Airport Advisory Board

AGENDA Airport Advisory Board Tuesday, July 28, 2020 7:00 p.m. Location 3232 Pleasant Street West Community Hangar DeKalb, Illinois 60115 A. Roll Call B. Approval of Agenda – Additions / Deletions C. Public Participation D. Approval of Minutes – June 23, 2020 E. Old Business 1. Illinois Department of Transportation/Division of Aeronautics Aircraft Counting Study. Airport Manager’s Summary: The General Aviation Recording Device (GARD) traffic counts system had to be adjusted a couple of times for better clarity of the recorded transmissions. Currently our busiest days are Thursdays, followed by Wednesdays, Mondays and then the weekend days. Based on an estimated 3 transmissions per operation (TPO), our total June aircraft operations were approximately 2,844, and so far for July operations have been 2,957. The counts will be audited throughout the year, so if we end up being less than 3 TPO then your operations will go up and if it is more than 3 TPO, the operations will go down. 2. DKB-4331 – Taxiway – Rehabilitate T-Hangar Pavements, Airport Entrance Road, and Auto Parking Lot. Airport Manager’s Summary: IDOT has released a line item to close State Block Grant 105 per the FAA’s request, which means we will receive direct deposits in the amounts of $8,599.33 from the FAA and $429.96 from the State toward the total project costs. The remainder of the funds will be released when Grant 111 is closed; closure date and amounts are yet to be determined. 3. DKB-4853: CARES Act. Airport Manager’s Summary: We received the executed agreement on Friday, July 24, so it is ready to obligate for our reimbursement for a Frontier FM1015R mower deck, $19,500.00 and Airport Manager’s salary, $10,500.00, which totals the allotted award of $30,000.00. IDOT has indicated that payments should be processed quickly following their shut-down for its fiscal year shutdown, July 1-30. Airport Advisory Board Agenda July 28, 2020 Page 2 of 5 4. DKB-4556: Relocate & Replace the Existing NAVAID Units on Runway Ends 2, 20, & 27. Airport Manager’s Summary: The forms for the City to execute the agreement are being finalized in the next week and will be sent to IDOT for their execution along with our City local share obligation ($37,646.00) and then the project will be made active for construction to commence. 5. DKB-4800: Resurface Runway 2-20. Airport Manager’s Summary: This project is slated for bid on the July 31, 2020 IDOT letting. I received an update from Crawford, Murphy and Tilly, our engineering firm, that they have received inquiries from potential bidders, which is a good sign that we might receive competitive bids. I reached out to CMT for further input on the possibility of leaving a portion of R9-27 open during the intersection construction. CMT reiterated that it would be cost prohibitive for the required engineering and FAA certifications for the relatively short duration that both runways will be closed during the intersection construction. 6. AWOS (Automated Weather Observation System). Airport Manager’s Summary: The asset insurance is still being investigated. The AWOS land line has not been troubleshot by the AWOS-contracted technician as of yet due to COVID-19 restrictions to his travel. F. New Business None. G. Reports a. Airport Manager’s Report. Our NIU Summer Intern, Dylan Moffitt, has been working 30 hours per week and will be with us through August 7. He has accomplished many tasks that I assigned and has worked with our IT department for revamping our website and Facebook presence. He is currently on a brief medical leave, but is able to work from home, so I am having him evaluate our hangar rents against other regional airports and our land leases to determine if our rates are competitive and if they could be raised. Dylan worked with our IT department to review all airport engineering plans and layouts for scanning and archival purposes. Dylan worked with me to redesign our DeKalb Flight Center business card for distribution at the Line Service Desk. Dylan and I collected the required quarterly stormwater discharge samples and sent the report of findings to the State. Both samples were without contaminates. The State contact person said on-site visits would resume in July. Dave Dahlburg, Line Service Technician, rescinded his resignation, which was a relief! To keep staff availability at a comfortable level, I requested one of our line service technicians, Jeff Flanigan, to resign, as he is not living in the area currently and hasn’t been local for  Airport Advisory Board Agenda July 28, 2020 Page 3 of 5 approximately six months. We have 20 applicants and are inviting six of them to interview next week. I spent many hours gathering information for the IDOT State Aviation System Plan worksheet, which led me to reviewing tenant leases where I discovered disparate language across common hangar space leases. I had a 3.5-hour Teams meeting with the two CMT representatives who are the project leads. They were most helpful filling in blanks and were able to provide me with electronic data and charts for airport layout plans that I have not found so far. The submitted data will assist the IDOT Division of Aeronautics in planning for airport improvements and result in an updated Illinois Airports Economic Impact Study to be released Summer, 2021. Sycamore Kiwanis requested social-distancing compliant