Kenneth Brown
of The Clarion
The Town of Kindersley has replaced landing fees with new annual fees in a new airport bylaw after airport users expressed their concerns with the new fees.
Council members gave the final two readings to adopt the new airport bylaw at a special meeting of council on Dec. 21, but not before the town responded to concerns from airport users regarding new landing fees proposed within the bylaw’s fee schedule.
Bylaw 10-17, a bylaw to regulate the Kindersley Regional airport, and to provide for airport authority, rules, regulations and fees, was first before council on Dec. 11 at a regularly scheduled meeting. Representatives of the Kindersley Flying Club and Kindersley Airspray appeared at the meeting.
The delegates expressed various concerns with the proposed new bylaw. The addition of landing fees at the airport was a common concern for both, but there were other concerns presented to town officials.
Concerns included the lack of consultation with airport users and stakeholders before the bylaw was drafted, the perceived removal of the airport’s advisory board, competitive edge for commercial users operating at airports with no landing fees, the ambiguous nature of the bylaw, and the idea of charging landing fees to permanent, local aircraft owners that pay other rental and tie-down fees.
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At the meeting on Dec. 11, a town official assured the delegates that the airport’s advisory board was not being removed. The delegates were told that language regarding the airport’s advisory board had been removed from the bylaw, but the board is not being removed.
Mayor Rod Perkins said amendments had been made to the bylaw when council resumed its discussion on Dec. 20 at the special meeting. The landing fees were to be charged to all aircraft whether they were recreational or commercial, but a change was made.
“We are going to remove the landing fees totally,” he said, recognizing that council members had just determined the amendments through their discussion. “We are going to add an annual operating fee of $150 for recreational users and $750 per plane for commercial users.”
All references to landing fees in the bylaw have also been removed. Deputy Mayor Ken Francis said council discussed a range of information gathered from airports, user groups and other sources before making the decision.
Francis said council chose to remove the landing fees for several reasons. He noted that it would be difficult to administer landing fees to users and the fees were unpopular with both recreational and commercial users, so council members unanimously agreed to remove landing fees.
The deputy mayor said officials believe the annual operating fees are a better way to handle the situation. He recognized that the town wanted an option that was fair for cost recovery and compensation for airport usage.
Changes were made in an effort to recover more of the cost to operate the airport. Francis said officials realize they will not reach full cost-recovery. The airport needs to be there and it does not have to make money or break even, but officials wanted the changes to be fair, he said.
Monte Sheppard, the flying club’s chairperson, said in an interview that the landing fees were the club’s main concern. The landing fees had been set at $10 for recreational users and $14 for commercial users, so the cost could add up for frequent flyers.
The flying club has about four active members with their own planes and five active members that fly a club-owned plane. Sheppard said there was give and take between the users and the town with respect to the fees.
He noted that he never knows how often he is going to fly, so there is no telling what the cost would be if he had to pay $10 each time he went flying. He said with an annual operating fee, at least club members could plan for the expense in their budgets.
The flying club sells fuel to transient, recreational pilots flying through the area and the club also has a shuttle car for them to use. One goal of the club is to promote the use of the airport, so members had concerns that landing fees would deter other recreational pilots from landing in Kindersley.
“Our concern was that transient people coming through, recreational pilots coming through, land at our airport just as a matter of convenience,” Sheppard said, adding the pilots spend money in town. “There’s no real necessity to land in Kindersley.”
He said a landing fee of $10 could be enough for pilots to fly straight to another airport in the area that does not charge a fee. If users with permanent aircraft pay rental fees for their lots and hangers, along with tie-down fees, the addition of landing fees would be viewed as burdensome, Sheppard added.
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