_{Thumbnail photo: Inside the Del Norte County Regional Airport terminal. Photo by James Brooks}

Sean Rosenthal unveiled a five-year list of capital improvement projects he said may be eligible for $15.5 million in federal funding.

But, while the Border Coast Regional Airport Authority would be responsible for a 5% local match for most projects, things are different for a long-awaited rehabilitation of a fuel farm at Jack McNamara Field, the airport authority director told commissioners Thursday.

About $600,000 in Airport Infrastructure Grant dollars are available for the fuel farm project, Rosenthal said. Though the total estimated cost for the project is $1.2 million, the airport director told commissioners that figure isn’t finalized. Still, BCRAA will be responsible for figuring out how to pay for what the AIG grant doesn’t cover, he said.

“We are expected to come up with a match of what we believe (the cost) will be by about April of next year or we lose the $600,000 for that project,” Rosenthal said. “That’ll be the main topic of discussion for next month.”

The fuel farm project is included in the BCRAA’s Airport Capital Improvement Program for 2027-2032. On Thursday, six commissioners approved the ACIP for submission to the Federal Aviation Administration’s Airport District Office for the Western-Pacific Region in San Francisco.

Brookings representative Clayton Malmberg was absent. The public member seat on the BCRAA Board had been occupied by former Del Norte County supervisor David Finigan who recently resigned. 

On Thursday, Del Norte County District 3 Supervisor Chris Howard was nominated to fill the position of BCRAA Board Chair. He informed his colleagues that the Board of Supervisors had appointed former supervisor Gerry Hemmingsen as Finigan’s replacement. Hemmingsen was not at Thursday’s BCRAA meeting.

BCRAA staff developed the 2027-2032 Airport Capital Improvement Program with input from Airport District Office representatives, who visited the area last month, Rosenthal said. 

The FAA evaluates and prioritizes those projects against projects from other airports and then determines which will receive funding through its Airport Improvement Plan. According to Rosenthal, there are two funding sources associated with the AIP. 

The first are entitlement funds, which are awarded based on the number of travelers using the airport. According to Rosenthal’s presentation, U.S. law calculates entitlement for “non-primary airports” at $60 per enplanement for the first 2,500 passengers and $153.33 per enplanement for each passenger through 9,999.

Basing an FAA report of 8,027 enplanements from the region in 2024, the Del Norte County Regional Airport is entitled to $997,455 in entitlement AIP dollars, according to Rosenthal’s presentation.

If a project’s cost exceeds its entitlement allocation, the FAA can consider awarding discretionary AIP dollars, according to Rosenthal. 

“One of the reasons why we do this Airport Capital Improvement Plan is so they could start taking money and socking it away for (projects) in the future,” Rosenthal said.

When he unveiled BCRAA’s five-year plan, the airport director informed commissioners that they aren’t committed to any of the projects on the list.

“This is just what the FAA said they could do for funds,” he said. “They take what they say they can do and we ask for more.”

Major projects included in the 5-year capital improvement plan include the rehabilitation of Runway 12-30. The lighting system is also expected to undergo a rehab, according to Rosenthal’s presentation. The design phase is scheduled to begin in 2027 with construction coming the following year.

For the design phase, the total project cost is expected to be about $325,000 with the FAA kicking in $308,750 in AIP entitlement dollars. BCRAA will be required to provide a match of 5% the project cost.

The cost for construction is expected to be about $8 million with the federal share coming in at $7.6 million in discretionary AIP funds and BCRAA kicking in about $400,000, according to Rosenthal’s presentation.

The $600,000 in Airport Infrastructure Grant dollars came from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, it allocated $500 million annually to non-primary airports, though Rosenthal noted that it ended this year. According to him, BCRAA needs to use those funds this year or risk losing them.

That $600,000 is earmarked for the fuel farm replacement project, which is also scheduled for 2027. Rosenthal noted that the FAA’s cost estimate for the project is $1.2 million is high and said BCRAA is doing its own research.

“Mark Weaver’s a terrific partner at Cal-Ore Lifeflight and is our subject matter for all things fuel farm and he’s looking into things on his own,” the airport director said. “It does have to be reconstruction because we cannot reuse the pads. A side note, we don’t want to anyway ‘cause Mark Weaver just learned that they are failing.”

Despite appearances, the Border Coast Regional Airport Authority doesn’t have to foot the bill for half the project cost, Rosenthal said. If the airport authority determines that the fuel farm could be reconstructed for $700,000, it would only need to contribute $100,000.

“That’s where we need to be smart with how we do it, which is why we’re partnering with people that know what they’re doing,” he said.

Weaver, a long-time Cal-Ore Life Flight employee at the airport, had been the BCRAA’s choice for the empty at-large seat on the Board with Hemmingsen being his alternate. 

On Thursday, Howard suggested reaching out to the region’s Congressional representatives to petition for a special allocation to support the project. 

“The fuel farm is an absolute must based on its current condition,” he said. “We as a commission need to consider going back to our various bodies and see if there’s willingness to help support that.”
Howard urged Rosenthal to reach out to Assistant County Administrative Officer Randy Hooper and Del Norte County’s grants specialist.

Howard also spoke to the Del Norte County Board of Supervisors’ decision on Aug. 25 to appoint Hemmingsen. According to him, despite the BCRAA vote on Aug. 6, the decision to appoint Finigan’s replacement belonged to the Board of Supervisors, not to the Airport Authority.

“It’s oftentimes important to honor some of those things, as one of the supervisors pointed out, however the Board chose a different direction,” Howard said. “I do believe we selected the right candidate given previous Supervisor Hemmingsen’s connections, not just with the airport, but more importantly with lobbying efforts in DC where most of our funding comes from.”

Howard said he did want to look into rewriting the joint powers authority that established BCRAA.