Library - Regular Meeting

All right, I believe we'll come to order now for the Air Park Advisory Board. This meeting is the first one in many months, we kind of delayed things because the city was kind of busy with a couple of hurricanes here and didn't see any need to tie up everybody, things seem to be going rather well at the air park. So, first item is approval of the 08/07/2024 Air Park Advisory Board meeting minutes. Motion?

So moved. Second.

Approved. Citizens to be heard is for items not on the agenda. Is anybody here who wants to say anything to the board and to the gathered folks here? Alright. New business. Our fixed base operators fly USA verbal quarterly update.

Mister Shipp. Presentation.

Hey guys, how are we doing?

You've been busy.

Happy New Year.

Happy New Year.

Same to you.

So I know we sent you a pretty lengthy deck. As you know, as part of our lease agreement with the city, we provide them with an annual report, so I figured I'd use the annual report to guide this meeting. We'll be submitting that to the city and we're also required to submit our financials by the end of Q1 and we expect to have those by the February.

Is your mic on?

Is that better?

That's better.

All right.

How do you how do you clear I'm sorry, Graham. I'm going try to pull this up so

it's Sure.

It's AID's presentation. You want

to go and have them go first? No.

I don't know how to, how do you clear?

Sorry.

So the first person I guess I'd like to introduce you who's not here today that you should know about us, did hire a new General Manager for the airport, Danny Cooper. He's in fuel QC training today, which is why he's not here, so I'm assuming you guys will meet him sometime in the near future. One of the things we continue to do in 2024, which is a follow on of last year, is modernizing operations, you know, implementing a number of different technologies that improve both, well, I think three things, one, safety, number two, our employee experience, and number three, our customer experience. You know, that includes us being able to fuel planes paint side and give people their invoices and receipts right there without them having to walk into the FBO. It just makes for a more efficient operation and a much better customer experience.

The NDX platform is a new quality control platform that we put in place that has electronic checklists that each of the employees use for various other tasks. We've also upgraded some of the ground support equipment as well. As you guys know, and the reason we haven't met in a while, it was an active hurricane season with this year. We did, we were, well, we hate to see these things happen. I think we performed admirably. We didn't, we had

a little bit

of damage from the second hurricane to some of the T hangar roofs and some of the doors on the T hangars or the shade hangar roofs, rather. But, you know, our partnership and the MOU with the Coast Guard is activated during both events, and, you know, they certainly appreciate the partnership with the city and the air park management. It also, you know, probably plays a good reminder that at 72 feet above sea level, you know, the air park is critical infrastructure for Pinellas County. As I think we've talked to you guys about before, we have formed our own advisory council in the airport with the intention of being able to have meetings more frequently. We've only met maybe a little less than once per quarter this past year, but as we begin the development phase, we really want to have feedback from our tenants, the neighborhood, the flight school, and EA leadership, you know, as we start accelerating the redevelopment projects around the airport.

And that framework allows us to obtain that feedback and act on it quickly.

How's attendance been on that?

A little spotty this year, but it's, you know, I think we're gonna do a better job in 2025 to make sure that everyone's engaged. We are swapping out one of the tenant representatives to someone that used to sit on the council here that I think will be a good addition to the group and we're looking forward to that. Fuel pricing. This is something that we always like to highlight. When we took over, we said we wanted to make sure that we had competitive fuel pricing.

There were lot of concerns that, oh, we're going raise prices. We know that we have to have competitive fuel to get people to come to the airport and we have consistently been either the lowest or within $0.10 or $0.15 of the lowest price for full service low lead in the region. In addition to our public pricing, the tenants also receive an additional $0.50 a gallon off of that. So I think that's, you know, we're more than fair as it relates to our fuel pricing. Safety, which we talk about often, you know, really a lot of safety has to do, you know, a lot of the advancements we've made is because we've implemented, you know, a much more stringent onboarding and training of new employees and have gone beyond just air park specific training to include things like emergency preparedness and first aid training for the employees.

As I mentioned, Danny is not here because he's in fuel QC training, sending more of the team to advanced fuel safety certifications is also, you know, part of our objective going forward. Does that make sense? So safety never stops. We've also installed additional wind socks and replaced the lighted wind sock. We continue to improve and strengthen our operational by implementing new SOPs and updated safety signage and decals around the airpark.

