NBAA, along with nearly a dozen local aviation companies, is appealing to the U.S. FAA to find that East Hampton, New York, diverted airport revenue to pay for legal fees in violation with grant obligations. The organizations filed the appeal this week, asking the agency to reconsider its earlier decision against enforcement on the use of East Hampton Airport (HTO) funds, which they said went to pay for the town’s unsuccessful legal effort to uphold a series of restrictions at the airport.
An FAA decision against enforcement, NBAA said, “is contrary to agency precedent, is bad policy, and is plainly at odds with congressional instructions.”
“There should be no doubt that the airport dollars spent by the town in litigation seeking to perpetuate the illegal restrictions constituted an improper use of airport revenue,” NBAA and the others wrote in the appeal. “The town explicitly adopted an anti-airport agenda, declined to utilize FAA administrative procedures, and represented to its taxpayers that—even though litigation would almost inevitably result from its campaign—the consequences would be cost- and risk-free.”
The appeal further noted that while this effort is ongoing, “the airport has been starved of needed improvements that could have been funded with those diverted funds. The town now should be required to make HTO whole.” It also argues that the FAA is congressionally compelled to take action, citing a requirement to apply airport funds for the benefit of the airport. “The town had an explicit anti-airport and bad-faith agenda...The FAA should now require their reimbursement, with statutory interest.”
“While East Hampton apparently has spent millions of dollars over the past several years in its attempts to impose access restrictions that the federal courts concluded violated federal requirements, the FAA decision puts at risk far more than the dollars currently at stake at HTO,” added NBAA president and CEO Ed Bolen. It could jeopardize the national system of airports by providing airport sponsors an option of using airport revenues to restrict or close airports, he said.