At Monday’s meeting, the board authorized BDA Executive Director Joe B. Montez to enter into a limited fixed base operator contract between the authority and Beeville Air Services Inc.
The company already provides similar services for the Beeville Municipal Airport.
The company will provide services in two phases, starting with providing fuel and maintaining a fuel farm at the Chase Field Industrial and Airport Complex.
To enable the company to sell fuel at Chase, the board authorized Montez to purchase a 12,000-gallon, above-ground fuel tank for the storage of jet fuel. The tank will cost the authority $85,000.
Montez said phase two of the two-phase agreement calls for BAS to provide additional airport services like mechanics, aircraft tie-downs and aircraft rentals.
The Beeville company will complement the expanding airport operation at the former naval air station. Work is underway in upgrading the paving and lighting of Chase Field’s main runway.
That work is being financed by the Dan A Hughes Co. of Beeville. The oil and gas company is building a new hangar at the parking apron near the control tower built by the U.S. Navy before it left the facility in the early 1990s. The Hughes firm plans to keep its corporate jet at the hangar.
The largest aircraft operation at the industrial and airport facility is Sikorsky Aerospace Maintenance, which rebuilds and repairs Sikorsky helicopters from around the world.
That company is expanding operations at the facility. It occupies two former Navy hangars and a maintenance, supply and shop building located between the two hangars.
During the meeting, BDA board members authorized Montez to sign a change order with F&W Electrical Contractor Inc. for work that company is doing on installing runway lights.
That order authorizes the company to provide an additional $34,700 in lighting improvements to an existing contract.
The board also voted unanimously to approve an agreement with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to use some of the parking apron and possibly the crosswind runway pavement as a staging area for its disaster management operations on the Texas Gulf Coast.
Daniel Escobar, emergency response coordinator for TCEQ, said he doubted that Chase Field would be used as anything but a control center for emergency operations. He did not think that any hazardous materials would be kept on the property. However, Escobar said the state uses special contractors to handle hazardous materials and even if they are stored at Chase Field, they would be completely and professionally removed in a short time.
Montez expressed concern about the wear and tear on the entrance road to Chase Field. He said the road suffered extreme wear last year when emergency response teams from the federal and state governments parked about 600 buses, ambulances and tractor-trailer rigs on the parking apron south of Hangar 26.
“We want to participate but not if it’s going to destroy the only road we have where people can get in and out,” Montez said.
Escobar assured the board that the TCEQ would see to it that the entrance road would be repaired to its original condition after any use for emergency response needs.
“We’re in it for the long haul,” Escobar said, reminding the board that the Chase location is ideal for a control center for emergency operations following a hurricane or other coastal disaster.
Other federal and state disaster agencies will be required to enter into an agreement with the BDA board before they can use the facilities again.
The board also heard a report from Jim Eller, senior vice president and investment officer with Wachovia Securities.
He said the BDA’s investments actually had ended on a positive note but he encouraged the board to authorize Montez to move some of the authority’s cash to bonds.
Montez said he would take the recommended action in the near future.
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