The author of the Guest Commentary regarding the Naples Airport which appeared in the Naples Daily News on April 9, 2006 organized his commentary around six brief statements he referred to as “little known facts.”
Based on those “facts,” the author came to the conclusion that the airport, by raising various charges to airport customers, should be able to provide lease payments of $10 million annually to the City of Naples. According to the author’s vision, this flow of funds would then open a door to improved services and lowered taxes for Naples citizens.
The NAA Board of Commissioners, after thorough review and analysis by the airport’s operations, finance and legal staff has concluded the majority of the author’s “little known facts” are erroneous, misleading, or unsubstantiated. His estimates of the revenue which would be derived from various customer charges are equally flawed, and would not remotely produce the revenue envisioned. (See detailed fact assessments below.)
The Naples Airport Authority wants to make a real and hard fact very clear to all those taken astray by this article. The author’s plan to transfer millions of airport generated funds to the City of Naples violates established federal law. Neither the City Council nor the Naples Airport Authority are empowered to change this circumstance. There is a clear record of rigorous enforcement on the part of federal authorities of potential revenue diversion by airports and airport communities.
It is regrettable the author did not incorporate intellectual rigor and the exercise of even rudimentary due diligence before submitting a commentary which, in effect, urges the City Council and the Airport Authority to violate the law. A straightforward courtesy call to the Airport Director or any Naples Airport Authority Board Commissioner would have surfaced these issues of facts and of the law. No such call was received.
It is regrettable the author grossly misled the citizens of Naples in this article.
Ernest W. Linneman
Chairman, Naples Airport Authority
“FACTS” from Naples Daily News (NDN) Guest Commentary April 9, 2006 authored by Allan Parker and a candid assessment of these “facts”.
“FACT”
The Naples Airport Authority pays the City of Naples $1 per year to lease 732 acres of land worth between $3 billion and $5 billion.
ASSESSMENT
This statement is simultaneously erroneous, misleading and unsubstantiated. The current assessment on the tax rolls for the airport property is $184 million. This assessment reflects its current use as an airport. To even approach the value asserted as “fact” every acre would have to be prime commercial real estate or some higher value use. Scott Cameron, a Neapolitan since 1974, and a respected commercial real estate broker, has stated, “That is grossly overestimating the value and is almost three times the most expensive small commercial parcels on the Tamiami Trail”(NDN 4/16/06). The value figure is obviously unsubstantiated.
Further, since a multi-billion dollar value would clearly require the airport land be used for some imaginary purpose other than an airport, the argument that the existing airport should make lease payments justified by a non airport value is nonsensical. This illogic demonstrates the lack of intellectual rigor which characterizes the article and serves to mislead readers.
Finally, in a demonstration of his unwillingness to perform even rudimentary due diligence and access readily available information, the author is incorrect when he states the airport leases 732 acres of land. The accurate and readily available figure is 637 acres. The remaining 95 acres were purchased by the Airport Authority. If one intends to hold oneself out as an oracle, accuracy is critical to credibility. What else did the author get wrong? Plenty….it turns out.
“FACT”
The Naples Airport Authority pays no property taxes.
ASSESSMENT
The author’s statement is very precisely correct AND totally irrelevant. The fact is, because of the airport’s existence city, county and state treasuries benefited by over $1.2 million last year through the direct payment of fuel and sales taxes, property taxes (by on airport businesses) and by underwriting the costs of airport located and community available fire/rescue, security and EMS services.
This figure does not count sales or personal property taxes paid by airport businesses nor does it value in any way the airport’s contribution to Mosquito Control, the Collier Sheriff’s facility, the Collier Recycle facility or the Humane Society. Further, it does not value the creation of a significant portion of the Gordon River Greenway project and the granting of easements to extend the Greenway to the northern boundary of the airport. The author has gone out of his way to mislead the people of Naples on this “fact”.
“FACT”
Over 90 percent of all passengers use private aircraft, mostly jets. The Airport is a “private use” facility.
ASSESSMENT
Since no data is collected on how many passengers fly on which type of private aircraft at the Airport this “fact” is unknowable. One can only deduce that the author created it in some way.
What IS KNOWN is that last year over 66,000 passengers arrived or departed from the Naples Airport on scheduled airlines or charter airlines and therefore the Airport cannot be correctly identified as a “private use facility”. The author’s “fact” cannot be substantiated (no data exists to support it) and his conclusion is wrong and misleading.
“FACT”
“Landing fees are zero, passenger charges are zero, car parking is free and overnight aircraft parking fees are trivial.”
ASSESSMENT
The Authority imposes fees upon its users in the form of aircraft parking fees, customer facility charges, passenger facility charges, hangar rents, land leases and, most important, fees associated with the sale of aviation fuel. According to industry studies, the Authority Airport actually charges higher rents and fees than many other airports. The author’s “fact” is incomplete and misleading.
“FACT”
“Jet traffic has been growing at the compound rate of 20% per year.”
ASSESSMENT
In fact 2006 year to date total operations are DOWN 11% from last year and compound growth of operations over the last decade is 4.7% .Using the volatility of year to year comparisons has long been discredited as an appropriate way to measure long term trends. The author’s statement is blatantly misleading.
“FACT”
REVENUE PROJECTIONS
Landing fees
“Based on the NAA’s fiscal year 2006 budget, an average landing fee of $100 based on weight, would yield $8 million.”
ASSESSMENT
There is no historical, actual aircraft landing weight distribution data for the Airport in the 2006 budget and, in fact, no such data is collected. Therefore, how an average landing fee of $100 per aircraft based “on weight” can be calculated, is in the realm of mystery.
However, using the Airport’s published landing fee rate for airline aircraft ($1.25 per thousand lbs.)* and using that to calculate the weight of an “average” aircraft needed to obtain the author’s “average”, “weight based” $100 landing fee, results in the “average” aircraft weighing 80,000 lbs. The Airport does not permit aircraft weighing more than 75,000 lbs to land in Naples!
The author’s $8 million revenue projection is clearly not based on any weight data in the 2006 NAA budget. It is unsubstantiated and demonstrably absurd.
“FACT”
REVENUE PROJECTIONS
Embarkation Charge
“A $4.50 embarkation charge for all passengers would add approximately $1.5 million (to revenues).”
ASSESSMENT
Based on actual fiscal year 2005 passengers enplaned, the proposed $4.50 “embarkation charge” would yield $135,000 not the “approximately $1.5 million” as stated by the author. This is another erroneous and unsubstantiated “fact.”
*NOTE: The airport is currently waiving collection of our commercial aircraft landing fee as a part of our package of incentives and guarantees made to Delta Airlines. The fees have been collected in the past and the waiver is currently due to expire in September.