One of the tenants has found a private piece of property
where the landowner is willing to lease a couple of acres for an airstrip. It will be short and will probably be in a
flood plain, but there will be far fewer politicians involved, which makes any
shortfalls of the property less of an obstacle.
As a matter of fact, politicians and unelected bureaucrats are becoming
more and more the source of many of the problems facing aviation. Because of the way the Federal Government
handled the St. Clair Airport, every airport now has a bull’s-eye on their
backs. It is now acceptable airport sponsors to
violate may grant assurances and Federal Laws that regulate airports, in order
to “destroy them by neglect”.
The city has stated that it will be two years before
anything happens on the closure. That
seems strange!! All the city has to do
is payback the Feds. Why would that take
two years? For every year that goes by,
is approximately $27,000 less the city has to pay back the Feds.
What is real now at this point, is that the city has
promised a Shopping Mall. A “Chesterfield
Mall” like center was mentioned by Ron Blum.
He did not say he was getting a Chesterfield like mall, just that a chesterfield
mall would fit on the airport property. So, now the city has to come up with a
shopping center as promised. As one
former alderwomen stated “There have been TONS of proposals made to different
companies. It's up to the company to determine if we are the place for them.” Whatever happens Ron Blum for damn sure has
to come up with a Shopping Center, no easy task in today’s world, or the
future, where fifty percent of all shopping centers in this country will close
in the next ten years.
