nine commercial airports in the state. If you exclude Hartsfield-Jackson from the report, you would see the commercial air service employs 26,000 people and created $3.2billion in revenue. According to the US Department of Commerce for every $1 spent at a local airport they add another $2.53 to the local economy. This means Paulding County would generate $83million in revenue annually based on four commercial flights per day. For those of you who believe the airport will be the next Hartsfield-Jackson, then you have been misled. Paulding County purchased 162 acres of the 10k+ acres from the City of Atlanta, which the city has owned for the past 40 years. There is a contract with Propeller Investments to develop 60 of the 162 acres for MRO companies. There is no way you could convert the entire 162 acres that Paulding County owns into an airport that would compete with Hartsfield-Jackson, which occupies approximately 6,400 acres. As for the current capacity of the airport, it is not large enough to support more than five flights a day. I am a construction estimator who has worked on large infrastructure projects, to include building passenger air terminals at several bases throughout Iraq for the DOD and DOS, I can tell you the ramp directly outside this building cannot support the movement of more than one Boeing 737 at a time. For an airport to handle 25 flights a day you would have to build an airport the size of Pensacola Regional Airport. That airport for instance has one main terminal building, one concourse, nine gates, and two runways that are both 7,000 feet in length. Conversely, Silver Comet Field has one gate and one runway that is 5,500 feet in length. Some of the opposition group members primarily argue against the airport based on emotions, or facts they have twisted in such a manner that it suits their argument. In one such example they recently stated, children were dying from noise pollution caused by commercial aircraft. If this were the case then why havent all commercial airports been shut down? Its simple, theres no truth their assertion. I could go on but I would need far more than five minutes. My last topic today deals with the most recent attempts by the opposition group to cease all National Guard training at the airport. The members of the GA National Guard did not specifically come to Silver Comet Field to harass anyone or to cause anyone PTSD. These citizen soldiers train at various times of the day to replicate real life scenarios. Ones that include inserting and ex-filling soldiers into hot LZs, rescuing wounded soldiers and delivering them to the Combat Support Hospitals, fighting forest fires, rescuing citizens swept down river by flash floods, and countless other support activities. I appreciate the PC BOC passing Resolution 14-08 last week showing the countys continued support of the GA National Guard and hope the issue caused by the members of the opposition group can be resolved relatively quickly. I would like to see our citizen soldiers back out here training and demonstrating their talents to all of us who reside in Paulding County. I thank you for your time this morning and look forward to speaking with you again in the future.
Posted on: Wed, 19 Mar 2014 16:50:45 +0000
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