By Amy Emerson, The Chronicle, 11/29/2001
The Chehalis-Centralia Airport Board will not be purchasing the 75 acres of property at 3110 Airport Road in Chehalis it had hoped to use to expand a dike around the airport.
Instead, the city of Chehalis has just purchased the property as a ''potential site for a wastewater treatment plant,'' said Dave Campbell, Chehalis city manager.
The airport board could not purchase the property because to do so, it required the permission of all three bodies that govern the board -- the Centralia and Chehalis city councils, and the Lewis County Commission.
The city of Centralia was the only government body that would not authorize the purchase.
In late October, Centralia devised a letter of intent that set conditions to which the city councils, the board of commissioners and the airport board all would have had to agree before the property could be purchased.
At that time, Chehalis announced that if all involved parties could not agree to Centralia's letter of intent, Chehalis would purchase the property.
All parties did not agree to the letter of intent, the contents of which were unavailable to The Chronicle this morning.
According to Campbell, the city purchased the property for ''about $365,000.''
Campbell said the Airport Road property is ''one of two sites being evaluated for the wastewater treatment plant.''
The airport's Jerry Otto said now that Chehalis has acquired the property, it may be possible for the city to lease part of the land to the airport board.
''It could be a win-win situation for both of us,'' said Otto.
The airport board, which leases property to businesses such as Kmart and Wal-Mart, is not planning to use the property for further development.
Instead, the property is desired in order to maintain and expand the dike around it, and to expand or redesign the storm water facility to protect the airport's property from flooding, thus solving a drainage problem on downstream properties.
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Amy Emerson covers energy, business and economic issues for The Chronicle. She may be reached by e-mail at aemerson@chronline.com, or by telephoning 807-8231.
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