The City of Kenai was not among this year’s recipients of a grant that was intended to be used to court direct airline service to Seattle, but city officials are already looking to the possibility of reapplying next year.
City Manager Terry Eubank said, in an administrative report delivered during the Nov. 6 meeting of the Kenai City Council, that the city had been notified “very late last week” of the recipients of this year’s Small Community Air Service Development Grant.
“The city wasn’t one of them,” he said. “It’s disappointing but I don’t know that it should have been completely unexpected.”
Looking at the proposals that did receive grants, Eubank said that all but one included letters of interest from airlines for the project. Based on the timing of Kenai’s effort to make the grant deadline, such a letter wasn’t obtained — “I think that’s our next step.”
This week the city will meet with consultants Volaire Aviation to discuss the path forward, though Eubank said during the meeting on Nov. 6 that the city could work to strengthen its application for next year’s grants.
He said that they discussed the proposal with U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski on Nov. 1, and hope for her support in the future.
“One thing we don’t do at the City of Kenai is give up,” Eubank said. “We will continue working towards this.”
Volaire Managing Partner Jack Penning in June told the Kenai City Council that a study of the Kenai Municipal Airport led to the conclusion that service to Seattle could coexist with existing service at the airport, recapturing people who are choosing instead to drive between the Kenai Peninsula and Anchorage.
Kenai’s effort to apply for the grant, which would have been used to provide a revenue guarantee to an airline to convince them to add Kenai to Seattle service and for marketing of that service, was supported in July by a joint resolution of each of the Kenai Peninsula’s city councils and the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly.
Eubank in August said that if the city couldn’t secure the grant this year it would fall to the city council to decide whether to continue pursuit of the effort — but that the study findings and business case are “strong.”
A full recording of the council’s Nov. 6 meeting, and the June 19 presentation by Volaire to the council, can be found at “City of Kenai – Public Meetings” on YouTube.
Reach reporter Jake Dye at jacob.dye@peninsulaclarion.com.