You know, some of the things that we're really looking forward to, to take the visiting, you know, air traffic to another level from a safety perspective is having the GPS approach published, which I think we're in the final stages of that and expect that that could be published as early as Q2 of this year. And as I'm assuming you'll talk about later, the grant for the Beacon was issued, and now that we know the height of the new terminal that's being built, we can now find the right place for the Beacon and accelerate the installation of that.

You've hired a lot of ex military people, haven't you?

We do. Think something around the name something in the neighborhood of 30 of our employees are ex military. And we're trying to get even more active, you know, locally with the Coast Guard and MacDill for future pipeline. Tenant updates. As you guys know, during the first year we had a lot of derelict, un airworthy and uninsured aircraft around the airport.

We spent a long time having those removed. Happy to say that for the most part that problem's behind us. Now, you know, we're starting to ramp up the enforcement and ensuring that all of our tenants have insurance, that both the city and FlyUSA are named as additional insured, and that the aircraft that are there continue to be active, which we've defined in our leased as an active plane is one that takes off and lands at least once a month. And by continuing to enforce that, think you'll continue to see a more vibrant, active, safe community around the airport. We've been staying connected with tenant meetings and engagement.

We've had, I think, two or three tenant meetings, kind of all hands town hall meetings each of the last two years. So they're pleased, generally pleased to see that level of engagement from us as an operator, keeping them updated on what we're doing and then soliciting and acting on feedback that they're giving us. Roger, the attendance of those has been really strong, you know, between twenty and forty people have turned out for each of those events. The tenant community is engaged and interested in what we're doing. Some of the tenant driven improvements, you know, listening to them in the meetings, one of the big complaints they had was WiFi, especially in the southernmost hangars at the airport.

So we've extended coverage to all the hangars and I think there's been good feedback on that improvement. We also spent a lot of time talking about golf balls. So the driving range and landings, it's not uncommon for balls to end up on the airport property. It's one of the it's probably the most significant hazard that our tenants talk about on a regular basis. So that's something that we're trying to increase the frequency of golf ball collection and then we're looking into putting some additional netting on the fence between us and the driving range as well.

Additionally, some tree and vegetation removal has been cleared. We had some of the taxiways between the hangars, the wing tips were getting pretty close to some of the bushes and trees that were going there. Those were all removed this year as well. One of the favorite things tenants had was a Christmas party, which I guess was an annual event there for a really long time that stopped sometime either during or before COVID. And for the last two years, we've we've got a lot of positive feedback about reactivating the Tennant Christmas party. Which So next year you guys are all welcome to

come to.

Thank you. Other

things in the community. In the fall we had an open house. Again, I think that was a tradition. It used to be called something else. What was it? There was something day, neighborhood day or something, and we've rebranded it as kind of a fall open house. I had great turnout for that, there were a couple 100 people there, coast guard was there, police, firemen. Obviously you see the mayor was there. And it was a great day. The neighbors were appreciative of being invited to the airport.

Other things we've been doing to give back to the community, you know, Pilots and Paws is a volunteer organization that flies dogs that need to be rehomed. And we've had a ton of Pilots and Paws traffic in the last twelve months, so happy to support them. Also supporting Access to Opportunity, which is a nonprofit for, that introduces young folks to potential careers in aviation, and they had a day at the airport. Toys for Tops has been our charity of choice for the last couple of years to do a toy drive around the holidays. And then we have two events coming up in the next two months, one for Ark of Tampa Bay, which I think is their tenth or twelfth year in a row doing their fundraiser there.

And then we also have local Y is doing one that very same week. So since we had the hangar cleared for one, we have two non profit events there. Noise. As you guys know, when we took over, one of the biggest complaints from the neighborhood and the houses surrounding the air park was noise and specifically the helicopter training traffic. That was the single biggest complaint from the folks in local community.

So when we took over, you know, we implemented some new noise abatement procedures. The airport has limited operating hours, can't land before seven a. Or after eleven p. M, but we further limited the flight training on holidays and the helicopter training restrictions, and the result was it was no longer cost effective or didn't make sense for the flight school to keep training helicopters there. So when we took over, were there six helicopters that were there for training, and we ended last year with only one being based there for training.

And even we got an email that we'd like to share with you from Frank Scalzo, a local neighbor who's been a critic of the airport, that said, There's no doubt that helicopter traffic is considerably less under FlyUSA than it was under the previous base operator. We were very happy and touched to see that email from Ms. Scout. City relations, you know, I don't like having these meetings without really giving these guys credit for acting and behaving as just great partners. Know, we've you know, with Mike and Bill, we know whenever we have a problem, you know, the teams get together and we figure a way past it, you know, and that spirit of partnership and the relationship being, you know, one that's collaborative versus one that's, you know, combative is the only reason we're making the progress that we are there.

