Rapid City Journal: "Keep fire center at airport"

The Rapid City Journal has taken sides in the battle between the Federal Aviation Administration and the wildland fire agencies in the FAA's efforts to evict the Northern Great Plains Interagency Dispatch Center from the Rapid City Regional Airport.

We first reported on this on February 29, but basically the FAA wants to evict the dispatch center, tear down the building, and then allow a private company to use the space to build an aircraft hanger.

An editorial in today's Rapid City Journal calls this "bad fiscal policy and bad firefighting policy". And:

"[...] public safety issues of wildfire suppression should take precedence over the needs of the private sector for bigger and better hangar space."

They are absolutely right. All involved parties agreed to have the dispatch center at the airport. They spent $1.8 million to build it, and to tear it down after just a few years would be an incredible waste of taxpayers' dollars.