MACHIAS, Maine — Voters approved spending $7,500 for airport improvements at a special town meeting on Nov. 25 and will be asked in the near future to OK borrowing $150,000 toward a planned expansion.
An estimated $4,000 to $5,000 of the $7,500 will be used to replace 23 runway lights, Mike Radeka, airport committee chairman, said Friday. The remainder of the money will be used to improve the small building which is used as an airport terminal.
“We have to take care of all the safety issues first,” he said. “That’s what our priority is.”
He said these improvements should be made fairly quickly because the committee wants to get them done before winter.
The special meeting, which lasted about 10 minutes, was attended by a handful of residents and the selectmen.
Another special town meeting will be set in the near future so voters can decide whether to authorize the town to borrow $150,000 interest-free from Machias Savings Bank, Radeka said.
During the regular selectmen’s meeting held right after the special town meeting, Manager Christina Therrien said Machias Savings Bank has agreed to the loan. No date was set for the special meeting at which voter approval will be sought.
The money would be reimbursed by the Federal Aviation Administration, which, in Maine, allocates $150,000 per small airport per year through the Airport Improvement Program, Radeka said.
The Machias airport never had any plans for using the available federal money in the past, he said.
But now, the town, which officially runs the airport, wants to use the funding to pay for engineering costs for getting “aerial easements” so that trees can be cut down on land adjacent to the airport for future expansion.
“That will get us kind of jump-started toward our ultimate goal of getting another 600 feet of runway,” Radeka said.
The airport committee, which was formed last spring, set a goal of extending the runway by 600 feet so it will be long enough to accommodate a LifeFlight fixed-wing aircraft.
Radeka said he did not know how much it will cost to expand the runway or when the work will be done.
“We know what we want to do … we just need a price from a contractor,” he said.