Hillsdale Municipal Airport T-Hangars house 5 T-Hangars per building. Jillian Parks | Collegian
Tenants at the Hillsdale Municipal Airport will pay 50% more to rent hangars starting this summer.
The Hillsdale City Council approved the increase in a 6-2 vote at a Feb. 3 meeting as Acting Mayor Joshua Paladino seeks to move the airport toward financial self-sufficiency. Once the change goes into effect, T-hangars will cost $150 per month to rent while the corporate hangar will cost $800 per month.
“The people of Hillsdale already pay for the airport through their state and federal taxes; they shouldn’t also have to subsidize the airport through their property taxes, especially when Hillsdale has a failing infrastructure system,” Paladino told The Collegian.
The move comes weeks after the council approved $105,000 in repairs to the airport’s T-hangars, a factor that Ward 2 Councilman William Morrisey said played a role in the decision.
“The rental rates hadn’t changed for some time, despite inflation, and the hangars have been upgraded, so an increase was justified,” Morrisey said.
Hillsdale Municipal Airport Manager Ginger Moore said she thinks the rent hike will be a fair price once the repairs are completed.
“Other airports in our classification — Coldwater, Adrian, Sturgis, Marshall — are also charging between $90 and $150/month for a T-hangar with sliding doors and a concrete slab surrounded by dirt,” Moore said.
With the added income from the new rates, the airport repairs should pay for themselves in about eight years, according to Paladino.
While he voted in favor of the 50% increase, Paladino said he originally hoped to pass a steeper rent hike, which would have set the price of T-hangars at $200 per month and corporate hangars at $900 per month.
The proposal would have covered the cost of the hangar repairs in three to four years, according to Paladino.
“I believe the higher rates are viable because both the airport manager and the city manager conceded that, one, there’s a waiting list for airport hangars, and two, hangar tenants keep their leases for years after securing a hangar,” Paladino said. “This indicates a market demand that exceeds supply.”
While the goal should be to make the airport efficient and profitable, taxpayer money put toward the airport is well-spent, according to Moore. After returning from a Michigan Association of Airport Executives convention in Lansing last week, she said all of the managers she spoke with operate airports that take money from general funds.
“The community needs to know that the Hillsdale Municipal Airport is the ‘front door’ to our town and makes a very good first impression on those wanting to do business here,” Moore said. Even if you personally do not use the airport, you may be profiting by businesses who have invested in the town.”
Paladino said his goal is for the airport to become “revenue neutral,” sustaining itself like a private business.
“If the airport were self-sustaining, then Hillsdale’s citizens wouldn’t have to contribute any money to support it,” Paladino said. “The airport will still get all the benefits of being publicly owned — tax-exempt status and massive state and federal grants.”
Even with this goal in mind, Paladino said he is willing to be flexible.
“The airport might lose money in a year,” Paladino said. “That’s fine, but it’s common-sense public policy that we should strive to have publicly owned businesses take as little from the taxpayers as possible.”
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