CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Governor Jim Justice has included nearly $3 million dollars in his latest budget proposal to be used by Charleston’s Yeager Airport, according to Justice’s Chief of Staff Mike Hall.
Hall made the announcement at Yeager’s board meeting Wednesday where he told members, “this airport is really important to the economy and to the state.”
It’ll be up to the state Legislature to approve the funding, but Yeager Airport Director Terry Sayre said it would certainly help.
“The governor sees the benefit of potential economic development here at the airport and in order to have businesses, you got to have air service,” Sayre said.
The money would likely be used toward construction on the airport’s hillside that collapsed nearly three years ago.
Since the collapse, airport officials have been tied up in litigation over who should pay for the damages.
“That’s a heavy lift for us right now since we haven’t got funds from our lawsuit at this time,” Sayre said. “We need these funds to get the project finished on time. We need to get it rebuilt this year.”
In September, the Federal Aviation Administration granted the airport about $13.5 million to start work on Yeager’s overrun safety area. Sayre said the airport will be seeking additional funds for the entire project, which is expected to cost around $25 million.
Blocks for a new Engineered Material Arresting System (EMAS) bed will be delivered by this October. Part of the EMAS area, which is meant to improve safety at the end of the runway in the event of an aircraft overrun, was destroyed in the Mar. 2015 slip.
Because the runway length had to be shortened due to the damage, Sayre said it has impacted some flights.
“We lost Dallas-Fort Worth service because we had to shorten the runway after the collapse, so we’d like to get that direct flight back to Dallas,” he said. “We think that if we get the EMAS system in and our runway length back, we’ll have a chance to attract a low cost carrier at that time and hopefully get some other direct flights.”
The airport plans to announce a low bidder for the project after Feb. 13.
Construction is expected to start in a few months.
“We expect to put out a notice to proceed sometime in mid to late March or early April. That’s our goal right now,” Sayre said.