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Airport takes off

BY CRAIG GILBERT [email protected] Now that renovations are complete, the Sudbury Airport is flying to a new home, but Ward 1 councillor Terry Kett is more concerned with its executive structure.
BY CRAIG GILBERT

Now that renovations are complete, the Sudbury Airport is flying to a new home, but Ward 1 councillor Terry Kett is more concerned with its executive structure.

As part of a number of realignments within the City of Greater Sudbury?s administrative structure, responsibility for the airport will be transferred from Citizen and Leisure Services to Economic Development and Planning.

City CAO Mark Mieto said the move is perfectly timed now that the $6.34 million expansion to the terminal is completed and the airport can play a bigger role as an economic engine.

Getting more stakeholders on the board, he said, will give the board a stronger economic development ?flavour.?

Kett says the move is ?nothing.?

The key to its success lies in the board of directors, which consists of council and the mayor, being allowed to operate independently.

?That?s the part a lot of people on council don?t understand,? he said Friday. ?City council has to trust its own citizens. I want to know if the city (including municipal staff) is ready for that or not.?

Kett campaigned on a shakeup on the airport?s board of directors.

Kett used Winnipeg?s airport as a model.

Its board of directors has only three members of council, and it operates as an independent, not-for-profit corporation, with its own government and
bylaws.

?Winnipeg is probably the best example of a well-run airport in the whole country, and it is community-owned.?

There are lots of pilots, pilot-owners and businesspeople in the city who, with a vested interest in the success of the airport, would be motivated and effective on the board.

If the board becomes a committee of council, Kett fears it will become clogged with ?former councillors and has-beens,? who with no real
responsibility, will become listless and apathetic.

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