Palmer: Sept. 24, 2026 - Airport Advisory Commission

Scott Work is not present. Jeff Helmrichs? Here. Is present. Joyce Momartz, here.

Present. Uh, Shannon Dardin.

Yes, I can hear my—. Shannon, are you, are you there?

We know he's logged in. He's logged in. Yeah, he's, he's here. He must be, uh He must have fallen asleep.

See if you can— if you can hear. Hello, Shannon, are you here? You're muted right now.

Shannon, if you can hear us and you can get your mic figured out, just chime in when you can.

With myself here, that's 4, so we're good to continue.

Richard, you want to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance?

Thank you, Richard. You're welcome. Okay, so has everybody looked at the agenda? If so, can we get a motion to approve? Motion.

Second. Okay, we'll vote. Richard? Uh, yes. Jeff?

Yes. Joyce? Yes. And this time, yes. And we'll try Shannon one more time, see if he can respond with yes.

There he is. Okay. All right, thank you, Shannon. Okay, so the agenda is approved, and next we'll approve the minutes from the last meeting if nobody has any Comments or changes? If you do, go ahead and speak up.

Otherwise, if we can get a motion to accept those.

I'll move to accept them. Second. Okay, uh, we'll vote on it. Shannon?

I'll go to Joyce. Yes,. Joyce is a yes. Jeff? Yes.

Richard? Yes. I'm a yes. Shannon, can you hear me? Yes.

OK, with that, is that yes to approve the minutes from last week? OK, thanks. Can you hear me OK, or am I not talking loud enough? I can hear you. I'm just driving to get home right now, so I might miss a few things, but I'm here.

OK, we'll just, we'll just keep yelling at you.

OK, so meetings from 8/27 are approved and we can move on to John's reports.

Good evening, everybody.

Superintendent report for, for this evening. We'll start off airfield status. We're looking pretty good. Nothing is different than what has been reported in the past. Taxiway edge lights are on.

The taxiway edge lights are off and will be off till late October. Runway light edge lights are on.

The pilot control lights are inoperative and will be inoperative until the end of next season at the end of the construction project.

Correct. PAPIs are good with the exception of the runway 16 and the reels are out of service until they've been— until they get replaced. All the runways and helipads operational. AFS is good, beacons running. The flight service station is experiencing personnel shortages and will continue to do so for the near future.

Right now for airfield operations, we're— it's hunting season and the end of the field season for the bush season. So we're— everybody's in a mad scramble right now. That's— we've seen a peak in the number of airport operations, doing some small tree removal, fence repair. We're cutting a firebreak in the field to the north of— or I'm sorry, to the approach end of 10 off of Rampal. Now that the brush in there is getting rather large, so we're cutting it down.

And the golf ball collection on the airport is constant and continuous.

So there was a golf course discussion on September 8th. That's the last council meeting before the last one. The city is going to continue to operate the golf course. Council's direction is still to pursue release of obligation, and for the short term, the city is going to be negotiating with the FAA over what the, what the lease rate for that, for the land should be. So you can see that, that developing over the next few months.

So it's budget season in the city right now. You'll see the beginnings of my budget here, or the airport budget here towards the back of that, and we'll get toward to that towards the end of the meeting for 2027.

We just will go through the new— there's a new capital improvement plan.

Which she is. The old one is on page 11 and the new capital improvement plan is page 12. You'll notice they are remarkably similar.

The capital improvement plan right now is more or less on hold. It's the airport master plan is going to be what's driving, going to drive our new capital improvement plan. So once the— once that's finished, basically it gives us a roadmap on where we go with the airport and then a new capital improvement roadmap to get us there.

The master plan. Let's go back a page here. I'm sorry, master plan. So the master plan is underway right now. They're doing a survey.

Its topographical survey has just started yesterday, should go for about a month. You'll see a white van with blinking lights driving all over the airfield.

Basically, it's the physical layout. We're looking for utilities. The dimensions of the airfield is basically everything. It's an inventory of physically what's on the airfield and exactly where it's at.

The, the aerial survey has been completed. There's a LIDAR survey as well as a visual aerial photography of the airfield, which will be included in the plan. And then they're looking at the airfield as a whole. So it's— I drove around with them with this group of 4 or 5 planners that for a couple of days, pointing things out and looking at different parts of the airfield. They'll be taking pictures and making recommendations on, on where we go from here.

Kind of, again, as a reminder, this is the, this is the conditions and needs phase of the master plan. So we're looking at the current condition of the Palmer Airport and what the airport needs.

And that will be continued in Phase 2 at some point next year, where that's actually where we take the conditions and needs that we, that we develop here, and we actually have a roadmap to meet some of the needs. And to move forward as an airport.

They'll be conducting interviews of folks. I would say that probably most everybody up here would be, should be interviewed by this panel as to where you think the airport should go and what your needs and what you see the airport as.

We're also gonna be, they're going to be recommending a stakeholders group And that's the folks that are surrounding the airport that are affected by the airport and can help advise forward to what the future should be. So that, that you'll see the formation of that.

I haven't seen a timeline yet, but, you know, it's— there's a, there's a lot of information that needs to be gathered before we start kicking this off. So I wouldn't be surprised if this— if the stakeholders group and the public meetings don't start till after the New Year. I'd get the, uh, the November-December time frames are very difficult to get people together.

A construction update. So let's, uh, refer to the map on page 9 of the packet.

Taxiway Alpha is close to 90% complete with the lighting.

So if you've taxied down Taxiway Alpha, you'll notice between Taxiway Echo and Taxiway Foxtrot, which is not, not labeled on this page, but it's about the middle, about the middle half, 50% of this runway or of the taxiway, has lights actually on it right now. Taxiway Alpha just south of Foxtrot and Taxiway Golf at the, at the far south end are blocked off. Anticipate that work finishing on the 2nd of October. And then with, with good weather, we're hoping to get up to Taxiway Charlie at the very far north end and finish it off as well.

So what this will do is the entirety of Taxiway Alpha would be complete by the end of this year, and that's Taxiway Charlie is weather permitting. So we'll we'll get to it or we won't. But before, before the contractor leaves, you can expect to see new LED lights from Taxiway Charlie all the way down to Golf. So next year's plan is going to be the main runways. There's not as much dirt work on the main runways, so they should go a bit quicker.

