Vote to change Richmond International Airport services delayed

HENRICO COUNTY, Va. (WRIC) — A vote to potentially change services at Richmond International Airport (RIC) in Henrico County has been postponed.

On Tuesday, July 30, the Capital Region Airport Commission met with Richmond Jet Center and Million Air Richmond on potentially moving from their fixed based operator (FBO) services with the airport.

For decades, both local organizations dealt with maintenance equipment, refueling and deicing of planes for the airport — but RIC President and CEO Perry Miller said proposals submitted by several FBO’s, which included a $30 million investment to improve the facilities, didn’t meet their standards.

“We decided that the best way forward, to get the type of FBO services that this community deserves, was to do it ourselves,” Miller said. “This is an opportunity and has been for us to improve our status in terms of economic development. We’ve been recently named the number one place to do business in the country. I think the FBO service will rise to that occasion.”

In a statement sent to 8News, Richmond Jet Center President and CEO Michael Clarke said that a “government-run monopoly won’t be able to match the agility, the efficiency, the responsiveness of a competitive privately-run FBO like Richmond Jet Center.”

I think it’s also important to point out, by having private FBO ownership, we’ve got skin in the game,” said Clarke in the statement.

Million Air Richmond Owner and Chief Financial Officer Mark Cooke said the entire situation came as a shock.

“We were totally surprised, we were blindsided, we were angry,” Cooke said.

Cooke also said Miller might be underestimating the responsibilities that being an FBO requires — and that the change will ultimately put hundreds of employees at risk.

“Anybody that comes into Richmond, they pull in a plane, whether it’s a small window or whether it’s a big corporate aircraft,” Cooke said. “They need rental cars. They need catering, they need to use the bathroom. They might need their plane clean, they might need newspapers, they need coffee, they need ice. If there’s anything wrong with their aircraft, they obviously need to get it fixed before they can take off.”

The vote is set to take place on Aug. 27.

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