[8/5/03]An executive of LeTourneau said Monday his company will negotiate with the city to keep Vicksburg Municipal Airport open and hopes for a plan by the first of the year.

Dan McNease, chief executive officer of Rowan Companies Inc., the parent company of LeTourneau Inc., said 1,000 jobs at the company, which builds exploratory oil rigs just south of the city airport, are on the line.

Reading from a prepared statement to the city board, McNease said that it would be less expensive to build the rigs closer to the Gulf of Mexico where they are floated for completion after fabrication here.

“The closure of Vicksburg Municipal can cause great losses in jobs and have a tremendous negative impact on the Vicksburg economy,” McNease said.

LeTourneau has a 50-year plus presence in Warren County, but shut down after building about 50 rigs. Since reopening eight years ago, the company has built three of its largest class of rigs, is building a smaller-class rig and has contracts for more. Each sells for about $200 million.

Don Brown, president of the Vicksburg-Warren County Chamber of Commerce, also spoke at the city board, saying briefly he was there as the Chamber president to support keeping the airport open. It was a Chamber study in 1979 that led to construction of Vicksburg-Tallulah Regional Airport. The rivalry, of sorts, between the two facilities goes back at least 20 years when a commitment was made by four local governments to accept federal money to build VTR as a replacement for Vicksburg Municipal and Scott Field in Tallulah.

“I’m here just to support Mr. Cross and LeTourneau,” Brown said. Donald Cross is in charge of LeTourneau operations here and was at Monday’s meeting with several other businessmen and industrialists

In 1998, LeTourneau joined other plaintiffs in a five-year legal lawsuit against the city following a 2-1 vote to close the municipal airport. Last year, the Mississippi Supreme Court ruled in favor of the city, clearing the way for the new administration to take action regarding the airport.

“When Rowan desired to reopen the LeTourneau shipyard in 1995, Rowan sought and obtained the commitment of the officials of the City of Vicksburg to continue the operations of the Vicksburg Municipal Airport,” McNease said.

“Since that time, each administration including the current mayor, has provided assurances that they would continue to operate that airport; however, some of those promises have been broken,” he added.

City officials have said only that they are looking at options including leasing or selling the 55-year-old facility to the plaintiffs, including LeTourneau.

“I think if they are really about the city and the people that they would work with us any way they can,” said North Ward Alderman Gertrude Young, who had been the sole vote to keep that airport open under the previous administration.

Since a Neel-Schaffer report completed this year and funded by the four of the plaintiffs showed that $630,000 worth of work is needed at the airport in the next two years, along with $3.3 million over the next 10 years, Young has said she will consider voting to close the airport.

“What I’m trying to do is not sink any more money into it,” she said.

Young said she will also consider what McNease said in deciding how she will vote on the fate of the airport. South Ward Alderman Sid Beauman, whose district includes LeTourneau and the airport, said he has not made any decision.

“Until we see what LeTourneau is going to propose I won’t know how I’m going to vote,” Beauman said.

Although city officials took no action on the airport Monday, the board again tabled an agenda item to apply for a $650,000 grant from the Mississippi Development Authority for the airport.

A problem city officials may have with seeking that money is a 1997 agreement between the four owners of the Vicksburg Tallulah Regional Airport that stipulates the city cannot fund or seek funds for the municipal airport.

That agreement, which was signed by former Mayor Robert Walker during the last city administration, also stipulates that Vicksburg would close the municipal airport in 1998.

“The city is trying to accommodate significant industries in our community, but the City of Vicksburg does not have the budget dollars or the ability to continue to operate that airport,” said Mayor Laurence Leyens.

The municipal airport serves several local businesses along U.S. 61 South as well as locally owned private aircraft and flights from out of state. According to a study by GCR & Associates Inc., a private consulting firm contracted by the Federal Aviation Administration, there were a total of 20,725 flights at the airport in 2002.

The same report shows about 1,980 flights at the regional airport in Mound, but airport manager Randy Woods said that number has about doubled this year.

During the litigation, the plaintiffs operated Vicksburg municipal. Since July 1 when a court-ordered injunction was lifted, the city has contracted out the operations on a month-to-month basis.

City officials also said they were in favor of building a new community airport at the Ceres Research and Industrial Park, but Young said that idea is dead.

Leyens said that the only way the city will consider seeking the grant to fund improvements at the airport is if LeTourneau and the other businesses will indemnify the city against any possible legal action.

Work suggested in the study by Neel-Schaffer, which was paid for by four of the plaintiffs, includes rehabilitating the airport, built in 1948, taxiway improvements and land acquisition and clearing for safety improvements.