So thank you guys again for everything you do to support us. We really appreciate it. EAA. As you guys are aware, EAA has a hangar on the airfield which they continue to build experimental planes in, and we partner with them for the Young Eagles events. And Young Eagles events, they were having them twice a year under the previous operator, and we've gotten that to where every other month, the second Saturday of every other month, we're having the Young Eagle events.

And you typically have between thirty and forty kids between the age of eight and 17 that have the opportunity to take their first airplane ride. And really hoping to generate more enthusiasm around aviation and get the kids as they're growing up to understand what opportunities might be available in the area. I know you're gonna hear from the AID guys next, but just to give you guys a time update on the timeline on construction, the survey and geotech project, which was a dependency for everything that we're doing, has finally been completed. We're finalizing, and I think the plans for the parking lot and the terminal should both be ready to go to permitting next quarter, which means we hope that we can, with things aligned, we can break ground in Q3 of this year and then potentially have the terminal up and operational by 2027. Now Chip's going to tell you it's going to take longer than Q1, but we're going to work on managing Chip's expectations and your little view to what that could look like as we go forward, but I'm not going to steal their thunder.

So the other thing I wanted to talk to you about today is returning the Clearwater Air Park to be known as the Clearwater Executive Airport. If you didn't know, when the airport opened in 1939, it was called the Clearwater Executive Airport, and has gone over a number of changes over the years and, you know, we would like for a lot of reasons to revert to that name. You know, I think, you know, the name Air Park is a little deceiving. I think most people, when they think Air Park, they think of a fly in community. They think of, you know, an airport that has residents on it where people pull their planes into their hangars that are attached to their houses, and that's not what we are.

You know, so I think as folks are flying to town and coming you know, to the region, if a pilot sees an airport named, an air park in the name, they're less likely to select that as where they'd wanna stay because they're just gonna make that assumption, you know, that it's a residential community. I would be guilty of that as well. So to be clear, in changing the name, nothing else changes, it doesn't change the type of aircraft that will be operating there, we're not gonna be extending the runway, It should be the same mix of general aviation aircraft that we've always had. It doesn't mean we're opening for commercial traffic, that's not gonna happen. So we just would like to go back to what we feel is a more appropriate name for the Air Park.

I think as we rebrand it, I think our brand will align with the City Of Clearwater's brand and and the expectation that when you come to Clearwater, it's a premier aviation destination and we want to attract more pilots, businesses and visitors to the region. Any thoughts on that?

Why not?

Why not?

You have several rebel cars there now, don't you, available for pilots and visitors?

We do. We have a crew car that they can use for free, so we own that. It's a Volkswagen Taos. So they can call and ask for the crew car when they land. There are some restrictions around how long they can keep that. But now we also have Go Rentals, go rentals on-site, and they have a couple rental cars that are available there as well for folks that are landing from out of town.

That's a good convenience for people. That adds to the attractiveness of the facility, I would think.

It does. I think it's it's important. And and again, as we, you know, look, we're we're relatively new. We've only been there a couple of years. We wanna be known as the destination for folks that are, you know, owner pilots that are flying to the Kluwer or Tampa Bay area. And having those amenities, you know, you're right, I mean, we consider them to be table stakes.

Yeah, people could fly in, head to the beach, have a wonderful day, and fly wherever they wanted to. Exactly. Questions, gentlemen?

What's, has the training, shall I say the percent of training operations, been about the same through the last year as previous years, or has it made any movement one way or the other?

Well, the helicopter training has reduced significantly. It's almost been completely eliminated. The regular flight training, it's down, like the back half of this year, it's been down pretty significantly, the volume. But a lot of that was when the storms hit. I think a lot of the students that were there were in the hospitality business and maybe had, you know, got displaced homes or they didn't have the second job that they had that was paying for their training. I mean, the flight school's definitely seen a reduction in student activity since September.

Has the mix of aircraft changed at all?

More specifically, you're asking?

You know, the training aircraft, I'm assuming, are mostly the Cessna one seventy two's.

Oh, correct, yes. So you're asking, did the flight school change their planes? They've Well,

mean, more are twin engines coming in and out

Oh, okay, I see. Yeah, we're getting a little bit more turboprop traffic, which are, and it's mostly single engine turboprop, so some Pilates' and Piper Meridian's and Caravans and the sort. You know, we became the preferred FBO in the region for CAA. And CAA is something that owner pilots use to get fuel discounts. So once we put the CAA program in place, we started to see some additional owner owned owner flown single turbine aircraft.

