Grounds surrounding the Marion County Airport terminal have undergone some tree-clearing work along Cessna Road.JASPER, Tenn. - The state has mandated some trees around the Marion County Airport must come down.
"We're going to be doing a tree-clearing project out at the airport, cut some trees that are in the flight path for the planes coming in and out," County Mayor David Jackson said.
Last year, the board approved the hiring of an engineer for the project, and now the $31,750 bill for that engineering work is due.
At the Marion County Commission's January meeting, Jackson said that amount requires board approval.
"This is a grant that the state will pay 95 percent of," he said. "We pay five percent of the cost."
Commissioner Steven Franklin questioned some of the language in the engineering contract, such as potential charges the county could incur if unforeseen problems arose during the work.
This photo shows the Marion County Airport terminal and of some of the clearing work that has already been done along Cessna Road."They listed everybody on there but their dog to charge if something goes wrong," Franklin said. "I expect them to add a $50 minimum for dog care. Is that normal?"
Jackson said the proposed contract was a normal agreement for engineering work.
"Most of this is paid through the state," he told Franklin. "The state's the ones telling us we've got to take these trees down. It's not the engineer doing it."
"It seems like an awful lot of money to me just to trim a bunch of trees," Franklin said.
Jackson reminded the board that the trees would be removed, not trimmed.
The board voted unanimously to approve the contract.
Commissioner Tommy Thompson there are two areas on which the work would concentrate.
"Some of that tree-trimming is on the ends of the runway," he said.
Grounds surrounding the Marion County Airport terminal have undergone some tree-clearing work along Cessna Road.Marion officials ran into issues last year when it was discovered that some trees at the ends of the runway were home to a protected species of bat.
Thompson said the county had to "jump through all kinds of hoops" to rectify that issue.
More clearing and trimming will be done on each side of Cessna Road, which leads to the airport, and Thompson said that work has been held up for about six months.
The "total plan" calls for some trees to come down on private property, but Jackson said the county would have nothing to do with that.
"We don't want to cut somebody's oak tree out of the front of their house," he said. "We'll take care of everything on airport property."
Thompson said almost every project completed at the airport is done through grants and is typically of little expense to the county's taxpayers.
"Everything we've done out there has been handled that way," he said. "We're not breaking up the taxpayers to do it."
Ryan Lewis is based in Marion County. Contact him at ryanlewis34@gmail.com.