The crosswind runway, right now we're talking about 24-hour closure when we're, when we're working on it. And then 1634 will be overnight closure. When we work on it.

All the reels are going to be replaced. The pappies are going to be replaced. The airport beacon is going to be replaced. And just outside the flight service station on your way in, you notice a small building, and that small building is— that's the electrical equipment box that is going to be replaced as well. We're going to be adding One of the main improvements on the maintenance, maintenance side is we're going to be splitting the taxiway lights up into two circuits.

In the past, we've had problems when the taxiway lights go down. You have 4 miles of wiring to troubleshoot, so we're splitting that into two 2-mile problems, make it a little bit easier on ourselves.

I also expect with the pilot control lighting to come back as well with, with the LEDs. And I'll get to this here in a minute in the budget, but I expect our electrical bill to drop fairly dramatically.

So once— and again, before now and we turn everything back on, there is still between taxiways Charlie, Delta, and Echo, that northern part of the runway, we still don't have lighting fixtures in there. The cans are capped off. So we're going to be installing the lighting fixtures themselves. The wire's already been run, the cans are in. It's just a matter of throwing in transformers in the cans and bolting on the, the lights themselves.

It should go fairly quick. So you can expect some intermittent closures on the north half of the airfield for about the next month.

One of the requirements of this project is that they close no more than one perpendicular taxiway at a time. I have allowed them to do two taxiways in a couple of special instances just because, for example, Taxiway November closing it off with Foxtrot doesn't affect our operations. So and they were quick to get through that area as well.

So I expect just another couple of weeks of back taxiing and then some kind of wandering around the airport a little bit, doing random punch list stuff here and there. So just keep an eye on the NOTAMs.

And you can also expect at the next, the next meeting, I'll have a schedule for our 2027 meetings. So if you have any input on the 2027 meetings on times or dates or, or days of the month, please please let me know between now and the next meeting.

Are you planning to stay on Thursdays? If that's—. Was planning to stay on Thursdays, if that continues to work for the group.

It's a— but it's your meeting, so you tell me when— what works best for you.

And that's all I have. Are there any questions? Does anybody else want to move the meeting to 6 PM?

I would like to propose we move our meetings to 6 PM.

If we move those meetings to 6 PM, when I'm on the slope, I will not be able to attend.

Okay, we're just— I guess we'll talk about it a little bit and, and, uh, just everybody let John know your, your preference before next meeting.

Yeah, just to let you know, when I'm on the slope, I don't get out of work on Thursday night till after— till 7 o'clock. I can be in there at 7, otherwise Otherwise, um, I cannot make it when I'm on the slope.

Okay. Yeah. Is there another day of the week, or you, uh, is that for 2 weeks on, 2 weeks off for you? That's 2 weeks on, 2 weeks off. I'm till 7 o'clock every night.

Why do you want to change them to 6? So that we finish earlier. That's the only reason. I think once since I've been on this thing, he's been here later than 9 o'clock ever. 8 O'clock rarely, 7:30 maybe.

I like 6 o'clock because when I'm in Arizona, that's 8 o'clock for me. So it's like 7, that's 9 o'clock for me. Okay. I have to excuse me. And that 8 o'clock is just 8 o'clock is Jeff's bedtime, so.

I don't know that I have a total preference. I just stick around before I go home. So it's just sitting around for another extra hour and then coming to the meeting. So, but at the end of the day, it's not a big deal for me. If we got rid of daylight savings time, it wouldn't make any difference for me.

Well, I don't know about— I don't know if you can complain about it being 8 o'clock when you're in Arizona and we're up here freezing. I don't think so.

And if the meetings change to 6, I'm fine with that. You know, I'm not saying don't do it. I just let you know that I just will be opting out on those nights when I'm on the slope.

Maybe we could do half of them at 6 and half of them at 7. Oh, that'd be really good. Uh-huh. When you can't remember to be here at 7. Thank you.

Yeah, watch how many of us will be late then. Well, Shannon, just for planning purposes, is, is, do you have a schedule that you could send to John that shows how your schedule works?

I can, and it is up to change at any time, just to let you know that too. And things just change in my life a lot of times where I come home or I have to go up, but I do have a set schedule I'm supposed to be on.

Okay, yeah, just, I think send it to him anyway, but I'm kind of starting to get the sense that this might be more complicated and bigger hassle than just leaving it as it is.

I agree. Okay.

Um, but I agree with that. Yeah. Um, but everybody should still give their input to John, and he can bring a tentative schedule for next year to the meeting next, next meeting.

Um, did anybody else have any other questions on John's reports or comments?

Okay, if not, we'll go ahead and go into audience participation. There's a pretty small group here, so I won't read the long spiel because I don't have it anyway, but if you can state your name and then we will ask that you stick to 3 minutes apiece.

Testing, 1, 2, 3. Okay, yeah, my name's Joel Stefanski, and I've been probably coming to the Airport Advisory Commission meeting more than most of the commissioners have been present. So just want to let you know that since last July.

You know, obviously my— I don't want to be here. I've been here because of unnecessary airport creep onto the golf course. And, you know, over the past months when I've been here, spoke, you know, a lot of passion, a lot of emotion. And I've also been a business owner here for 43 years, and I've watched the airport grow, not necessarily the way it should grow, but it has grown. We got 19 businesses that contribute to this community on this airport, and they deserve to be here, just like the golf course deserves to be here.

And I'm trying to find solutions on how do we make this airport more efficient. And, you know, I've had the opportunity to do a lot of research. I am on how this golf course, how this airport has grown, and because a lot of times it's, uh, there hasn't been much planning. People got the cherry pick where they wanted to be. Not common sense, but because they got the best ground or the wind didn't blow as much there, or they didn't want to be next to one of their competitors or something like this.

You know, it's a big family, 19 people, 19 businesses, not everyone gets along.

But my two cents is, you know, number one, Division of Forestry takes up a huge square footage and they're only a part-time aeronautical use, 5 months a year, and they take up a lot of space. And I'd like to see some of that space get used in the off-season, 'cause they're only operating 5 months a year, folks.

That's on the north end. The south end, 'cause you got, you guys know the history of New Horizons. They're supposed to be out of there on the 30th. That's another huge chunk of land that I think these lease and contracts need to be renegotiated. Division of Forestry got a 99-year lease, should have never happened.