Yeah, and

I and I asked that question because I saw plot in presentation along with a couple other planes that just made me wonder, so

We do. We have two Pilatus's that are based at the Air Park today, and one Meridian or Piper 600, so there are a few turboprops based there now that weren't there before.

Yeah, okay, thank you.

Any pure jets, not pure jets, but jet No.

There are no jet aircraft based there. We occasionally get one that comes in, it's pretty rare, but there are no twin turbine planes based at the airport.

Very good. Next is the presentation regarding the name of Clearwater Airport. Are you doing that or

is it? He he he

kinda I think I just did it then.

I think you just did it. Alright. You don't need to vote on that or anything, do you? It's a

No. It's just a presentation. Okay.

Very good. Any thoughts on that?

I think it's good. You'll need to rename their ordinances.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.

If they wanna unless a friend of mine got out of the ticket because of that. Yeah. The ordinance was air parked and the airport was all the executives, so he'd have to pay his ticket.

I guess you'll have to buy a new sign out front, replace the one that's

I think the sign blew away. Angling. Alright.

Well, thank you very much if there's no further questions.

Alright. Thanks, guys.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Alright. Hurricane damages. I guess we survived.

Yeah. We did. Good afternoon, Mike McDonald, marine and aviation director. Let me just go ahead and pull it up since you didn't get a chance to look at it. Oh, you have to redo the whole browser?

Sorry, guys. Alright. Okay. So this first one is just the invoices. Basically what we had is we had AID come in.

We issued them a PO to do a damage assessment. The damage was not nearly as severe as it could have been. I closed out that PO. I closed that out that PO about $5,000 They gave us a damage assessment, which is on the other attachment. Feel free to go in there and read that when you guys have the opportunity. Basically, we had some hangar doors that were blown in that were repaired. They were off track. We didn't have to replace any of them. The shade hangers, the roof of that was peeled up. We did not replace it.

We just put the 10 back on only because those are slated to be they surpassed their useful life and they're going to be demolished when we do the commercial hangar project. The wind sock was damaged. That's been replaced and restored. And then, of course, the air park sign was blown away, as Barry would say. So with that, if you have any questions.

I think we're lucky.

Yeah. Yeah. We got we got we're very fortunate.

Did better than most of the houses of people I know, actually, price wise, as far as things that were destroyed are gonna be destroyed anyway, so it wasn't

Did most of the airplanes relocate, you know?

They did. Yeah. I mean, they were out after a Helane. I think everybody was a little gun shy, so the majority of them majority of them took the aircraft and then went elsewhere. And, you know, less than $20,000 for all the repairs, absolutely. So we're fortunate.

Thank you. How are we getting along with the golf course next door? Are they being cooperative with those balls flying over the fence?

Yeah. Yeah. No. They've always been great. They've been great partners with the city for a long time, and they're great working with FlyUSA. So we'll come up with a solution with the netting, make sure that it's compliant with FDOT, and we'll get something figured out with that.

Mike, I just looked through the pictures that you gave me, and I'll pass them over to Roger here. But, yeah, I mean, there's a little damage, but emphasize little. Yeah. I'm I'm, you know, pleased.

Yeah. Albert Wood had they they sustained a lot of damage. I think they, you know, had a tornado that went through there and damaged quite a few hangars over there.

Yeah. They're still cleaning that up. It's

a Yep.

Major disaster. One thing that I paid a visit to an airport up in my hometown in Illinois. They had a an interesting display of a fighter jet there. Apparently, you can get those from the military at various airports. I don't know if that would be a favorable thing to have to inspire our youth to have a used f 16 or something of that nature, but it's something to think about.

I I I think your checkbook can handle that, couldn't it? Purchasing an f four?

Actually, I think they are delivered for free. Really? All the city has to do is maintain the thing in a dignified manner. I think that's a

Is this just a static display?

Yeah. Static display.

Oh, okay. Yeah. No. I'm not gonna

I'm not gonna fly in.

It's static, but you may have to have some sort of foundation to

A be on a pedestal of

some sort. Yeah.

Pedestal. Yeah.

Something to look into, for sure.

Just a thought. It's kind of impressive at a tiny little airport up in the wilds of Illinois to see a t 39 trainer, I think it was, in the middle of the

airport. Yeah. Questions,

comments, thoughts? Thank you so much.

