Barbara Haake is helping lead the way for airport planning and accountability. A resident of Mounds View for 40 years, she has served on Mounds View's City Council, its Planning Commission, its Park and Recreation Commission, and is now serving on its Cable Committee. Ms. Haake has served in the Minnesota State House of Representatives; she is also interested in environmental issues. She believes in giving citizens a voice in their government.

On April 7, 2009 residents met from several area organizations including Concerned Citizens of the North Metro (CCNM) formed by Ms. Haake and other residents and Zero Expansion of Eden Prairie. These groups have begun a collected effort to oppose the 6,000-foot MINOR II airport runways redesignation in law proposed by local aviation transportation planners. (Current law 5,000-foot MINOR airport runways: MS473.641 Subd. 4. Read more at www.ccnm6.com and www.ZeroExpansion.com )

There is strong community opposition to expansion at the reliever airports going back to the 1970's, but there has never been a comprehensive statewide plan that considered and carried out the utilization and promotion of small airports and regional airports around the state.

Thus our groups’ adage: "If there is such strong opposition to something, you need to propose an alternative."

Actually the economic impact premise is just a relocation of current businesses to other suburban areas – it’s just "robbing Peter to pay Paul". It is another faulty premise that one state/city needs to be pitted against the other (i.e. TIF) to "capture" economic growth when all growth benefits the collective body regardless of where it is located within the same state or region.

Study after study by the U of M, General Accounting Office (GAO), to name a few, have identified an underdeveloped regional airline network in Minnesota which has led to capacity issues at MSP. MnDOT recommended other regional airports to be developed so they could absorb additional demand for air service.

We believe there should be a statewide aviation planning group/committee/agency that plans for growth in the state's northwest area, its southern area and the area to the northeast. This is the only way capacity issues can be addressed at MSP in the future.

This means: Northwest ( St. Cloud ), south ( Rochester ) and the northeast ( Duluth ) - ALL of these "areas" could be considered to be the State’s/Regional INTERMEDIATE airports (with the length of runways 5,001 feet long or longer. St. Cloud has a 7,000-foot runway.). There is no need to have another intermediate airport in the Metro's seven-county area.

Currently the very small Twin City Metro Area under MAC's jurisdiction has ONE MAJOR airport, ONE INTERMEDIATE airport and FIVE MINOR airports. The metro area is saturated with options for aviation use. ALL of these SIX "reliever" airports are located within a radius of just about 10- to 15-miles from the Twin Cities' MSP MAJOR airport hub.

Just how saturated should the metro airspace be? SAFETY has to be the main concern and it is not safe to have so many airports within this small Metro area. The problem has been the aviation and transportation planners have concentrated only in the Metro area which consumes the lion’s share of the available aviation dollars. A good indicator of the problem is that 80% of St Cloud area’s commercial passengers drive to MSP because their local regional airport was not as well equipped and does not offer enough flights.

Airport security and safety are not just limited to aircraft activity at reliever airports; it also includes the security of the airport installation itself (information from Homeland Security). Unlike commercial airports many of the security measures at GA airports are voluntary, not mandatory.

If, as the Metropolitan Council and the Legislature say, they are planning for a statewide transportation plan to include a wide variety of multi-modal travel and a boost to economic development for "outstate" cities/towns, then upgrading these other intermediate airports (St. Cloud, Rochester, Duluth) should benefit outstate growth.

We need aviation to be a statewide discussion; not just a discussion for the Twin City Metro area!!!