FAA doesn't approve that kind of nonsense, but it happened here. I think these leases need to be renegotiated to, uh, to free up another 15 to 20 acres of potential business space. Besides, you already have 13 to 15 acres that is going to just kind of have very wealthy people are going to be able to develop those as it is. And you got those two planes that have been there. Forever, to have more revenue-generating space too.

And so I, I really think you guys have the opportunity to, uh, utilize the space that's available and try to keep aeronautical industry on the airport. Thank you very much for your time. Thanks, Joel. Is there anybody else?

Okay, if that— we can move on to unfinished business.

Uh, first topic was the airport SOP. Um, We've, we've talked about this a few meetings. I think at this point, if anybody has any recommendations, we talked last meeting that this is something we can release and edit if we need to in the future as we, as we start implementing it and referencing it and comparing it to how the operations are. And so it's not, you know, set in stone. I read through it almost every word as it sits in our packet tonight, and I'm, I'm thinking I'm, I'm ready to say let's, let's say it's ready to release and go to the next steps on, on getting it out to the, the airport community.

But you guys can chime in and give your thoughts as well.

I would say let's go ahead and release it and I'm sure we'll get some feedback because, I mean, we can work on. It, you know, forever and then we're at least— there's still going to probably be some folks going to have some thoughts or ideas we didn't think of. So I think the sooner we get out there, the sooner we'll get information feedback and can adjust if necessary as appropriate.

I agree.

Okay, so John, as, uh, our airport superintendent, like, what are the steps to— what comes to mind as far as releasing an SOP to our airport?

I plan on— I'm going to put a letter in front of it and publish it. It should go fairly quick. Okay. And make sure it gets disseminated to everybody on the airport.

And I'm not putting you under the gun. No, I know, I know. And I need to— I just— what we need to do, and now what it's my task to do, is to figure out how to reach the most people with it. Yeah, that's kind of—. Put it on, get it on the website, maybe a QR code that goes to it and just make sure that we can get it to everybody.

Okay. Yeah, that's kind of what I meant. You know, we like think about the businesses, people who are leasing spots. Are we thinking like everybody? Everybody.

Everybody. Everybody. Yeah, because it's got, you know, it's got driving, it's got tie-downs, it's got, you know, winter considerations.

OK, yeah, that's all I was really wondering is if there's anything we need to further contribute or if we go for it. Yeah, feel free. I'll get a final version to you. Feel free to disseminate it. So when you have that ready to publish, then when you go to the next city council meeting, you can report that we have put that out.

Absolutely. They don't have anything. Nothing to do with it, but you can just inform them. Correct. Information.

Correct. Thank you. That would be part of the packet.

Yeah, laminated QR code to put by the gas pump would be good.

Okay, excellent then.

All right, then next is our airport master plan.

Is there anything to start off with from you, John, or just ready to open it? So again, the master plan— talked about it in my report earlier. We have kicked off and we are actively moving forward and going to be starting the public engagement here shortly. But, you know, again, before that happens, the The consultant needs to have their information together on what the airport looks like. You know, a lot of the survey's got to be done so that we can tell exactly what it's going to take to move forward.

So, you know, this group right here is going to have a— is going to play a major role in the ideas moving forward. So it's— there's a couple of ways you can approach it. One of the ways, like we talked about last time, is you can, you can do it individually, individually. You can have input. You can, as a group, you can, you can put a resolution together and say these are the topics that we want to explore.

And even further, this is how we think it should happen. This is what we think, you know, this is what we think this airport needs. And this is maybe where we think it needs it. Yeah, you can do that. Right now.

And if, you know, there's pluses and minuses to doing it now, because, you know, one of the benefits of doing it now is you're putting it in their minds that, you know, in shaping how this plan moves forward. The other part of that is you can wait, and then maybe your statement after, you know, after the public engagement starts, you put a resolution together.

You can put your weight behind something that's being proposed, or you can do both.

So that's— it's up to you how you want to move forward, what topics you want to discuss. You'll get in the packet. I've given you a few examples that I've seen around the airport, but I know you are around the airport as much or more than I am. So And I, and I would, would value your opinion and love to hear, you know, what the group had, what the group wants to do.

OK, so, so we haven't just started talking about this, and I know you asked us to give our thoughts to you as the airport and opinion.

And so I've put together like a, I think the best way I can share my thoughts are if you look at the same map on page 9, I wanted to start a little bit basic and I just worked my way from the aerial view from north to south. And I started with our aprons.

And I think there's nothing that I'll say that hasn't been thought of or addressed, or some of it is we've even already talked about, and I think we didn't drop, but it might be time to like make, make an actual step. But so I covered the aprons. Aprons. And apron— I'll work my way from north to south just because that's the order here. But so Apron D, we have had discussions on converting some of the aprons to lease lots and then allowing those lease lots to be developed with hangars or— well, hangars.

And so Apron D I think is our most likely apron to, to, I think, have a more stronger conversation on moving forward with converting to a lease lot. We do have expenses coming for reconstruction of those aprons. That's a lot of money, and, and like many people have stated that they're not really generating any money, so That would save on that reconstruction as well. And so that's my thought on Apron D, is just move forward with converting it to a lease lot and getting approval for that. Apron C was the next one that kind of came up as a conversion to a lease lot.

You know, and a lot of my thoughts are driven a little bit by the development of the airport and growth. So we're obviously all probably interested in finding places that we can grow on the airport that doesn't affect the golf course. Apron C, I think we put on the back burner for conversion to a lease lot and see how D goes.

And then if it goes well and there is the ability to convert that to lease lot for more development, then we can look at that. But I think right now it's— it's D is the focus. I think C is too big for a single lease lot, and it would need to be reduced in size or, or, or multiple lease lots. There's a lot to think about with that one too, because there's taxiway all the way around that. And so how would, how would the aircraft movement happen?

Aprons A and B, I just think we leave those as is. I think we need some you know, tie-downs. We also have the new tie-down ramp, Juliette. Is it Juliette?

Echo. Echo. Echo. Apron Echo.

And. Where is. That? So that's— those are my thoughts on the aprons. I I think stop and give anybody else a chance to have input on this before I move on to some other thoughts.

This is kind of for John. Do you have a way that we can look at the different options of breaking up Apron C into multiple lease lots?