Thank you, guys.

Alright. Next on our list, electing a chair and vice chair. Nominations, anybody wanna take over? Anybody?

I'm if we stay as we are. Second? Right.

Okay. Fine. Alright. Airpark project updates. I think we pretty much hit the high points of that.

We have architects here and presentations of all all types. We were hoping to inspire some new members to come on this board and join, but nobody seems to want to do it at this point. Well, welcome.

So I just this is Chip. He's with AID. They were selected to be the engineers of record for the air park redevelopment. They're doing the runway and taxiway, lane extension. They're doing the terminal in the parking lot.

No, it should be right here. Let me see.

Yes. He made preparations before our meeting, and he's in good shape.

Yeah. We had it hidden. So I have a brief presentation for you. Again, my name is Chip Hayward. I'm vice president of architecture for AID and the architect of record for the new general aviation terminal.

So just a quick kind of background about our experience. I was the architect of record for the Ocala General Aviation Terminal. If you've flown in there, won an FDOT award in 2022. We've worked on a number of hangars and general aviation terminals, including the one in Punta Gorda. We've done a lot of aviation work at Tampa International Airport and all over the state of Florida.

We have

about five offices throughout the state. We specialize in aviation work. So this is the site plan of the project, and the terminal is a little box there that's kind of an H shape. We have the existing apron we're trying to preserve, and the parking lot that's to the north of the terminal has capacity for 135 parking spaces, and that includes the ADA parking. We have a little drop off that's in front of the terminal, including a covered canopy.

And to the west of the terminal and a little bit to the north, you'll see kind of a narrow strip. That's the event court or the trellis that's there, and that's being set up to accommodate a food truck event or a wedding or some other, social event or or the thing that Barry had mentioned, you know, about the inviting the neighborhood and getting those people there for that. So we want this to be a place that people come, not just to fly in and out of the airport, but also to, you know, appreciate aviation. This is the ground floor plan, and the center of the lobby is the white portion that's there, the yellow is the restrooms, and then the FVO component, I don't know if it will show up on this or not, is in the lower left hand corner. And then there is a flight school that's in the upper left hand corner, and then a pilot's lounge and some offices are in the upper right hand corner.

We have a community room that's in the lower right hand corner, kind of a darker blue color, and then a passenger lounge lounge that's immediately off of the, you know, kind of a concession area that we have set up. This is a 2nd Floor plan, and we have, some meeting rooms that can be used for the public that are the blue areas on the bottom of the drawing and some restrooms that are associated with each one. There's actually a bridge that has the two wings of the of the 2nd Floor, and that opens into the lobby on both sides. This is the new updated elevation of the front of the building, and you can see that the center portion has changed slightly. The upper part of that glass will actually have a frit that's to it to help with sun control, and then we're implementing the blue glass throughout.

And we have sun shades on the offices at the 2nd Floor. So it'll be, I think, a very attractive, building. That center glass area will be lit up at nighttime, and so it really will become kind of a beacon, you know, for anybody that flies in, to the airport. Be very clear where the FBO is.

How tall is the top of that building?

The top of the building is it's about 38 or 40 feet up, I believe. The floor the 1st Floor elevation is about twelve six, so that that kinda gives you an idea. 2nd Floor is about 12 foot six up, then the next floor is up, you know, another, you know, 10 feet from there, and then the top of the roof is probably another 10 feet. So that kind of gives you an idea. You can see that to give you a scale, there's a person that's right

here. So it kind

of gives you an idea. But we have done a 7460 study to make sure we're not, you know, we're in compliance with that, and so there's not an issue.

You took one of my questions away, Jay.

Anticipated that. This is the apron elevation. I don't like to call it the back elevation, but the apron elevation. We've got kind of a a little balcony here that's off of the break room. We do have, you know, canopy that mirrors the front building.

Of and you'll notice that this elevation, we don't have any palm trees that are here because we don't want any flood, you know, going out to the apron, so that's why we got rid of those. This is the east elevation and shows the, access to, you know, the community room or the meeting room. This is access to the stair. This is the electrical room. Instead of putting in an emergency generator, we're actually going to have two quick connects.

So we'll bring in a portable generator to the building, we'll have the capability to power the entire building or just the FBO and the meeting rooms and some of the emergency elements that might be used for the building. So it does have the capability to serve as a command center, you know, for the coast guard or for for other people that might need, you know, emergency operations. Just a little background, the General Aviation Terminal at Punta Gorda, two weeks after it opened, hurricane hit, and Army National Guard and the and the Coast Guard used that facility as their staging area because of the quick connect for the emergency generator. It saves on the cost of having a generator and maintaining all of that, and it's something that can be accommodated pretty easily. This is the west elevation, and we have a little balcony that's here off of some of the executive offices.

