Ordinance 3155-2020 was presented to the Kenai City Council on Wednesday, aiming to approve funds for a new sand storage facility at the airport.
The ordinance aims to increase the estimated revenues and appropriations in the Airport Improvements Capital Project Fund, while also accepting a grant from the Federal Aviation Administration, for a new sand storage facility at Kenai Municipal Airport.
City Manager Paul Ostrander offered details on how the city is receiving roughly $1 million more in funds from the FAA than planned, reducing financial stress on the City of Kenai: “So this is sand storage and snow removal equipment storage facility. It’ll be constructed at the Kenai Municipal Airport. The total project cost is just over $2.8 million. It’s a 5,600 square-foot structure. It is quite unique in design because it is a sand storage foundation and the concrete requirements are far beyond anything you’d see in typical construction. What this ordinance does is it appropriates the money for the grant from the FAA – and as you’ll recall, we’ve been waiting for some time to get notification from the FAA on how this funding would work.”
He also delved into how patience in approving this project has paid off for the City of Kenai: “This is a perfect example of how being patient can really pay off because, as you’ll see in the ordinance, we’re getting approximately $1 million more in FAA funding than what we had anticipated. As the FAA closes out their fiscal year, a lot of times there is money in dockets that have been unspent, and they were able to find a lot of that and supplement this project with that. So, the end-result is that the total contribution by the City for this project has decreased substantially. By the time this project is completed, total project costs of approximately $2.8 million, we’re anticipating the total contribution from the City will be under $60,000.”
Ostrander also confirmed that the design of the facility has begun, and that construction can begin as soon as this month – though the developers have a window of completion until October of 2021.
The ordinance passed unanimously.