Other than thinking about it, I haven't gone to a visual yet. One thing to keep in mind on Apron C, there's a couple of things. So on the west end, that would be— right now there's a taxi lane that parallels Airport Road along the fence line. That can go away. There, that's not— not the— the lease lot can go to the fence line.

One thing I would be One thing to think about is if we do split it into multiple lots is utilities. So if you're getting— you've got to get power, water, phone, sewer, and all the different utilities to multiple lease lots. There's going to need to be an easement that separates the two. It might run east to west and split them and provide for an access road.

Which takes away usable space. So it can be developed as a single apron or as multiple aprons. That's, um, I think I'm going to put that on the planners for this master plan. Just to see what, what the possibilities are. You know, these folks are airport design folks.

It's what they do.

One question I think I'd put to the consultants, because You know, I would, I would ask, okay, if, if, if these, if one of these, if you have one or both these aprons was turned into T-hangers, high-density T-hangers, how many of the, you know, on average, this be a consultant question, how many of the, of the people are using the ramp then switch over to using a hanger?

And the one advantage about having a large lot like that is you can you could put in— I think when I measured, you could put in like 40 T-hangers.

And, uh, but if you split it in pieces, it's going to make that more difficult. And so I think it might be a question for the consultant. There's one thing is, if we eliminate the aprons for parking and turn them into lease lots, we're starting to kind of eliminate the small GA on this side where the having 40 T-hangers, you know, that's going to increase the value of the ground considerably. And I'd be curious to see what the consultants have to say, saying, okay, if you build T-hangers, I mean, half or three-quarters or whatever, the people sitting outside are now going to want a hangar. That'd be a good consultant question.

Yeah, I agree. That's why we were thinking Apron D to start with, because you're not displacing anyone except for the three—. Yeah, you can use that as a test. Yeah, exactly. Because ideally, what you would be— what I would envision and what I hope to see happen is, okay, you put in some T-hangers.

Well, now a lot of people— I think we can attract more people to come to Palmer just because now there's a— the wind is not an issue.

Yeah, that's it. There is not a— there's not a large supply of T-hangers anywhere in South Central. No, because that's really the only downside to Palmer is the wind. I mean, the facilities are better. The town— we got the town, we got facilities.

It's closer to Anchorage. I mean, there's the only real negative is, is the wind.

Any other comments? And I'm just doing kind of a brain dump here, so to get like conversation going and stuff. But the apron stuff we already talked about a little bit, and we— I don't want to say it dropped, but I think we could, we could really say we're ready to see what will happen with Apron D. OK, so then I kept moving around the airport. There really wasn't much, and we will come to Lots 31, 32, and 33. And for—.

These are the lots off Taxiway November. Yeah,. Yeah, these 3 lots here. Up here? Yeah, right, right by, right along The western side of Taxiway November.

Yeah, there's actually— yeah, there's actually 3 lots. There's actually, I think, 4. 33 Kind of comprises of a couple, but it's broken up a little weird over there. So this has been the area that everybody knows as the undevelopable.

Area due to the ground.

Richard's got the most experience, I think, building here because that's his hangar on 34, maybe that lot. 33B. Okay, 33B. Oh, here. This is the Palmer tree.

That's what I thought. Yeah. And so my thoughts on this We're trying to come up with a compromise on, you know, space for development, space for growth, and saving the golf course.

We're working on a master plan.

You wanna go. Ahead? Can I say something? Yep, let's go ahead. So these lots, these 3 lots you're talking about off of Cope Industrial.

I've talked to, I'd say, probably close to 3, maybe 4 dozen folks who've come in and looking for— looking from anywhere from a small hangar just to barely fit a Super Cub to, let's say, something larger than that.

Taxiway November is not a GA Or I'm sorry, these lots off of Taxiway November are not GA lots. These are not— I mean, there's folks that could come in and maybe divide it into multiple lots, but this is an engineering problem and, as we know, a soils problem. But these are— this is not for a small developer. This is not for somebody looking to house 1 or 2 Super Cubs. The lots are deep, the lots are difficult to develop.

It is there. It is long access from the road to a hangar and long access from the hangar to the taxiway. It's a— this is not— it's not for a single small hangar. So it's more— it's more of an industrial commercial development kind of land. That would be just— and that's from talking to folks over the last 3 years.

That's kind of how I look at that land, because the individual, the individual Hangar Over owner has no interest in, in doing anything with that monstrosity.

So I think where, where my mind goes with this is that in the master plan, can't we, can't we ask for our survey company and, and, um, for a, a plan to, like, just develop the ground part of it so that it's a more manageable surface to develop with FAA funds. And then I'm going to throw it out there that the FAA Um, the compliance with the grant, you know, we've all read it, we've all heard it many times, is that some of the revenue from the golf course is supposed to be reinvested into the airport. And this would be a pretty nice compromise to say we use some of that revenue to invest in improving this land so it can be built on by not a huge, you know, I don't think someone's going to come in and develop these whole lots. They're just— no one's going to see the value in it. It's going to be way too expensive.

So, so in order to do it and use it for development, which it's been on the plan for years, but Isn't there some option to start discussing that through— you know, let's talk about what's still there. They got a massive ramp going in, and Wasilla is not paying for that. So how do they get this big project to expand that ramp on the south side for development and divide it into usable lots? So that's my thoughts. One thing I could see that would make the utilities easier because you wouldn't need water and sewer is use that area for a T-hanger development.

For what? T-hangers. Because then everything is basically— all you need is basically electric. I mean, if you want to have some with gas, I mean, there's no water and sewer.

Whatever, and soil requirements are a lot less for a T-hanger than for a big structure. That may be, and that, and that because T-hangers need a lot of real estate because you want, if you want to put in a very big development.

John, is there anything that's, that you're with your comments that are reserving these? For like corporate development, or is there option to, you know, for anybody to do it?

I would say there is an option for anybody to do it. One thing to keep in mind is that Taxiway November has the same pavement strength as the main runway, so you can taxi rather large aircraft down there. And the taxiway is capable, dimensionally capable, of holding something along the size of a 737, so, you know, C-130, that size of aircraft.

John, have you got any inquiries from, you know, C-130 type operators, you know, or they would be bringing— putting it— it'd be a maintenance facility, is what it'd be. I mean, have you got any inquiries or do you have any idea whether that's something— is that pie in the sky or is that— or do you think there's a market for that?