We've got an ice machine that's going to be in this area, this will be the entrance to the FBO. The FBO has a tremendous view of the airfield, kind of a corner setup with these large windows, so they'll basically be able to see everything that's going on in the airfield. This is a drive through canopy. This is a fabric canopy that will be spanning this distance, and it will be designed to for hurricane wind loads, but if you get a tornado, you know, the fabric might blow off, but it'll be the structure should remain. This is a section through the lobby area, sort of an east west section, and you can see the start to see the glue laminated truss that are cable stayed truss that we have here, the bridge railing, and then the glass element and the volume of the apron.

This is going to be very striking because of its height, but I think it will be a very nice feature, you know, building. And because of its narrowness, it's also going to give you this sense of acceleration, you know, once you get into that that space. This is a north south section through the lobby, and you can see, the glulam beams. Let me see if I can get this cursor

to move

over there. Yeah. The glulam beams are here and here. We have a metal acoustical deck that's here, this location. That acoustical deck is also the structural deck, so it serves as structural element of the roof.

And then the glulam beams span that lobby, and then we have lights that are here that are suspended that will uplight the ceiling and we have a cove light that runs the length of this here that will also act as an accent. So at nighttime it will be very dramatic with the lighting as well as providing the lighting that we need for that space. And then we have the FBO counter that's here, check-in, and TVs. One would be dedicated to weather, flight information, and probably some local news or whatever. These are some of the finishes that we're contemplating.

We're looking at a standing seam metal roof that is shown here, kind of an accent blue fascia that is highlighted with arch, and then you can get a sense of the glulam beam that will be right here, and we're actually looking at trying to do a gray stained beam, so this is the actual stain color that we're looking at. It's kind of a beechwood, you know, effect, and then this, the metal deck that's associated with that is shown adjacent to that. These are some of the interior finishes and seating, signage, stuff that we're we're looking at or doing or implementing. These images over here in in the restrooms to kinda get rid of the tunnel effect that you have in in restrooms, we have these, graphic wall panels that will be lit with LED lights, and the graphic wall panels are actually a photograph that's printed onto glass. So if you've flown out of St.

Pete or not St. Pete. If you've flown out of Tampa International Airport out of Airside A Or E and gone into the restrooms, then you've seen an example of what this this looks like. It's very easy to maintain, and it's very striking, and it kinda gets rid of these, restrooms that are not that are kind of boring, and it's an inexpensive way to do it. We've we've looked at a couple of different options.

We looked at aeronautical theme or using fish or flowers for some of those those images. All of the finishes are going to be very durable and easy to maintain. This sample here is a polished concrete floor that we're looking at doing in the lobby and some of the public areas, and I'll pass this around after the meeting, but this is a sample of what the polished concrete floor looks like. And we've done this at Ocala as well as the Kissimmee Airport Administration Building. So after the presentation, I'll share this with you.

And what it involves includes blue glass and black glass and a slag material that's called Black Beauty that's embedded into the concrete, it's cast in, and then there's a series of polishing things that we use to polish the concrete. And I've asked Kyle to be here this morning. Kyle Holly is our, engineer of record, and he's been working on a number of other, airfield projects related to the the airport, and I'm gonna let him take over, then when we're done, we'll answer any questions that you might have.

Thank you. As Chip mentioned, I'm engineer of record for AID, Vice President of Engineering. We're doing the from the engineering standpoint, we've designed the parking lot to accommodate the terminal. We designed it to accommodate trucks to come in to deliver aircraft so they can maneuver through that parking lot. But as far as an air parks, airport update, this is, what's shown on the screen is the current project, which is getting very close to being bid.

We, submitted the the final stages of the Southwest Florida Water Management District permit was submitted last week and building permit application is submitted this week. They're shown in blue. There's an existing taxiway that's kinda curved. I don't know if you've been out there or noticed that, but it's basically compliant taxiway. The planes park within the safety areas.

So the main part of the project is considered the base bid to do a parallel it'd be parallel to existing taxiway a and then accommodate a parking apron to the north to get the aircraft out of the safety area. This is being FDOT funded, so we're working with the FDOT budget. We've designed the base bid to, based on our, you know, somewhat conservative efforts, to to be within that budget. If we get favorable bids from contractors, we've added several alternates in there to take advantage of all of the state money available. The areas in orange are just a seal coat.

