National airports policy

The following two letters are in regard to COPA’s exchange with the Ontario Government and reminder to the Minister of Transport that his National Airports Policy is failing to achieve its objectives.
The issue started when COPA received a package from the Ontario government’s SuperBuild Corporation which proudly stated that they were investing millions in Ontario’s transportation infrastructure, but not mentioning aviation in any way.
COPA wrote to the president of the corporation, David Lindsay, to urge him to consider his responsibilities for investment in air transportation needs within the province.
His response was that the feds take care of all airports and that Ontario’s responsibility is for emergency services in remote areas.
The letters below are COPA’s response to SuperBuild’s letter and a letter sent to Transport Minister David Collenette.
To SuperBuild
Thank you for your letter of July 4th responding to my letter regarding your Annual Report and funding for airports by your corporation.
You are quite correct in your letter when you state that airports fall under the jurisdiction of the federal government but this is limited to safety regulation of all and ownership of only a few of the larger ones (26).
The responsibility for funding them is no longer federal, and in the case of smaller airports, has never been. You may not be aware that the federal government has “walked away” from the funding of airports all over Canada as described in the 1994 National Airports Policy.
Currently the federal government, through Transport Canada, provides only a very small amount of funding to those airports that have scheduled commercial service. The amounts provided to even those airports under the Airport Capital Assistance Program (ACAP) are small and cannot even begin to keep those airports properly maintained.
The vast majority of airports in Ontario have no scheduled commercial air service and cannot qualify for ACAP funding.
These airports provide vital links for their communities in the form of medevac flights, forest fire fighting basing, charter flights, forest patrol, flight training of tomorrow’s airline pilots and maintenance crews, executive and business travel, air tourist flights, recreational flying, civil and military search and rescue bases and hundreds of other uses.
Because the federal government now no longer provides any funding to these airports, they have left it to the provinces and municipalities to pick up the bills.
As you have stated, the policy here in Ontario is to provide funding only for northern and remote airports. This leaves the responsibility for funding all the remaining airports with the municipal governments. Those municipal governments have had so much “downloading” from senior levels of government that they usually have no means left to maintain their airports.
Air transportation is a vital part of moving people and goods around this vast province. Because the federal government has abandoned their responsibilities for funding airports in Canada I would ask you to consider broadening the application of SuperBuild projects to include accepting applications from all airports in Ontario that cannot access the small amount of federal ACAP funding available.
Kevin Psutka, President and CEO
To Transport Minister
Enclosed is some correspondence between myself and Mr. David Lindsay, President of Ontario’s SuperBuild Corporation, concerning responsibilities for airports in Canada.
As you will read, one of the failings of your National Airports Policy is that it assumes that the provinces and municipalities will pick up where the federal government left off in funding and caring for airports.
Ontario, the province with perhaps the most airports in Canada, considers that their responsibility does not extend beyond a few emergency services for remote areas, and that “The Federal Government has a responsibility to invest in our air system and airports to maintain their ability to serve our communities.”
While your Airport Capital Assistance Program goes part way to meeting this statement, it falls well short both in terms of sufficient funding and excluding hundreds of airports that fill a vital service but do not provide scheduled airline service. As airlines continue to rationalize their route structures, fewer airports will qualify for your funding.
You have stated several times to me over the years how proud you are of the National Airports Policy. The correspondence from the Ontario government should serve as a warning that your policy is failing to achieve its objective.
Instead, you have passed the buck to lower levels of government who neither understand their responsibilities or refuse to accept them. I urge you again to rethink the Policy.
Kevin Psutka, President and CEO