I don't know. I think that's something that I'm going to put on this plan and to go talk to folks in, you know, at Anchorage International and Merrill Field and see if they're interested in downsizing there and building a maintenance facility here. One of the big— one of the big— One of the things we have going for us is, you know, with all those folks at Anchorage International and Merrill Field is that their workforce lives in the valley. Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of it. That's where Palmer has a lot of advantages.

I mean, not just for the, for the, for the tenants, but I mean, also for the residents, because nice thing is you have maintenance facilities working on large aircraft. I mean, they come in, they go in the hangar, they get worked on for a long period of time, they leave. They don't sit and fly overhead, do a touch and go. Goes,. Right?

And you have a workforce that lives here, shops here, whatever. So it's, it's win-win. And in town where you're starting, Anchorage, where now the dirt is more expensive, is more valuable than the airplane sitting on it, uh, Palmer becomes, you know, well, the same thing that Haglund was doing before they went out of business. It's kind of that idea. And that's— yeah.

And there's, there's 3 lots there. And it's not just one lot with one option. You know, there could be one nice T-hanger development and still the ability to, you know, market to those folks that you're talking about as well.

The closer to town, the better for the large home because it's, it's closer for people to go to lunch and things like that. You know, teen development could be further away because they're not going there 8 to 5 every single day, typically. And if you start to look around, you know, taking a step back and looking at the other airports in the area, you know, Wasilla being one of them, they're, they're expanding. They want their runway to go to somewhere north of 5,000 feet. If you look at the geography around Wasilla, they have incredible IFR capability.

You can put ILS, you can go below ILS capability there. You can. And so what that does for them is become attractive for a passenger and cargo moving airport. So that's going to be your, you know, the quote unquote, the flagship. And there's going to be a need for those folks to have maintenance facilities and have other places where they can store their aircraft for the winter.

You know, it's not— they can't just base in Wasilla. So it's the valley, the aviation in the valley. Is going to grow here in the next 5 to 10 years. It's going to be fairly substantial. And plus now you have all the electric aircraft.

I was looking at our statistics. We've had our first 3 electric aircraft come into Palmer. I don't know who they were or when they came, but it was— it's interesting.

Well, I think that my comment on those lots is the reason you won't get anybody on them is the cost to develop them. It's going to cost more to develop them than it is to build on them. And so I think what Steve was getting at was we should take some of the lease money, especially from the golf course, if the FAA says, hey, you got to raise the rent, which it looks like that's the way it's going, or if they get bought out, you know, if they sell, then we get that money. For the airport. So we should use that money to get those lots developable, bring the fill in, compact it, get it ready to go, and then I think you would see people coming to build on those.

Okay, any other comments on those lots?

Airport? No, I'm just thinking about it every time, every time the wind blows, because they just knocked out a whole bunch of trees, which I think is going to affect maybe not the airport, but maybe the airport, because the winds are now coming more from the west. Than they ever did before that I've noticed at my place. And though that I think is going to affect something, so then you look across the runways there to the lots you're speaking of, which are trees, and that's going to maybe not affect it. Just, I mean, it's all changes every year, except it doesn't.

I've been in my place 54 years, and the only thing that's increased the speed of the wind. So last year we had 3 weeks in a row of 100-mile-an-hour wind, and it all hit me. So those are the kind of things I think about. And, and because it has to affect, uh, stationary— I mean, planes tied, or just whatever you're doing for your business, or whatever, you know, when you clear everything off. And of course, you can't have an airplane airport without clearing a whole lot off.

So those are my concerns at this point. But it's, you know, I think if that land is going to sit there empty, I like the idea of the T-Hangers. If you can work it out with your financing, you're correct. Somebody's got to come up with the money to develop.

What about the New Horizon end there? Is that— you mentioned it, they're moving everything out evidently. And so is that owned or will remain leased or whatever it is by New Horizon even though they're not going to be here? Or what's going on there?

I don't know the answer to that question. It's— that's going to be determined by New Horizons when the lease comes. No,. When the lease comes up.

The— on the lots real quick, in the trees, and we— there's a path there. So when I was looking at it, I was, I was like, someone's not gonna like the path. We kind of assume there might have been a large setback there, and My thought in possibly laying out those lots would be that the trees aren't part of the lot. And that the lot only extends so far, and that the setback remains, or even that part of it, it remains to separate that path. And but John looks like he wants to say something.

My recommendation would be to look at the— um, on matsue.gov, look at the parcel viewer and look at where that path is in relation to the lease lots. You'll notice that, that path goes on to the lease lots, so that's something that's going to need to be resolved.

Yeah, I kind of figured it would be a point of contention.

So any other comments before I move to my— keep going?

Joyce, my next thought was as I moved down was the South Ramp, and it does seem like a mystery ramp. It doesn't seem like anybody knows what's going on there, what's happening there, what's the leases, what the requirements are, what the non-compliance was last time. There just seems to be like this mystery, you know, land down there. So not that I know anything about it. I was just going to ask John if he could— what he could find out about it.

What is the lease requirement? What was— I thought there was non-compliance in the past and it's pretty— are they converting to aeronautical? Are they not? What did the FAA say? Not asking for answers right now, but is that something you can try to find out and come back to us with?

I can answer you now.

Okay, so back in 2008, again, we had our compliance inspection, uh, came to light in 2010. One of the findings was that we were leasing— there were multiple properties that were non-aeronautical in nature, uh, two of them being the, the nutrition center and the fields across the street from the fire training center and Cope Industrial Way. The other one was New Horizons, which was primarily non-aeronautical. So what the FAA, New Horizons, and the city came up with was a, was a lease amendment until it was either 2030 or 2031 for them to convert to completely aeronautical in use. So The deadline is, is that 2030, 2031 timeframe.

Okay. So if he— if they convert to complete aeronautical, then their leases are extended or they—. Then they have the option of extending their lease. Okay. The— do they— Um, have that whole section be, you know, past Everts?

That's correct. The other side of Everts, there's 3 lease lots. There's the lot that's, um, it's up against, so you can see where the public access is. There's the railroad that parallels that road onto the south ramp. To the south of that, to the left of it as we're looking at it on the paper, there's 2 lease lots.