That's it adds life to the pavement. It doesn't it doesn't bring back it doesn't bring back pavement that's damaged. It just extends the useful life of good pavement. So, it prolongs the need to have to do a rehab in the future. The areas in, cyan, the light blue there, that pavement is too far gone to do a seal coat on.

That's a mill and overlay, as an option. And then the area in yellow is also a mill and overlay, to replace that plate, pavement, and then as well as the green area in the apron. They're only separated for budgetary reasons. So the anticipated award would be the blue base bid area. And then, we've set up the bid schedule for contractors to provide their prices of each of those other elements separately that could be chosen, you know, based on the prices that come in.

What's the project budget?

$1,600,000 is

the construction budget right now. Okay.

I think the base bid is right just shy of 1,600,000.0 based on our, estimates. We look at, comparable airports of similar size. Arcadia, was the most recent one. They they have an apron, very similar apron taxway project, under construction right now. And as where as well as, historical bid pricing from Albert Wittit and and some of the Tampa area, Peter O'Night, you know, smaller airports.

Yeah. Thanks, Scott.

One question, is there room in the terminal for that $500 hamburger restaurant?

We we don't have a restaurant component of the of the terminal, but we do have a, I guess, we call it a concession area. And that will have capability to provide refrigerated coolers to be able to provide meals that people can heat up or soft drinks. And I don't know that we've vetted out all the equipment that's going to be in there. At Punta Gorda, they actually have a vending machine that generates hot meals, and you have a select group of things. But I think we're looking at some other options. But Barry is kind of leading all that charge.

Chip, what's the total square footage of the terminal?

The total square footage is just slightly less than 18,000 square feet. It's like seventeen thousand eight twenty five or something.

And what's the hurricane rating on the building? Wind speed?

It is it is gonna have to be an essential facility, and I don't have the the wind speed, you know, numbers, you know, offhand, but it will be it will have impact rated glass. The, the roof will be, you know, designed for a higher wind speed to be able to accommodate, you know, all of that. So we're anticipating that this building would survive, you know, a hurricane and be used as kind of a staging area for the Coast Guard, you know, because we think that Saint Pete Cutterwater is probably gonna get flooded.

Right? What, what level hurricane did you design for?

I'll have to let me without telling you something that's not correct, let me get that information back to you. I just don't have a

committed memory, so I also want to follow-up on Roger's question. I get down to Albert Wittig every now and then and I go to the Hanger restaurant there. Is there any space where you could put a small restaurant in there that

I think that

Where a vendor could have just

Yeah.

There's plans for a future building that would be north of the terminal and that's probably where it would need to go if there was something that was going to planned. We're pretty far along with that Yeah. With the process at this And we talked about having a restaurant, and, you know, the restaurant in Ocala has been very successful, but there was a lot of, you know, concern about whether it was going to survive. The one at Punta Gorda had a pizza restaurant in there and the pizza restaurant, you know, came out. So I think, you know, it's a very precarious financial risk.

Yeah, it can be, absolutely.

You know, I think at Albert Wittit, you know, it's downtown and they do a lot of, you know, they have jazz music there and it's more of a nightclub kind of thing as opposed to, you know, a place where people come and have breakfast, you know, so

Pretty full at breakfast then often I during the

think it's very nice, but again, it's that, you know, you got to consider the setting and where

it's Yeah, absolutely. You know, Totally agree.

So, I mean, you got the view of, you know, the Yacht Basin and, you know, much better views,

you know, so

But we did discuss it and talked about it, and it just wasn't didn't make sense,

you know.

Very good. So.

But we're excited about the building. I think everybody that's seen it, you know, it's evolved and the design has changed, and I think it will be very something that you'll all be very proud of and it's very unique to, you know, to Clearwater.

What's the rough schedule that you guys put together? You say the, it's close to going out to bid?

We're close to getting the permit drawings. We've to get the permit drawings submitted, and that's our next milestone, And we're anticipating getting the 90% set of drawings to the city and Paradise in the next week, at least for architectural, and I think the site work drawings are even further along than that. So we'll be we got to submit the drawings to the permitting agency, make sure we have all their comments so that we know we don't have any hiccups, you know, with the bid. And I believe that there's a construction manager coming on board at some point in time in the near future.

It'll go out to bid. On the city side, Greg Kelly is the project manager for the city.

Okay.