meeting space in our Community hangar, and met on Tue., Jul. 21, 6-7:30pm. They provided their own chairs and cleaned the restroom at the end of their meeting time. We charged them $30 for afterhours staffing. They would like to meet again in October and keep the option open for using the hangar as a back-up for inclement weather for their other scheduled gatherings at a park. On Monday, July 13, Andy Raih, Public Works, arranged a roll-off dumpster for taking the unwanted items out of the Community Hangar and the end storage unit of Hangar E5. We filled it in short order! On Tuesday, July 21, I exhibited at the DeKalb Chamber of Commerce Drive-thru Family Fun Fest at Hopkins Park. I had printed and distributed close to 400 paper airplane kits between 4pm and 6:30pm. I promoted our DeKalb Air Park Picnic Place and Airplane Viewing, for which many families expressed surprise and genuine interest. Our replacement PTZ Camera for the south ramp has been ordered. b. Flight and Ground Operations. Airport Manager’s Summary: June fuel sales as recorded: Month 100LL gal Sales JetA gal Sales June, 2020 9,651 $31,938.72 5,264 $13,759.35 vs. June, 2019 5,658 $24,763.95 6,186 $19,481.65 NOTE: Fuel prices have been significantly lower in 2020 due to crude oil prices falling during the COVID-19 crisis. Our margin fluctuates around $.75-80/gallon for 100LL self-serve (+$.40/gallon full service) and $1.00-$1.25 for JetA. Our DeKalb Flight Center Line Service technicians are utilizing our new fuel sales spreadsheet and offering edits, as it is a working document. We have communicated with Fly America regarding our paper reports to them and they are receptive to using our electronic tracking for accounting verification of their fuel purchases, which are paid monthly. We have seen an uptick in the number of corporate/charter and significant numbers of flight training and transient aircraft purchasing both AvGas and Jet fuel, evidence of greater movement following lifted restrictions in the Governor’s Stay at Home order Phase 4. Airport Advisory Board Agenda July 28, 2020 Page 4 of 5 On Tuesday, June 30, following the Facebook Data Storage Center announcement, the ABC WLS/Channel 7 helicopter landed and took 70 gallons of JetA fuel on their way to the Facebook construction site. Residual benefits are occurring immediately! On Thursday, July 2, a ComEd helicopter did multiple flights and took a total of 157 gal JetA after 4 flights over the Facebook site. I gave the two pilots and Roger’s Helicopter line service staff a tour of our Maintenance Hangar. They took photos and gave my contact information to the folks higher up the chain to have them contact me regarding possible relocation of their maintenance and flight ops from Joliet (JOT) to DKB. I also received a call from a drone operator, contracted by Mortenson construction company, to overfly the FB site for weekly progress photos/video. Due to the significant air traffic at the time, he was not able to accomplish his mission. I have met with him and gave instruction for navigating the airspace when he schedules his drone flights. On Tuesday, July 14, a Shaw Media drone pilot called and notified me of his anticipated drone flight over FB site on Thursday. On Thursday, July 16, Target’s Gulfstream 560 landed at 8:50am, 5 passengers deplaned and drove to their DeKalb distribution center in 4 Enterprise rental cars, purchased 400 gallons of JetA, and departed around 11:30am. This is an example of one of the largest corporate jets for which our airfield is designed. Also that day, Meijer’s Cessna Citation 680 landed at 11am, parked on the south ramp (social distancing from Target!), the passengers deplaned and drove to their Sycamore store in an Enterprise rental car, purchased 450 gallons of JetA, and departed mid-afternoon to fly back to Grand Rapids, MI. On Monday, July 20, the 100LL AvGas fuel farm pump stopped running. Our staff troubleshot, bled the system and released a partial vacuum. Since then we have had three other occurrences. We have called Howard Lee and Sons for technical support and they will be coming for a service call next week. Weed control spraying has been accomplished on ramps, taxiways and runways to reduce the small forests that have sprung up in the pavement expansion joints and cracks this season. I escorted the spray crew the morning of Friday, July 24, while they sprayed both runways. We have scheduled the JetA and 100LL fuel farm drain valve assembly repairs for Friday, July 31, with Mechanical Inc.; one of our line service staff will oversee the work. c. Budget. Airport Manager’s Summary: I am continuing my tracking of all expenditures as they occur to determine appropriate budget numbers for the 2021 FY. I have kept expenditures at a minimum whenever possible. d. Hangar Rentals. I received four additional requests for T-hangar spaces since our last Board meeting. Our list is currently at 14, with two being current tenants who would like to vacate their asphalt floors for concrete floors and/or heated hangars.  Airport Advisory Board Agenda July 28, 2020 Page 5 of 5 T-hangar tenant, Casey Teets, is vacating E5-8 at the end of July and is moving his plane to Aero Lakes, a fly-in community. I revamped our Exit Survey to send to him. I have started contacting those on our wait list to find a replacement tenant; I am waiting for responses. H. Adjournment