One of them is vacant and the other one has a building on it. And then there's the larger lease lot to the right of that access, which contains most of the buildings on there of the New Horizons itself.

Okay. So it is— it's, it's a sort of a wait and see. Scenario, but sort of at an unfair level. It seems to me that— do we wait till 2031 to find out?

Yay or nay, or—. Yes, we do. Partially. That was the agreement, is the deadline. And the deadline— the document, the lease amendment is a recorded document on the— on the with the state of Alaska.

So you can see that lease amendment as it's listed going to the, the state recorder's office. I believe you can access that through the matsu.gov. And there's, um, if you go through the, the parcel viewer and then the property viewer, it shows the different recorded documents associated with a lot. And that should be the, the top one, if I'm not mistaken.

OK. All right, well, anyway, that was my thought on South. I didn't really know anything about it. Just asking for more information for us all.

I did a— I did the best I could to determine what's been built on the airport for quite a while. I might have missed one, but I counted about 7 hangars built in the last 6-ish years.

Um, I think building will become a little more difficult with some of the policies required this year to follow. So if we're looking at a hangar a year being built and, and growth, then, you know, apron D. I don't know about Apron C quite yet, or these lease lots. You know, we're talking, that's a lot of space to put a lot of hangars on. It can really stretch out the area to develop and the years to, you know, for options for people.

My proposal right now would be that those, those turn over to T-Hangers. And the reason why that, that I say that is they are— I'm sorry, that Apron Charlie and Apron Delta go to the airport requires T-Hangers just because What we're doing is we're taking what is currently open space and currently what you would call dense aircraft storage. And as the, as the airport manager, I would not want to displace, you know, you count the number of aircraft on Apron Charlie and it's going to be, you know, 25, 30 aircraft. I would hate to displace 30 aircraft aircraft and replace that with storage for 4 aircraft or 6 aircraft. I think that the best way— that our best way forward is to almost a like for like.

We try to— we try to— those displaced, we try to take in that same number so we're not pushing out more aircraft out into the— into the woods, I guess.

Yeah, me too. I don't, I don't think I was thinking those are big hangars. I just was sort of trying to get a gauge on how fast the airport seems to be growing with, with people interested enough to come and actually build hangars. And, and they have been, you know, bigger hangars, really. But But no, I kind of imagined like the cruise condo things just lined up right there or this way.

You know, D will be a little more challenging than C, but, but that's my thought. Jeff looks like he wants to talk.

I think you start with D, I'll give you a good indication because you can see how many airplanes off A, B, and C migrate to the T-hangers. And that'll give you an indication of saying, okay, if we take and cover the airport in, in T-hangers, I mean, if, if the people who are parked outside want to go in the T-hangers, that's great. If only half of them do, then, you know, you're still going to have to have a pretty good size ramp space open for people who want tie-downs. But like I say, if you, if you put in 20 T-hangers over there and 20 people on the airport move over there, then that's a pretty good indication that you could develop more T-hangers and more people would move into them. You could displace the high-density tie-downs parking with high-density T-hangers without adversely affecting the general— the population as a whole.

And so you also have to look at, you know, not just the, you know, necessarily the Palmer Airport airport, but look around South Central, you'll look how many hangars there, there are not. And if we build T-hangers, you're going to get folks from Merrill, you're going to get folks from all over the place coming here. Yeah, you may find that, okay, you build 20 hangars on Apron D, and if 18 of them come from someplace else, then that's pretty indication you're still going to have to have quite a bit of open space for the existing aircraft. But if of Apron C empties out and goes over into T-hangers, well, then you can go ahead and build more T-hangers without displacing anybody.

But, but the proof will be once it's built, see who shows up to get their checkbook out. That's a big gamble, though. So a lot of T-hanger guys don't want to pay rent, so it's hard to get them to— I think you couldn't build them and rent them for less than $1,200 a month. Yeah, the only Thing I know is like those brown hangars we built 30-some years ago have— I mean, there's always people wanting them and there's never been a vacancy for more than about 10 seconds. What's your rent for like a month?

We're not rented, they're. Owned. Owned. Yeah. All the T-hangers on the airport are owned.

There's no rental. There's no rental space at all. Yeah. And there needs to be. There needs to be, because for somebody that doesn't know whether they're going to be here for 2 years or 20 years, may not want to invest in buying a piece of property, but be more than willing to rent it.

Same reason you have rental houses. We need something between making a 20-year commitment and signing a lease or tying your plane out in the wind. Right now, there's nothing in the middle. I think if we build— I think you'll find that a lot of people will move here like you're saying, from, from there, because, because there's a lack of hangars across all of South Central.

What spaces are now, I mean, community hangars are like $800 a month, you know, that's, that's community.

That's what. They're paying right now. Where? Or Wasilla. Oh, okay.

Well, yeah, yeah, Anchorage maybe is high everywhere. I'll say, you just can't build a hangar cheap enough. You know, Steve knows.

There are quite a few. I usually run into every customer or every new person on the, on the ramp at the field. They'll eventually want something throughout the summer. And there are a fair amount of nice aircraft that will spend the summer here. But inevitably, come about October, November, they're gone.

They will not leave their airplane here. And I don't know where they go. It might go to Willow or somewhere and find a hangar for rent. But they do like having Palmer as their summer airport. They probably would stay even if they just had a cold, like, port to put their airplane in to protect it from the wind and then just not get rained and snowed on.

It's nice to be able to go on vacation or go someplace else and not worry about your plane getting blown away.

Another thing too, that is, if you had more based aircraft or these, you know, nice based aircraft here, that's work for avionics, maintenance people, snowplowing, fuel, fuel restaurants.

You know, that's all good for the community.

One of the other things that, that we haven't addressed is individual hangars, like a small private hangar. One guy could build a hangar for his aircraft.

There's no space for that on the aprons and there's no space for that off of Taxiway November.

And there is a demand for that here in South Central.

Yeah, that requires more real estate. The nice thing with, with, with T-hangers is, is they don't require that. I mean, you can get so many more aircraft in a smaller footprint. You know, that's kind of the idea. And that's the biggest piece I see missing that I see at other airports around the country.

You go to— you can go other places and you can rent a hangar for a month or a year or 5 years or whatever without having to go through a 2-year construction process.