But it'll go out to bid and then

Okay. So it's, you know, takes time to go through this, you know, process, and you've got to do it right, dot the I's and cross the T's, so All right.

Any other Any questions? Okay. Thank you so much.

We'll try

to get it get it open. Let me let me share this with you.

Let's have a look at that.

You can't keep it. Just need

to look.

Take it home and install what you have. Thanks. I'll pick it up.

I've worked on those before.

It's pretty durable,

doesn't it? It's durable.

No question. Do you need a copy of this?

You got it? Gonna install that in the building when it's done there.

It's a lot like terrazzo.

Yeah. Terrazzo lasts forever. That's

Yeah.

I see Dan Slaughter is here from the city of Clearwater to keep us under control. Thank you so much. All right. Director's report.

What are you guys' thoughts on that terminal building?

I'd like it.

Looks good to me.

Something like that.

Sorry?

You could use a cheeseburger in there somewhere. We used to stop in Lakeland intentionally because they had a good cheeseburger place, you could taxi right up to it.

Yeah. Yeah.

Back in the old days, I don't know what they got there.

So director's report, I don't have a whole lot for you guys. Covered everything pretty well. I will say that we received a grant opportunity from the state eightytwenty for a rotating beacon for 110,000. I will be taking that to council on February 20 and with approval, I'll get with Barry and decide how he wants to move forward with that. But as Barry stated earlier, it should go in pretty rapidly. It's not going to be a part of the terminal building. The roof doesn't support the rotated beacon, so it's going be a standalone. But since we have the height of the terminal building, we'll be able to erect that.

So is there any impediment to putting that up at all? Mean, the FAA rules or

No. No, there won't be. We'll hire a designer to make sure that everything is within regulation.

You know that's my pet project there, so what would be the timeline on that again?

I'll just I'll have to get with Barry and see, you know, what direction we want to go, if we want to sit out to bid or how we want to approach that.

110,000, you're thinking?

Yep. That's what we read the grant that we received from the state, and 80% of that will be paid by the state.

No site's been selected. You're going to do the site study with the designer, right? Correct.

I think pre design, they looked at the terminal building and now you know where the dumpsters are on that north side of the building right now near the gate. They're thinking in that area. So all right. The other thing is I have an opportunity, and I've reached out to the state to do a co project with gas for a generator, an emergency generator. Gas is needing one for the compressed filling station the compressed natural gas filling station that's there on the corner.

So we're looking at going into that together to power the building with the emergency generator as well as the runway and the fueling facility. So we're going to be looking at that. I'm waiting to hear back from the state to see the status of that grant. And once, you know, they get to go ahead with that, then I'll take it to counsel and get their approval. Then I'll work with GAS on getting that design.

Good. Good.

That's really all I have for Director's report.

I'd like to compliment the city on getting through the last few months after that. I knew you guys were

It's a challenge, for sure.

That's why we Yeah.

The whole city, I mean, citywide, everybody was affected. Every department was affected.

But you wouldn't know it coming into town. Unless you look at a few signs that are still down on private businesses.

Yeah. Yeah, Absolutely.

So compliments to you guys, because a lot of other cities are not this far along.

Appreciate it. Yeah.

Yeah. That's you guys have done a great job, and I'm really, really happy to see the projects moving along. Yeah. I think this is as Barry was talking and showing all the various things, then Chip and Kyle, when you put it all together, it's gonna look like quite a different and shall I say, better maintained airport than it did five years ago.

Yeah. Abs And believe it or not, when the shovels hit the ground, my job gets easier. So Yeah. I'm waiting for the shovels to hit the ground too on this project.

It's well, I know Roger flies in and out. I I retired from flying, but when I flew in and out of this airport, and I think about what's going on now, it's it is a world of difference.

Yeah. So

Good. Congrats to you guys.

Good. Fly USA. Congrats to them. Yeah.

For sure. To them too.

Yeah. Most cities get criticized on everything they do, but it looks like, on a number of fronts, you guys have things under control, and that was why we delayed this thing for several months. There was no real need for us to

Well, with the hurricanes, it's been hard to get you this information.

He wanted it delayed for

a couple months. I know.

And I think that was good. Cause Yeah. You guys have done great work. That's perfect. All right.

Anything Thanks, Mike.

Yeah. Anything from you gentlemen?

Board Nothing members to be from me.

No. Nothing from me.

All right. Motion to adjourn.

So moved.

Second. Adjourned. Or somewhat older like that.

Thank you, gentlemen. Appreciate y'all's time.