CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Officials at Yeager Airport are excited and thankful for the recent announcement by Gov. Jim Justice that the state will provide the necessary funding to build a stand-alone Customs building.
Justice announced on Friday during the commissioning of the new emergency stopping system that $2 million will be provided for a Customs facility that airport officials have been asking for since last year.
Nick Keller, Assistant Director of Yeager Airport, said the airport asked for funding in December 2018 as U.S. Customs has been working without its own facility at Yeager since 2016.
He said U.S. Customs has continued to work only because it knew Yeager was working on funding, but has sent the airport a clear message recently.
“Every state including West Virginia has Customs but U.S. Customs has said if we don’t build the facility, they would stop handling any flights later this year,” Keller told MetroNews.
“That would have meant West Virginia would be the only state in the nation without a Customs port of entry. That’s not a list you want to be on.”
Current Ports of Entry in the United States
Keller said the money, which is coming from the Infrastructure Fund in the Infrastructure Jobs Development Council, will be used to build a facility in accordance with U.S. Customs regulations. This means the facility will have screen equipment and hold rooms and a place to screen passports.
Right now, Keller said it’s a hassle for all parties when international flights land at Yeager.
“They don’t have anywhere to process people,” he said. “They get on the airplane. They don’t have all the screening equipment that they would have at another port of entry. So it creates an officer safety hazard and it is not as good of a process for customs or the passengers.
“It deters people from using the services here because we don’t have the facility.”
Keller said with the building that he projects to break ground and open in Spring 2020 next to the Capital Jet Center, it will create an economic boost for several reasons.
This would put Yeager an even playing field with competitors with having non-stop international flights that won’t have to stop in other location to clear Customs, and this may make flights not destined for the state to stop at Yeager for Customs and to buy fuel at the Jet Center.
Keller expects several hundred international flights a year to come through Yeager once the Customs facility is up and running.
The announcement comes on the heels of the airport finishing a $4 million general aviation roadway that is expected to house Marshall University’s aviation school and host other tenants.
At today’s commissioning ceremony for @YeagerAirport’s EMAS system, I announced my request for $2m from the WV IJDC to fund the construction of a new US Customs building so that Yeager can be an international gateway. https://t.co/pXtJokwztR pic.twitter.com/6B8Fn8q0s9
— Governor Jim Justice (@WVGovernor) July 20, 2019