You know, if the guy has a million-dollar airplane, okay, building a million-dollar hangar might make some sense. When the guy's got a $50,000 airplane, $100,000 airplane, building a million-dollar hangar doesn't make too much sense. You've got to be, you know, definitely an aviation enthusiast to go down that road.

I had thought about the same thing, and my thought on it was like, if Apron C became hangars, then if we have a very short setback up against the West Airport Road, that first row could be nestled almost right up against the apron there and be, you know, 5 box hangars and then a taxiway and then nested hangars, nested hangars, nested hangars. And then there's, you know, 5 hangars. If we needed more, the last row on Apron C could also be box hangers facing west, since facing a door east around here is not like— it's not a good idea anyway.

The new hangers that were built, the blue ones that are— there's 4 there. I don't I don't know how those have sold. I know one sold. They're all for sold.

So, you know, how many in it would we need— would we need to put in there? Apron D also has some constraints as well because it's narrow and we gotta leave a taxiway down there. So I don't know that T-hangers would— nested T-hangers would fit in there. How this would work, kind of practically speaking, is that we go through all our processes and finally decide, okay, Apron D is a lease lot. What happens next is the city puts it out for bid and takes proposals.

And then during a period, however long that period of time is, you take in proposals. And then it closes, and then the city evaluates. Maybe, maybe this group evaluates, maybe the city evaluates. There's a, there's a group of folks that evaluate the different proposals, and we go forward from there. It's not— we're not going to get down to the point of where we decide in here what, you know, the configuration of any of these lots is.

It's basically going to be kind of a general, okay, we're converting Apron D to a leased lot. We want to see at least 10 aircraft per square foot in your, in your proposal kind of thing or something like that, you know, and then, and then leave it up to, leave it up to a creative developer to come up with a really cool solution that, that we're not going to be able to come up with ourselves. I ran the numbers on these a while ago. I don't remember off the top of my head, but as I recall, like D, you could you could put about 20 and C, you could put 40, you know, because there's, there's various vendors make different size, you know, nested T's and you can vary the size of them based on which happens. I recall it's like 20 on one and 40 on the other.

So it would fit.

You can see the nested T's over there next to the flight service station and crew hangar. And you can kind of compare scale, scale to scale. You could get quite a few rows in there, and those are 10 or 12 apiece, I think.

Okay, any other comments on this?

I think personally, I think that's my thoughts and that's what I had wrote— written down and thought about for this meeting.

Um, Shannon,.

You still with us?

Yes, I haven't fallen asleep yet.

I'm just going to give you the chance to chime in if you have any thoughts on this.

No, I'm, I'm on board with what we're talking about. I think we should go with, uh, Apron D. I think we should do T-hangers. I think that's what we really need at this airport is T-hangers. So I don't really have anything to add. Everything was good.

Okay, cool.

I don't know if I really have anything else. I don't know if it's really the right time to bring it up, but during the public comment, forestry has been brought up a few times. I don't really have information right now, but I did go visit forestry. And asked for some information to share on what forestry does. I think we'll be surprised at what that operation is over there.

It's, it's in the few minutes I talked to them, they're going to put together something that they can share with me and I can provide in the future. They're a national emergency response, some sort of center. So they're not just forestry or airplanes. They're there for medical, floods, earthquakes, everything. And so it's, it's a, it's a much bigger thing than I think a lot of us have any idea.

But I just wanted to to mention that, that we will get some good information on what's going on over there.

And then I think that that's really it. I had— we're really still in the master plan topic, so I don't have anything else to add to master plan.

Okay, so we want to move on to— is there something you want from us on the budget proposal?

So this is the 2027 budget proposal, and this is the last the last 2, 3 pages of the packet.

So you can see these numbers in the— on page 41 are the revenues that I've entered in, kind of my conservative feeling of what 2027 is going to look like. And then the back page of the packet is what I feel expenses are going to look like. And keep in mind, you see the X's and some of the blanks there. The X's I do not control. I don't control the salaries, benefits, general admin expenses, and insurance, and all of those compose two-thirds of the budget.

Power, I'm hoping goes down next year for— with the new— with the lighting project, with the pilot control lights coming in and with the LEDs being installed. I'm hoping it goes down even further in 2028. I'd probably— I'm probably going to put in maybe half of what 2027 is in 2028.

But I do have the— I have the visibility on the, on the individual electrical meters, and it's going to be hopefully fairly easy to gauge as budget time comes next year. But it's right now, taxiway and runway lights will be on medium intensity 24/7 until we can get the pilot control fixed.

John, what's, what's all included in this airport sales tax? The only reason I ask is it's like doubled in 2 years.

That's, that's the sales tax that all the businesses pay on the airfield. Okay. And all the sales tax collected on the airfield stays on the airfield. For sales. Yeah.

That's the, that's a pretty big increase for sales tax in 2 years.

There was a one— oh, that was, that was still 3%. But that was— when did it go to 4%? But it still has gone up a lot. I assume that's what it was. And the reason for the jump from '26 to '27 is I looked at the 2024 and 2025 actual numbers and tried to budget a little bit closer to them.

The flowage numbers for the fuel seems a little low. Are we collecting— is everybody— is all the vendors bringing fuel in the airport? Because, I mean, that's about— that's about what I pay.

That's— there's two vendors. There's— there's Northern— Northern, and then there's Hitchinbrook. So it's collected by the supplier. It's collected by the supplier. I don't remit that.

It comes right on my invoice. That's why I was curious. We know that, that I'm not sure if Shoreside and Inlet— I know Crowley does because I mean, it's even on the propane. Crowley does and Shoreside does. And there's one more vendor.

Inlet and then there should be Fisher's usually. Fisher's, I haven't seen a Fisher's. Because, I mean, it just seems a little low because that's about the numbers here is about what I pay. Okay.

Unless they sell a lot less fuel than I thought.

I don't see a lot of guys at that pump down there, but I know they sell some. Yeah, because that's 300,000 gallons and that's about what I do.

So it's even on the propane now, which it should be.

Is there an interest in the, in the commission for, for changing the flowage rate? That's something we should ask the consultants, because I think it's honestly, I think it's probably too low. I mean, Merrill's, Merrill's a dime. I don't know what international is. The state airports are a nickel.

They used to be 2.5 cents and now they're 5 cents. I mean, $0.05 on fuel that's $6 is not much. What's Palmer? It's a nickel.

