For once, the Leflore County Board of Supervisors’ meeting was the place to be Monday night.
Architects, engineers, politicians, pilots, attorneys, hospital officials, utility experts and even Boy Scouts packed the room. Most were present for the contentious topic of Greenwood-Leflore Airport — although some admitted to the board they were just there to get merit badges.
The board ultimately voted to advertise for bids to build a new general aviation apron at the airport. That will require the county and city to tear down the existing apron — which some say suffers from fatal design flaws that have resulted in no one using it — at a cost of $150,000.
The airport will then use a $200,000 grant from the Delta Regional Authority to pay to build a new one. Pilots will be able to build hangars on the new concrete apron.
The City Council must now vote on the project at its meeting next week.
James Belk, vice chairman of the airport board, addressed concerns Monday that supervisors had voiced last week.
He said the general aviation area will be torn out and “brought back down to level where there will be no problems with an airplane going up or down the ramp.
“Right now that’s a scary situation,” he said. “And it’s sloped to the middle. If someone brought an airplane out of a hangar, it could run over you and run down the middle and hit anything. It’s not acceptable like it is.”
Belk said the new design is favorable to the Federal Aviation Administration, airport board and city. He said the airport has letters from pilots who want to build hangars.
Supervisor Phil Wolfe said there appears to be a lot of existing ramp space at the airport where hangars could be erected.
“It’s hard for me to explain to people. We spend $200,000 to pour this concrete. Now we’re going to spend $150,000, the city and the county, not counting the grant, to tear down that concrete that was never used,” he said.
But Belk said ramp space is available only on the east end where a hay field is. He said that area serves as agriculture access, which he said is worth more than two or three hangars. There’s not room for new hangars near the airport gate, he said.
He also said the airport board is hampered by the requirement that it must go before the City Council and Board of Supervisors for approval on even routine items.
Wolfe also asked Belk about the problem with “air hammers,” surges in water pressure that have destroyed plumbing systems at hangars and caused water leaks.
Belk said a low estimate to stop the problem is $77,000. He said it has been going on for 20 years but questioned whether it’s worth the money to fix it.
Wolfe said the airport has signed a contract agreeing to correct it, though. He said it doesn’t make sense to build hangars on the new apron if the plumbing is going to blow out.
Belk said the airport is ready to let bids on fixing the air hammer in two weeks and will ask city and county for permission to do it.
A variety of officials spoke about different aspects of the ramp project — Mayor Carolyn McAdams, Airport Board Member John Henson, City Councilman Johnny Jennings and City Attorney Don Brock.
Jennings was the most forthright, saying the City Council took bad advice from its then-attorney when it voted in 2006 to accept variances in the apron after receiving FAA warnings about the design.
“We shouldn’t have accepted it,” he said. “We as a body probably ought to go back to the council and whoever was sitting on this board, (and) we pay for tearing the dang thing up because we took bad advice.”
County Engineer Robert Willis, whose firm’s design of the apron caused a bitter feud between him and Airport Manager Bardin Redditt, said Jennings’ statements weren’t true but said he didn’t want to get into an argument about it.
After the city and county had requested the variance back in 2006, the FAA had granted it. Board President Robert Collins said the real problem was the county’s “own people” discouraging use of the ramp after that time.
“The only problem I have with it is FAA approved it, and the thing was ready to build tenants on it. Then our own people talked it down,” he said. “This would have never happened if we hadn’t had people talk it down.”
Henson said the new hangar space will be enough to serve the airport for years and has great economic development potential.
Also Monday:
• The board spent about 40 minutes talking with Circuit Clerk Elmus Stockstill about who should pay a deputy circuit clerk: the county or Stockstill from fees his office generates. The result was the same as after a lengthy discussion the week before — for Stockstill and Chancery Clerk Sam Abraham to meet to discuss budgeting for the position.
• The board approved for Greenwood Leflore Hospital to sell a clinic in Cleveland, Miss., for $410,000 and to buy a house on River Road for $127,000 to renovate for a specialty clinic.
• The board voted 2-1 — with Collins and Wolfe in favor and Wayne Self opposed — to readvertise bids for the new county unit system headquarters. Architect John Beard said they’ve pared it down to only what’s necessary to use the building after bids came in too high at $690,000.
• Contact Charlie Smith at 581-7235 or csmith@gwcommonwealth.com.
