It appears that the City of Tallahassee’s marketing efforts of available land around the Tallahassee Airport is about to bear fruit.
The agenda for next week’s city commission meeting has two items that seeks approval from elected officials to allow city staff to commence negotiations with private companies that are proposing a $145 million in private investment at the Tallahassee Airport.
The first item is related to Burrell Aviation, LLC
Tallahassee Reports first reported about Burrell Aviation’s interest in the Tallahassee airport back in March. The business model of the Apsen, Colorado based company calls for entering into long-term leases, typically 30 to 50 years, with municipally owned airports.
The agenda notes that Burrell Aviation Tallahassee, LLC is proposing to lease approximately 32 acres of airport property and to construct approximately 388,000 square feet of facilities.
The project consists of a proposed mixed-use development that includes general aviation, maintenance repair and overhaul, and air cargo / freight distribution facilities.
The development is expected to provide approximately $35,000,000 of private investment and result in over $14,000,000 of new revenue to the Tallahassee Airport during the term of the agreement.
In addition, the agenda item states that the proposed development would result in the creation of approximately 489 direct, 100 indirect and 149 induced jobs, for a total of 738 permanent jobs and over 400 temporary construction jobs during the development with a total economic impact exceeding $140 million, as projected by Florida State University’s Center for Economic Forecasting and Analysis.
The second item on the agenda is related to a project subject to a non-disclosure agreement which was signed by the City of Tallahassee on June 30, 2021.
City staff is seeking approval from elected officials to negotiate and execute an agreement with “Project Alpha” stakeholders for the lease and development of Tallahassee Airport property.
According to the agenda, the company behind Project Alpha proposes to lease approximately 57 acres of Tallahassee Airport property for the development of approximately 583,250 square feet of aircraft facilities. The development will provide approximately $110,000,000 of private investment and will result in over $30,000,000 of additional revenue to the airport during the term of the agreement.
In addition, the project would result in the creation of approximately 524 direct, 235 indirect and 226 induced jobs, for a total of 985 permanent jobs and over 1,000 temporary construction jobs during the development with a total economic impact exceeding $450 million, as projected by Florida State University’s Center for Economic Forecasting and Analysis.
The company behind Project Alpha is working closely with the Office of Economic Vitality and Space Florida to take advantage of financing and tax incentive opportunities.
David Pollard, the Tallahassee International Airport Director, told Tallahassee Reports that more details about the projects will be presented at Wednesday’s Tallahassee City Commission meeting.
The Master Plan
The Tallahassee International Airport completed an updated Master Plan in 2019. The primary objective of the Master Plan is to produce a 20-year development program that “would maintain a safe, efficient, economical, and environmentally acceptable aviation facility, while also identifying recommendations for improving customer service and technology.”
In addition, the Tallahassee International Airport advertises and markets available land in targeted aeronautical and non-aeronautical sectors.
As a result of these efforts, the agenda item notes that the Tallahassee International Airport was approached by businesses interested in development opportunities.
So how much is this going to cost us as taxpayers?
** John Dailey
It's still part of The Gang Who Couldn't Shoot Straight and they are trying to pass themselves off as aeronautical experts. That's who should be on the board instead of Scott Dailey. I'm expecting an FBI agent to jump out at any moment and yell freeze you're all under arrest and pass out indictments.
Did Delta Airlines ever renew their membership with the Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce after they canceled it under the tenure of Mayor Marks? Legitimate companies can smell corruption a mile away and won't have any part of it.
Lest we forget Scott Maddox was also very interested in wheeling and dealing commercial interests at the airport.
Now his middleman works for Dailey and Bellamy’s campaigns for some reason, all the way from St. Pete.
Meanwhile his hand-picked City Manager is strongly supported by Dailey. After the elections he will probably go work for developers like Rick Fernandez does, or for FPL.
NE Moderate,
You are 100% on the money!
TR folks: let’s be very careful about this airport business.
Dailey has long coveted the airport, stacking the board with cronies and even appointing himself as chair which has never happened before.
The agenda item I’m seeing online (mind you his aide now works on these, making $130k in city manager’s office) is very very loosey goosey, and may authorize millions without any oversight after this vote.
