Airport finance panel irons out details on $1.2M 2018 budget

Texarkana Regional Airport is seen in December 2015.
Texarkana Regional Airport is seen in December 2015.

The Texarkana Regional Airport Board's Finance Committee met Friday to iron out details on the airport's proposed $1.2 million budget for 2018.

Airport Director Mark Mellinger presented copies of the budget to board members last week during the board's regular monthly meeting.

Airport officials are looking at tentatively asking the airport's joint owners-Texarkana, Texas, and Texarkana, Ark.-to contribute a proposed combined total of $169,280 to the overall projected budget. Initially, airport board members considered asking both cities for a combined contribution of $166,280, but then decided to ask for an additional $3,000 at the committee meeting.

The amount each city would contribute is based on population. Since the Texas side has about 36,000 residents (about 54.7 percent of the combined population) and the Arkansas side has about 29,900 (roughly 45.2 percent), the Texas side's contribution is tentatively calculated to be about $92,698, while the Arkansas side's comes in at about $76,582. Both calculations are tentative because the Texas side won't approve its fiscal year budget until close to Sept. 30, and the Arkansas side won't be approving its calendar year budget until year's end.

Apart from the cities' contribution, much of the rest of the airport's self-generated traditional income revenue for the budget comes from such areas as parking fees. For next year, airport officials hope to collect about $250,000 in parking fees and about another $250,000 collected from contracts with on-site car rental services.

Airport officials also anticipate collecting about $62,000 in percentages of profit from on-site commercial aviation and jet fuel sales (fuel flowage sales). This amount will be generated by a proposal to increase the airport's percentage of both aviation and jet fuel sales from 3 cents per gallon to 7 cents per gallon.

Besides aviation and jet fuel sales, airport officials are also looking at receiving about $35,000 next year from aviation and jet fuel sales tax, which the state charges but returns to the airport.

Next month, Finance Committee members will present their revised budget to the full board for approval.

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