"Santa Maria Airport to upgrade security"

Enhancements to security at the Santa Maria Public Airport are being welcomed by federal regulators but questioned by some airport tenants as overkill.

At issue are efforts to beef up security on the airfield by installing a security-management system and more closed-circuit television cameras.

Airport officials say the enhancements are needed to keep up with federal regulations, and therefore ensure federal funding, but some general-aviation pilots see the added security as an unnecessary hassle.

Airport officials began negotiations last week with Newton Construction Management, the San Luis Obispo-based company that the board of directors has selected for the project.

The board went against staff recommendation when it unanimously chose the firm - which will use Santa Maria-based Quintron Systems for the security component of the project - on a 5-0 vote.

Staff had recommend the contract go to Navigance Technologies, a Los Angeles-based company that had planned to use a Massachusetts firm for security.

Staff recommendation was based on Navigance's previous airport experience and the fact that its proposal - at $860,550 - was cheaper, said Ric Tokoph, airport operations supervisor.

However, the board opted to go with the local contractor with the stipulation that staff negotiate with Newton to see where their approximately $1 million proposal could be streamlined, said Carl Engel board president.

Both Engel and Newton president Eric Newton said they thought an agreeable contract price, for a top quality system, could be reached.

The system, which would control access to the airport, is expected to include an access card to regulate the roughly 20 motorized gates around the airfield perimeter. Access cards would be given to airport tenants, Tokoph explained.

Terminal employees, who require a higher security clearance, would be given cards after a background check is completed.

More than 20 closed circuit TV cameras are proposed to be installed, Tokoph said.

He declined to go into detail about the TV monitoring, but noted there already are cameras in the terminal.

The whole project “is an upgrade to current security standards from (the Transportation Security Agency),” he said.

The project is 95 percent funded by the Federal Aviation Administration, and airport officials are working against an Aug. 30 funding deadline. The enhanced security covers the roughly 1,500 acres within the airport operation area.

Officials with Central Coast Jet Center and Arctic Air, two large tenants on the airfield, both said the increased security measures are a good idea and would actually help their businesses and not hinder them.

In the past TSA officials have been critical of Santa Maria Public Airport security, which has seen breaches, including a November 2004 incident in which a Nipomo man accessed the airfield and tampered with a private cargo jet.

Federal officials are pleased the airport is spending resources on security upgrades.

“It's been six years since September 11, and over the course of time, we've seen large and small airports use the resources they can to enhance security,” said TSA spokesman Nico Melendez.

However, some airport users who have hangers within the secured area are not as enthusiastic about the proposed changes.

“I don't think we need all the security we are getting,” said general aviation pilot Pat Viker. “...It's one thing if we had some really heavy traffic - but we don't.”

Mark Pirman, a pilot and hanger tenant at the airport for more than 20 years, agreed, adding that airports in the Los Angeles basin may need this type of security but they have the commercial flights to back it up.

Pirman also fears that the airport may remove access points as a way to reduce the cost of the program, which would hamper airport use.

Even with enhanced security since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, Pirman and his wife Diane, who is also a pilot, don't see Santa Maria as a risky airport.

“What it comes down to, if you are a terrorist, are you going to hit the Santa Maria Airport,” Diane Pirman asked.

Federal officials, however, don't see any facility having too much security.

“We need to lengthen our memory,” Melendez said.

“We know terrorists on September 11 originated from a small airport in Maine.

“The notion that one airport is less vulnerable than another is the wrong way to look at it.”


TSA employees check passengers bags at the Santa Maria Airport.