The North Carolina Board of Transportation recently decided to allow $5.7 million in state and federal funds to be used for improvements at six state airports.
These improvements will include stormwater planning, safety improvements to open areas around runways and attraction efforts for businesses and their aircraft. Broken down, $675,000 will go to installation of a waterline at Ashe County Airport; $148,500 will go to land acquisition at Dare County Regional Airport; $100,000 to Mid-Carolina Regional Airport for similar services; $162,000 to Lumberton Regional Airport for development of a stormwater master plan; and $692,439 for site preparation and building for the expansion of Wayne Executive Jetport.
However, by far the bulk of funds will be going to Johnston Regional Airport, to the tune of $3,872,000, for site development on a fixed-base operator and maintenance facility.
In some cases, these funds do not represent the full cost of the projects to which they were given, but it represents the state’s efforts to assist their development. In this way, a 2019 North Carolina Department of Transportation report found, they support an industry that brings in 307,000 jobs and generated more than $2.2 billion in tax revenue for the state, including a $52 billion shot into the state economy each year.