Board Chair Dan Eichenbaum banged his gavel loud enough that it echoed down the hallways of the downtown courthouse Monday night. Back inside the Cherokee County Board of Commissioners’ meeting room, it did little more than add to the noise.
An overflow crowd alternated between jeering commissioners and cheering local residents who roasted them with belittling critiques during the public comment portion of the meeting. The crowd eventually got what it wanted, after the board unanimously voted to take no action on a new fixed base operator lease agreement with Gayland Trull for Western Carolina Aviation at Western Carolina Regional Airport.
“After consultation with the board in closed session, pursuant to Chapter 143 of the North Carolina General Statutes, I have advised the board and can report to the board that if it chooses to enter into this lease, it would be against legal advice,” county attorney Darryl Brown said following a brief closed session with the board, part-way through the meeting.
The crowd erupted with cheers and shouts of approval moments before Commissioner Jan Griggs made a motion that no action on the item in the meeting. The board unanimously approved the motion.
That decision finally calmed what had arguably been an even more contentious atmosphere for a local meeting than the ones created by discussions about noise from unenclosed crypto mining operations.
A fixed base operator is an organization granted the right by an airport to operate at the airport and provide aeronautical services such as fueling, hangaring, tie-down and parking, aircraft rental, aircraft maintenance, flight instruction, and similar services. Trull has served as the airport’s FBO since fall 2018. His current lease agreement runs through 2024.
About 15 local residents spoke during the public comment portion of the meeting, including Ben Adams, who is unofficially commissioner-elect for the District 3 post occupied by Commissioner Gary “Hippie” Westmoreland. Adams, in an apparent jab at the proposed lease, mockingly “paid” Eichenbaum a coin to “rent” the room.
Some of local residents’ most potent words were reserved for commissioners not looking at them while they were speaking.
“Look at me, boys,” Jenny Pike said during the public comment portion of the meeting. “Hippie, I’ve heard about you, but evidently, you ain’t got no huevos, baby.”
Pike then chided Westmoreland for being “painfully disrespectful.”
While the majority of speakers did not address specific issues with the contract, John Midkiff said the contract likewise did not provide much detail to critique.
“It doesn’t really give you any information in here,” said Midkiff, who unsuccessfully ran against Eichenbaum during the GOP Primary earlier this year. “As you go through, like the rest of them, I’m in shock.”
Under the current agreement, Trull receives half of the airport’s fuel profits, while the county gets the other half.
Midkiff also took issue with point No. 18 within the contract, which states, “Time is of the essence in this agreement.”
“I’ll tell you why,” Midkiff said. “You want to keep (Trull) in and keep everybody else out.”
Besides constantly skewering members of the board – Eichenbaum, Westmoreland and Randy Phillips, in particular – the crowd often took aim at Brown, Trull and prominent local businessesman Charles West and his ties to the airport.
The large crowd was gathered outside the courthouse before the doors opened at 6 p.m. ahead of the 6:30 p.m. meeting. Those in attendance became agitated early on, after Eichenbaum announced his intention to discuss the new fixed base operator lease agreement in closed session. That decision was immediately met with expletives shouted toward him.
“I don’t see that there’s anything we need to discuss in closed session on this item,” Griggs said.
Eichenbaum, Westmoreland and Phillips approved the motion to go into closed session, 3-2, over Stiles’ and Griggs’ objections. Griggs and Stiles noted they had no knowledge of the contract ahead of time.
The future of the proposed lease agreement is unclear. Because no action was taken by commissioners – it was not tabled – it does not have to be brought up at the next meeting.
“I am glad that proposed lease was not adopted because it was not in the best interests of the taxpayers,” Stiles said Tuesday morning. “I don’t understand the rush to do a new lease when he’s got almost two years left on the old lease.”