Passenger volume at Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport/Adams Field will need to return to at least 80% of pre-pandemic levels before the airport can stop providing financial relief to its tenants, the airport's top executive said Tuesday.
That level of volume won't be reached until next year, Executive Director Bryan Malinowski said.
His remarks came at a meeting of the Little Rock Municipal Airport Commission's lease and consultant selection committee, which endorsed his recommendation -- as a concession to the drop in air travel brought on by the covid-19 pandemic -- to continue the suspension of the monthly minimum payments several airport tenants are required to make.
Last year, passenger traffic declined 56% to 977,342, the first time in years that fewer than 1 million people departed from or arrived at Clinton National.
In 2019, the first full year before the onset of the pandemic, 2,241,716 passengers went through the airport. Eighty percent of that volume is 1,793,373, or about 150,000 passengers monthly.
In January, the latest month for which figures are available, Clinton National saw a total of 72,572 passengers, or 54.2% fewer than the 158,475 that went through the airport in January 2020.
Malinowski said a February that featured two snow storms and an ice storm that triggered several flight cancellations means Clinton National saw even fewer passengers that month.
Fewer passengers means less revenue for the airport's tenants.
Total sales for the airport's main concessionaire, HMS Host was $161,359 in January, or 33% of the company's $491,047 sales in the same month last year, according to Greg Garner, the business and properties manager at Clinton National.
For much of the pandemic, Host limited its airport offerings to the Great American Bagel and Chili's. But after prodding from the airport staff and some members of the commission, Host re-opened one of its Starbucks in October and its Chick-fil-A outlet in December.
Host initially resisted re-opening the Chick-fil-A until passenger volume returned to 85% of pre-pandemic levels. Other restaurants are slated to open at lower percentages of pre-pandemic levels.
HMS Host is among the tenants from which the airport has relaxed the minimum financial guarantees included in most airport contracts. For Host, that amounted to about $47,500 per month to the airport. Under the relaxed rules, Host pays only a percentage of actual revenue every month.
Commission member Bill Walker, who isn't on the lease and consultant selection committee but participated in the meeting, again took issue with the airport granting relief to a tenant that keeps its doors closed and lays off employees, reportedly as many as 65 last fall.
"Getting relief for being closed," Walker said. "Not only did they close without our consent, they terminated staff without our knowledge and we still gave them relief."
Malinowski said the tenants are receiving a break as tenants at many other airports are and under guidance from the Federal Aviation Administration.
But "they're not getting a free ride [or] free rent," he said.
The lease and consultant selection commission also recommended the full commission approve Malinowski's request to wait four months before revisiting whether to continue to offer tenant financial relief. The commission has been revisiting every two months since last May.
Walker and other commissioners also said they will expect Malinowski to have a plan moving forward in four months.
Malinowski said he will continue to provide updates on passenger traffic and concession operations at the commission's monthly meetings.