I mean, I think, I think Kenai is even more. I think Kenai is like $15 or something.

I mean, we want to be competitive, but there's no reason to be the cheapest cheapest in town because. I think there's a reason it's cheapest in town. You get a lot of people over here. I think. I'll fly 30 miles out of the way to save 4 cents.

Yeah, but you're a cheap bastard. Yeah, I. Wouldn't admit. That. Is, is avgas cheaper than diesel right now?

It's, you know, avgas is getting, avgas is getting closer because avgas prices have not changed while everything else has gone up. It's not that avgas has gotten cheaper It's just that comparatively, because that's what I mean, because we only get avgas 2 or 3 times a year. And so the avgas is very stable where the, the jet has been like my last barge went up $0.85 in the past month.

Hmm. On a barge load, that's a lot. Yeah. I mean, I, I would think at. Least $0.075 I guess it makes sense.

But again, I think we should look at— look around and see what it is because I mean, extra, you know, raising the flowage 50% is going to make a pretty good impact on our budget, but it's not going to make diddly squat to the price of fuel to the end consumer, really, 2.5 cents, especially the fuel they haul out when they're hauling it out with airplanes. It's thousands and thousands of dollars an hour.

And yeah, you want to be competitive, but I could say there's— there's— I think it'd be worth a look.

I'll put that on the radar for the consultants. Should be pretty easy just to do a survey and see what's going on other places. Yeah, no, I just do that. I'd probably do that myself. Look around South Central.

And maybe come back to you next time. I know Merrill's a nickel. I don't know what international. And I think I've heard Kenai is more than that.

I don't remember what fuel costs in Kenai. It was pretty cheap. I think I bought about— on the float pond, it was $8 a gallon, which was cheaper than here, than in town. So I was tanking every time I passed. Kenai swinging a tank up.

So yeah,. So. What the flowage fee is or where to get cheap gas from. Well, where is it $8 a gallon here? What?

You're $7.97. I. Mean, Kenai or Birchwood is $7.90 last I checked. I mean, so $8 isn't any cheaper. Yeah, isn't any cheaper.

Well, it's a little bit. I think we were over $8 here for a while and over and definitely in Wassilla, we were over $8. Yeah,. It's never been over $8 here. Really?

You haven't got over $8? No, it's really horrible down, like down Ketchikan, it's $12. And even Homer, I think Homer's almost $9.

Yeah, there you've got some transport issues. I'm not quite sure Ketchikan, they've got a captive audience. Right. Okay.

Budget, anything else? John's gonna check into that.

I'll get back to you with flowage fees around South Central.

Okay, did we have any new business? I don't, I don't know that we had anything new.

You guys have anything? No, not for me. Good. Is there anything else you want included on the agenda for next time?

I think we should just keep working on the master plan stuff so we can make a resolution at some point regarding how we want to see the airport designed, you know. So we'll keep working on that.

Does it make sense to have a specific Discussion on Apron D. It's converting that to a lease lot, something you have the power to do through this. Like, does it have to go through the FAA? It does go through the FAA because the FAA basically constructed it the way it is. So we have to ask permission. I have asked for permission, and even it sounds like Frank Kelly asked for permission and got it.

So it sounds like that's something that we can do.

It's— I was waiting for more of a— of kind of letting the consultants kind of hash it out a little bit and, you know, go through the airport budget, go through this master planning process, and then come to this group with their findings and see what this group has to say. What would happen to the large aircraft that are parked there? Is there Is there— they go down where that other DC-3 is,.

Or— I don't know the answer to that right now. That's— we have a large aircraft parking apron that was not designed to hold aircraft of that size, and maybe that's a spot for them. But, you know, you look at those two aircraft, Neither of those two aircraft has flown in many years. I think the last time that one flew, I was in it. I think it's only— I was a copilot.

Really? 20? Yeah, I was a teenager. But it's—. No, it's when we took it to the FedEx Air Show in Anchorage.

I mean, that's how long ago that was. But it's— I need to— you know, I see my job as the airport manager as maintaining this airport for flying aircraft. Aircraft. And it's difficult to be able to see the space taken up by aircraft that are not flying, that, you know, then that space could be used by an aircraft that is flying, that is airworthy. It's a hard conversation to have.

Is there space down where that, that other DC-3 is? Go to the approach end of 10? Yeah. No, there's no space right there. And even that, that DC-3 needs to be moved as well.

Once you got stored around there, right around that, there is that. That's the staging point for our, for our construction project. That's me. That's the airport.

Yeah, that's where maybe if you can get some cover from the consultants about development and make it a little conversation a little easier.

Yeah. How long is it going to take them to do their survey of the airport that they're doing? Okay, so the survey they're doing right now, I think we're expecting to take another month. Okay. So collecting the information and it sounds like— and I don't have any exact timelines, but it sounds like looking to start the meetings in the public engagement probably next year.

Right. Although, yeah, the first part of the year, it could be this year, it could be, could be next, but there's all the, the information collection that needs to be done first. I just didn't know how long it was going to take him, if it was a year or something. I, in this, for this whole Phase 1, I'm expecting to probably last into next summer and then starting Phase 2 immediately thereafter. This will be— I'll be applying for the Phase 2 grant next year.

And with the way the FAA is awarding, I'm hoping we can get awarded that in June and then be able to proceed with it in July-August timeframe. It started. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Okay, nothing else for new business.

All right, we can go to our commission comments.

Jeff, you want to start?

Oh, I think I probably said enough, but, uh, Just, I appreciate the coordination, trying to keep the construction crews briefed on what's going on. So minimize the hassle. It's certainly, it's better this year than it's ever been in the past. So, you know, there's no way to make it easy, but this year has certainly been far less disruptive than what I've seen in the past. So they're doing a good job.

I don't think I have any more comments. Thanks.

Joyce?

No, I don't think I have any either right now. Thoughts but not comments.

Okay, Shannon? Shannon dropped off. Oh, Shannon left. Why am I always the weenie one?

Yeah, yeah. And I think I've, I think I've said enough myself. I, um, I don't really need to reiterate everything. I just, I feel like, um, that, that we can come up with some compromises and, and find spaces to continue to grow and then and not feel like the airport is maxed out at the moment. And but that's my thought.

I think that's it. That's it for me. We'll go ahead and adjourn the meeting. 8:35.