What troubling news that the Federal Aviation Administration Center for Management and Executive Leadership is being wooed by Kansas City and several other cities.
The FAA center in Palm Coast has between 80 and 100 high-paying jobs, and it brings in about 150 people from around the nation every week to be trained. That is substantial economic impact.
The center is located within a city and county still struggling to recover from the recession. Flagler’s unemployment rate is 13.9 percent but slowly improving.
The departure of the facility obviously would not be welcome news for Flagler County. Further, it’s not clear why the FAA believes it would benefit from the move.
The lease on the center is up soon, and the FAA, for now, is only considering new cities within 25 miles of major airports. That would knock Palm Coast off the list of places being considered because the city is about an hour from the closest large airport. yet, as U.S. Rep. John Mica, R-Winter Park, told the FAA, Palm Coast is near the international airports of Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Sanford and Orlando.
That is not good enough for the feds. The FAA is eyeing Kansas City, Milwaukee and Orlando because they are closer to more airports. Kansas City in particular is offering incentives to a building owner to fix up a property the FAA could perhaps use. It’s doubtful that Palm Coast could match Kansas City with incentives, given that Kansas City has 10 times its budget.
The economic loss from this potential move also would be troublesome for Volusia County. The FAA leases the hotel-like facility — with classrooms, lodging, a cafeteria and other amenities — from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. While ERAU does not handle the training there, the university receives about $1 million a year from the FAA lease.
ERAU has told city leaders it could upgrade and modernize the center. Also, having an aviation-based university as a partner should be a plus for the FAA.
The center, leased since 1987, is worth defending at its current location. Mica, the influential chairman of the U.S. House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, seems ready to fight the move based on cost-effectiveness guidelines.
“We are going to force a very aggressive look at the costs involved and the economic impact and the expenses incurred in trying to relocate this facility,” Mica said Thursday.
Palm Coast Mayor Jon Netts has also called U.S. Sens. Marco Rubio and bill Nelson to enlist their help.
It’s perplexing that the federal government would pull up stakes from Palm Coast and Flagler County when there is so much economic distress there.
Although federal officials often talk of improving the employment situation, they sometimes do more harm than good. A few weeks ago, President Barack Obama stood on Main Street in Walt Disney World and spoke to Floridians about his efforts to stabilize the job market of the tourism-dependent Sunshine State.
But on matters related to federal jobs — job opportunities the federal government actually controls — the administration appears deaf to Florida’s concerns.
The loss of so many jobs at NASA along the Space Coast and now the potential loss of the FAA center is perplexing, given that aerospace knowledge is a strength of this region.
It’s hard to see how the nation would benefit from moving the well-established FAA center. we hope Congressman Mica and other Florida leaders will redouble their efforts to keep the facility in Palm Coast.