Comments and Responses

We hope the information provided will lead to constructive dialog concerning these important issues. All relevant questions and comments submitted to us responsibly (includes your contact information) will be posted below. We encourage everyone to let us know what you think about our approach, especially if you have suggestions that would help us improve our position and ability to manage changes at the Airport responsibly.

Email to:   info@flyproflight.com

“Fly With The Best”

Received on 3/13/2007 from Sam Hobson

Thank you for creating the new website with information on the proposed changes at Renton Airport.

It would be helpful to better understand the plan you're proposing (in response to the RFP) and specifically how it minimizes noise impacts.  Based on my review of your website, you refer to your plan, quickly mention some advantages, but the plan is never shared. 

Thank you.

Sam

Response posted 3/17/2007

Thanks for your positive comments regarding this website. We believe it would be a great next step to release all the RFP responses to the Public for review; however the City of Renton has yet to provide approval to do this. Therefore we are unwilling to release a full copy of our response as we do not want to jeopardize our position with the city in regards to the RFP process.

That said, here is a brief summarization of Pro-Flight’s proposal.

· We recognized the noise issues, and associated responsibilities to the affected communities, from the very beginning.  Every aspect of our response was geared to address this specific issue, while providing profitability to the City over profitability to Pro-Flight. We also included our current operating policies of “normal business hour” operations and after-hours pilot consultation, not changing our approach because of this opportunity.

·  We designed the complex to be flexible in configuration and to promote aviation related businesses over airplanes at every opportunity (such as manufacturing, education and services). Promotion of businesses included reduced monthly rates, as they also require less Pro-Flight FBO services (such as aircraft towing or passenger greeting). Our proposal anticipates a final tenant mix including the following:

· 20 private storage hangars large enough to accommodate aircraft with 55 foot wingspans.  Our market research shows that the primary, initial market would be single and twin engine turboprops such as those made by TBM, Pilatus, and Beechcraft.  These are quiet aircraft and I don’t believe we have ever received a noise complaint concerning these aircraft that regularly use the field, and will be our target market.  VLJs will, of course, be marketed to when they actually go into full scale production.

· 8  70’ X 80’ hangars designed for use by Aviation related businesses.

· 1 100’ X 150’ hangar with attached office space and passenger reception area.  This hangar was designed to store transient aircraft staying overnight or based aircraft on short-term leases.

· We recommended that the City build and maintain ownership of the complex. By taking this approach, the following benefits to the communities are achieved;

· Since Pro-Flight will not have to incorporate the cost of the buildings (which become property of the City at the end of the lease anyway), this reduces the amount of activity required on the airport to be profitable. Since fuel is by far the largest profit center for an FBO, this will eliminate the need for a substantial increase in Airport traffic in order to achieve success.

· An FBO that pays to have these structures built will require an extremely long-term lease in order to achieve profitability when incorporating these costs (30-50 years). That is a long time to live with something that may not prove to be acceptable to the Community. Alternatively, our approach encourages short-term leases on each space, so that a “bad” solution can be easily and quickly replaced.  In this manner, portions of the solution can be changed, without having to change the entire complex’s operation, which would be impossible with long-term leases.

· The design is flexible and does not create any negative limitations; i.e. VLJs can be accommodated, as well as other aircraft types such as turboprops, which currently exist, and provide the lowest noise impact.

· A single, private entity able to determine the occupancy of the entire complex will likely create conflicts of interest with other entities that the community may prefer to operate out of the space.

· City ownership would allow the greatest control and maximum benefit to the community.  We believe the facilities should be open to public use like any other City Property. For instance, community groups or the City might benefit from the availability of the Conference room and equipment in the main building

· We proposed that the City allow our company to manage the facility in a somewhat unconventional fashion.

· Currently, our hours of operation are 8:00am to 9:00pm.  When aircraft arrive or depart after those hours and require our services, we charge a substantial “Call Out Fee”. In our RFP response, Pro-Flight promoted these fees would go toward community programs. Pro-Flight makes the commitment that we will discourage late night operations, as we do now.  FBOs at Boeing Field operate 24/7/365.

· Pro-Flight’s compensation for managing the complex would be based on management and service fees, not fuel sales. Any fuel supplier would be allowed to sell fuel to aircraft using this public facility. This is a departure from the traditional, single FBO, monopolized fuel sales. By shifting the main profit center away from fuel sales, the need to substantially increase transient traffic would be eliminated.

· Don’t Get Me Wrong. Pro-Flight will increase fuel sales and thus profits by whatever action is taken with space that Boeing is releasing, as they didn’t buy any fuel from us in the past. The changes at the airport are going to increase aircraft operations at Renton, but we are also insisting that all Fuel Merchants be provided a level playing field for the opportunities that will arise.

· The most significant feature of our proposal is that Pro-Flight is already established on the field and we are already the largest fuel supplier.  This required us to make significant investments already. If any other entity comes to the field they will be forced to dramatically increase traffic, fuel sales and therefore noise, to recoup these further investments and turn a profit.

· Pro-Flight Aviation will thrive regardless of how the available space is eventually used.  However, it is very core to our beliefs to do this in a responsible manner.

I hope this helps give a better understanding of Pro-Flight’s concept.  I appreciate your interest and welcome open discussion with anyone regarding these issues.

 

Bernie