Charlotte, North Carolina: Tillis Warns Council Ahead of Monday Vote on $2.1 Billion Airport Lease

The Charlotte City Council votes Monday night on a new airline lease that would shape Charlotte Douglas International Airport for the next decade, and a United States senator has warned council members, in public, to leave the airport's independence alone.

Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican who is leaving the Senate, said on the "R&D in the NC" podcast that he would go to the United States Department of Transportation and the administration to create an independent airport authority if anyone "steps out of line and challenges or threatens the independence of that airport." He called the move a "fail safe" he does not want to use but would if necessary, and said he was prepared to "move heaven and earth to create an airport authority" if local officials interfere.

The deal on the table

The council is expected to vote Monday, Nov. 9, on a new Airline Use and Lease Agreement. The proposed agreement with the major carriers runs ten and a half years and would keep the airport's signatory airlines, including American Airlines, committed for the next decade, according to local reporting on the draft.

Airport officials say the deal carries a capital program worth $2.1 billion for terminal, airfield and infrastructure work, known as CLT Beyond, more than four times the size of the program in the prior agreement. The draft rewrites the rules for how gates are assigned and used, and it would give the city a 55 percent share of yearly revenue sharing. The city owns the airport, and the airport pays for itself from aviation revenue rather than local taxes.

Business leaders backing the lease said Thursday, in coverage by WCCB Charlotte, that a deal is critical to keeping Charlotte's status as an American Airlines hub and the annual $40 billion economic impact they credit to the airport. Councilmember Ed Driggs has called it ten more years of a partnership with American that has paid off for the city, and opposes any change in who owns the airport.

The warning, and the record behind it

Tillis made his case on the podcast, hosted by former council members Tariq Bokhari and Larken Egleston. "I have seen city councils destroy airports and have to recover from them," he said. Charlotte is a hub, and in his telling the most profitable hub in American's system, because administrators from Jerry Orr onward ran the airport without government interference, he argued.

The fight over who controls the airport is an old one in North Carolina. In 2013, state lawmakers passed legislation to create an airport authority independent of the City Council, at a time when Tillis was speaker of the state House. After legal fights with the city, a commission replaced the authority, and the Federal Aviation Administration never approved the transfer of control.

Workers are the open question

The agreement has drawn scrutiny over worker pay and conditions, which are not covered in the lease. State law bars the city from intervening in subcontractor pay, but council members have raised those concerns in the run up to the vote. Airport workers and their union have pressed the council to tie better pay and working conditions to the deal. Councilmember Malcolm Graham has said the council can take up worker concerns in committee, including at other city owned venues such as the convention center and the uptown arena.

What happens Monday

If the council approves the lease, the airlines stay committed for a decade and the $2.1 billion building program starts. If the vote slips or the terms change, the argument Tillis previewed moves from a podcast to Raleigh and Washington. Either way, Charlotte decides Monday night who sets the terms at one of the busiest connecting hubs in the country.