Red flags all around with this Chambercrat priority.
Does Alpha = Atlas Air Worldwide the company Amazon leases there air cargo planes from and is located in Purchase, New York?
."Tallahassee's Bing Energy creating jobs and making global connections."
Tallahassee Democrat 8/4/11
"Bing Energy filed for bankruptcy, sue's inventors."
Tallahassee Democrat July 7th 2016
"Nearly $2 million in tax breaks from the state, along with matching money from the city and county, never materialized."
Another investment with ties to China?
Does Hunter Biden sit on the board?
They need to explain the China ties, also if it is even allowed regarding security issues for our country.
As for project Alpha the big secret just happens to be signed off on a year ago and comes out prior to a campaign election raises flags and usually nothing ever good comes from nonsense like that.
In my opinion the only thing the mayor has done is mis-spent and mismanaged taxpayer dollars for his special interests.
Well, I recommend being cautious with Burrell. And if I was Mac Langston/Flightline, Millionaire and Aero Assoc, my concern would be getting screwed in the deal. It wouldn't be the first time the city screwed an airport business...just ask Eddie Hudson/Hudson Aviation.
Staffing the air traffic control facility 24 hours would require an additional $500,000.00 per year in salary alone. And I'm sure the neighborhood will hate jets flying over their homes all night. BTW, changing noise abatement procedures is a real big deal..."a Federal Case".
In the early 1990's United Airlines got the State of Indiana to float a bond to built them a state of the art maintenance facility. United lead the state to believe the new facility would provide hundreds of new high paying jobs. In the end, the facility was never completed and thousands lost their jobs. United closed down a couple years later.
The decision will be made by a lot of people with very little aviation experience. I've said it before, if you want to make a million dollars in aviation, start with two million and know when to quit.
What has the city done right?:
What has Leon Co done right?
Our local government is wasting tax dollars on stupid stuff like "the civil rights museum".
Does project Alpha smell like mangos to anyone?
"Burrell is the parent company of Diversified Investments. Burrell Group who is tied Dongpo Capital A private investment platform linked to China."
Given the opportunity I normally join the usual commenters and bash the COT, however, this time I think they got it right. The future for big revenue at TLH is in air cargo and the repair and maintenance of aircraft. TLH is well positioned for cargo to be distributed via I-10 / I-75 ground transportation and there is lots of room for aircraft repair / maintenance hangers as well as warehouses for storage and distribution of goods brought in by air. Think bigger than a few cheeks in the seats going to visit granny in Topeka...that ain't where the money is. COT screws up a lot of things but this isn't one of them.
How many people have been shot while John Dailey has been sitting around cutting a ribbon at the airport?
"City staff is seeking approval from elected officials to negotiate and execute an agreement with “Project Alpha” stakeholders for the lease and development of Tallahassee Airport property."
"Stakeholders" - a vague, open-ended term. Aren't we residents of Tallahassee "stakeholders" in this project?
OK, I do have a question……… Since the City does NOT know how to plan for their Future and all they see here are Dollars so they act like Kids in a Candy Store, my question is this……. These Projects, once they are built, that’s it, they are built. What if the Air Port it self needs to expand in 10 Years, 15 Years or in 20 Years, will it be able to? Have you looked at a super large aerial Photo of the Air Port to see where it can grow when it needs to in the future and then where those two projects will be built to see if they will interfere in the Airports future expansion? No part of our Airport should need to be torn down to expand in the Future, it’s NOT the Northwood Mall.
(A couple words had a letter missing so I re did this since I can't do an edit.)
OK, I do have a question...…… Since the City does NOT know how to plan for their Future and all they see her are Dollars so they act like Kids in a Candy Store, my question is this...…. These Projects, once they are built, that's it, they are built. What if the Air Port it self needs to expand in 10 Years, 15 Years or in 20 Years, will it be able to? Have you looked at a super large aerial Photo of the Air Port to see where it can grow when it needs to in the future and then where those to projects will be built to see if they will interfere in the Airports future expansion? No part of our Airport should need to be torn down to expand in the Future, it's NOT the Northwood Mall.
What will happen to the locally owned ‘airport general aviation maintenance facilities ‘ ? Will this put them out of business?