Sheltair To Purchase Landmark Base

Service provider chain Sheltair has an agreement in place with Landmark Aviation to purchase the latter’s FBO at Florida’s Ocala International Airport, pending approval by local authorities. The 30-year agreement on the 17-acre property will expire in early 2018, and Sheltair is hoping to receive another 30-year lease.

According to airport manager Matthew Grow, terms were still under negotiation, but the airport board is looking to approve the assignment and then in the same motion end the current lease. “We want to get rid of that lease; we don’t want to extend it,” he told AIN. “It was not very favorable to the airport so if we go forward with the deal it will be with a brand new lease agreement.”

If the lease reassignment is approved, the airport will forego the RFP process in awarding a new lease, which will incorporate several changes from the one that was signed in 1988. “The old lease didn’t account for escalations in anything, and that really put us behind the eight ball when inflation went up, so we’re looking to fix that,” said Grow. In addition, the terms under consideration will call for approximately $4 million in capital investment for a new general aviation terminal at the airport, which saw approximately 50,000 operations last year.

While Ocala has 13 privately owned corporate hangars, the FBO, the lone service provider at the airport, has four aged 10,000 sq ft hangars that are unable to accommodate the latest top-of-the-line business jets, leading the airport to seek new hangar development as well.