Airport issue dominates candidate forum

The upcoming airport referendum and differing views about it dominated discussion among candidates for the Kalispell City Council during a Chamber of Commerce-led forum on Tuesday.

The Chamber supports realigning and expanding the city’s general aviation airport through the federal Airport Improvement Program, President Joe Unterreiner said before asking candidates how they plan to vote this fall: For or against repealing the City Council’s decision to pursue the project.

Mark Johnson, the unopposed candidate for mayor, said his vote is “most likely to expand” because he doesn’t know how Kalispell will pay for the airport if the expansion is rejected.

The situation is distasteful, but voters are caught between a rock and a hard spot in part because of a “significant failure to lead” by the City Council, Johnson said.

Johnson posed these questions: Do voters decide to expand the airport hoping Kalispell can get the funding needed to pay for the project and then maintain the expanded airport? Or do they not expand the airport and in five years face an estimated $1.6 million cost to resurface the runway and keep it usable as required by leases the city entered?

“The heartache I have as a fiscal conservative is I have to spend $16 million to keep our general fund safe, hoping we get money from the [Federal Aviation Administration]. If we don’t expand, then in five years, to maintain our lease obligations, we have to spend $1.6 million out of what fund? Where does that come from?”

Johnson noted the City Council’s inability last week to even put out a statement of record or a summary of facts for people to consider as they cast their votes this fall. “They have not dug in and found the answers we need,” Johnson said.

“Whatever voters decide, this council will take the next four years and implement that mandate. My promise is to do it with the most clarity possible and in the most fiscally conservative way to make sure the airport operates in whichever way the voters decide.”

Tim Kluesner, an incumbent running unopposed for council re-election in Ward 4, said without hesitation he will vote to repeal the City Council’s decision to pursue the airport project. “I believe the Chamber has made the wrong decision. And all the members of our local Republican Party supporting it as well have made the wrong decision,” he said.

Kalispell City Airport doesn’t need to be saved from closure and it doesn’t need federal money to fix runway cracks — it needs to be saved from its incompetent management, Kluesner said. “We don’t need millions of federal dollars to take care of that,” he said. “Why do we need the feds to fix something we screwed up ourselves? Let’s take the bull by the horns and fix it ourselves.”

Chad Graham, the unopposed candidate for a Ward 2 seat who spearheaded a drive to put the referendum on the ballot, shared that view.

Graham restated his concerns about getting federal money needed to pay for the expansion and maintain an upgraded airport.

“I’m a business owner here, and as a business owner I would not take my budget or money from my savings and put it in a business deal without a guarantee I’ll get my money back. I wouldn’t do it with my neighbor’s money, either,” Graham said.

Sandy Carlson is running against Joe Apple for a Ward 1 seat. Carlson said she’s researching the airport issue and trying to make up her mind.

“If this is a safety and noise issue and if the upgrades will fix that issue, then I’m all for it,” Carlson said, adding: “My question comes again with financing, and I still need to do more research. I can’t say today whether I’m for it or against because of those finance issues.”

Apple did not attend Tuesday’s forum.

Kalispell City Airport is quickly becoming a central campaign issue in Ward 3.

That’s where Karlene Osorio-Khor and Jason Mueller are challenging 25-year City Council veteran Jim Atkinson, a longtime supporter of the proposed airport upgrade.

Mueller said he sees no reason “to expand a small airport being engulfed by the city anyway.”

Osorio-Khor said she’s running as an “agent of change” who is staunchly opposed to the airport expansion. She added that she is being endorsed by Quiet Skies, an informal group of residents who oppose the project.

“In order to change and lead, you need to listen. I think that our neighbors have been talking and I think what has happened is many of our leaders have not been listening to them,” Osorio-Khor said.

Atkinson said the proposed airport upgrade that voters will consider this fall has been years in the making.

“Over the last 20 years we’ve talked about the opportunity to work with the FAA to develop the airport, make it safer, move it back, get it out of the way a little bit. There’s been an awful lot of people working in that direction to meet requirements to accept the FAA money, and FAA is going to take care of about 90 percent of that improvement” cost, Atkinson said.

Atkinson said he supports taking the Airport Improvement Program money and using it for the reason it was collected — to improve airport safety and help business in Kalispell. “Any time you have a chance to have another transportation system enhanced to bring business in and take products and goods out, then I think we ought to invest in that,” he said.

Reporter Tom Lotshaw may be reached at 758-4483 or by email at tlotshaw@dailyinterlake.com.