Colville Airport Critics Want Public Vote On Costs

Critics of plans to build a new airport here agreed after a two-hour public forum Monday night to seek a public vote on the city’s portion of the estimated $4.5 million cost.

About two dozen of the 33 people who attended the meeting appeared to be against the proposed airport along the Colville River just west of town. Environmental issues were high on their list of concerns, but cost, need and safety also were cited frequently.

“I think the voters need to speak,” said Cindy Reichelt. “I think the costs are going to be exorbitant.”

Reichelt helped organize the meeting along with Beverly McLaughlin, who recently moved to the Colville area from Texas.

City officials say 90 percent to 95 percent of the cost would be paid with federal and state aviation funds. Solid figures aren’t available because the project still hasn’t reached the engineering stage despite almost 20 years of discussions and federal red tape.

Several critics said they never expected it to happen, but the project overcame strong objections from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and received permits this year which could allow construction to begin next year.

The state and federal money would come from aviation fuel taxes and cannot be used for non-airport purposes.

City Councilman Carl Bach, a downtown businessman, said he thinks the idea of a new airport remains viable, but paying the city portion of the project’s costs “is a whole different thing.” He said the “equation has changed somewhat” because of major work needed on the city’s sewer and water systems.

Monday’s meeting at the county courthouse was notable for all of the people who went out of their way to speak for themselves and not for their organizations.

Reichelt is public affairs officer for the Colville National Forest; her husband, Dennis, who questioned the need for another airport, is a U.S. Forest Service forester. Airport board members Marvin Ray and Jim Witham, who likened himself to a bunny in a fox den, emphasized that their defense of the airport was personal.

Gig LeBret, Gifford ranger for the Coulee Dam National Recreation Area, represented the National Park Service in accusing the forum’s organizers of spreading misinformation. He symbolically removed his uniform to oppose the airport as a person who would be living next to it.

LeBret read a statement in which his boss, recreation area Superintendent Gerald Tays, said a claim that “Cominco tailings dredged from the Kettle Falls Marina will be used for fill” at the airport is “totally false.”

Tests have shown that the material to be removed from the marina bay is not contaminated with heavy metals, and an offer to donate fill to the airport has not been accepted, Tays said.

Notably absent was Mayor Duane Scott, who has objected strenuously to the claim about contaminated fill.

A pilot himself, Scott is one of the leading proponents of luring businesses with a larger airport which would accommodate corporate aircraft.

Springdale, Wash., environmentalist Owen Berio didn’t like that idea.

“We don’t want strangers coming in,” he said, “and if an airport is going to do that, we sure as hell don’t want an airport.”

, DataTimes