County board shoots down airports advisory group
During 2006, the Josephine County Board of Commissioners (BOC) abolished the separate advisory boards for the Grants Pass and Illinois Valley airports, citing an overall lack of productivity.
The BOC then decided to form the Josephine County Airport Commission for both airports, and charged its members with finding ways to utilize the facilities to attract investment and economic development to the region.
But history repeated itself, and during its weekly business session on Wednesday, June 20 in Grants Pass, the BOC voted 3-0 to dissolve the airports commission.
During that meeting, Commissioner Dwight Ellis said that the BOC had good reason for dissolving the advisory boards last year.
“It didn’t seem to be working or going anywhere,” he said.
Ellis said that the new commission’s meetings had been marred by arguing and that they were essentially a waste of time.
“In my mind, they accomplished very little,” he said.
BOC Chairman Jim Raffenburg said that the airports could be a source of clean, light industry and job creation. None of that has happened yet, Raffenburg said, and the airport commission wasn’t accomplishing any of its goals. As such, he indicated, the BOC was taking the right action by voting to disband that body.
“There are a lot of things that need to be done,” Raffenburg said. “We can get those things done faster by putting these changes in place,” he said, indicating that county officials Marie Hill and Alex Grossi will take the reins.
Raffenburg acknowledged that dissension “has been a problem with the airports for a long time.” In a Friday, June 22 telephone interview, Raffenburg said that trend has continued.
“It was having a negative effect on the airports’ operations, in my opinion,” Raffenburg said.
Luz Moore, a real estate broker with Century 21 Harris & Taylor, was one of the airport commission’s five members. She said that the BOC made the right decision about the commission.
“I agree that it should be abolished,” Moore said. “We were not doing anything.”
Moore said that her involvement in the commission centered on her desire to bring family wage jobs to the Illinois Valley.
“We do want economic development where people don’t have to go to Grants Pass to find work,” she said.
But irresolvable personality conflicts complicated such efforts, much to Moore’s disappointment.
“Some commission members came in with their personal agendas and vendettas, so they lost focus on what we were supposed to do for the airport,” she said.
She added that there were other reasons why the commission had become irrelevant. County officials have been working to streamline government operations and budgets in light of the potential loss of federal funding.
As part of that process, Airports Manager Alex Grossi is now under the supervision of county Chief Operating Officer Marie Hill. Also, any tenants wanting to lease airport property can contact Hill directly.
Despite the difficulties with the airport commission, Moore said that she expects an announcement to be made soon regarding a leasing contract.
“We do know that there’s already a prospective tenant at the airport,” Moore said. “We’re waiting for the final license to come out.”
Moore said it is unfortunate that the advisory boards have been unable to tap the potential utilizations of the county’s airports.
