General Aviation Airports Unauthorized Land Use Highlights Need For Improved Oversight And Enforcement PDF Download

To increase the capacity of the nation's airport facilities and maintain the aviation infrastructure, the federal government has made financial grants or transferred federal land to about 2,000 of the almost 18,000 general aviation airports in the United States Since 1982, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has provided about $4.7 billion in financial grants to general aviation airports. About 350 such airports have received land that is surplus to federal needs, while about 100 have received land that was not considered surplus but was transferred to support the airports' needs. To receive this federal assistance, airports must agree to abide by a number of requirements designed to ensure that the public interest is served. Among other things, airports must obtain approval from FAA before altering the use or ownership of airport land and must use airport revenues only for their operation, maintenance, or development FAA is responsible for monitoring airports' compliance with these requirements and, when requirements are not met, for enforcement. As requested in the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Report on the Airport Improvement Program Reauthorization Act of 1998 this report evaluates (1) FAA'S monitoring of general aviation airports' compliance with federal land-use requirements and (2) FAA's use of enforcement tools to resolve cases of noncompliance. To obtain information on FAA'S oversight of land at general aviation airports, we visited 14 and surveyed the remaining 9 FAA field offices responsible for overseeing airports' compliance.