There’s as much litigation flying around Paulding’s airport as there is aircraft with recent lawsuits being filed from multiple sides. Ongoing ligation is up the three lawsuits thus far with the county filing suit against the airport authority and the Industrial Building Authority and Silver Comet Terminal Partners filing suit against the county and the airport authority.

Paulding Commissioners recently asked Attorney Charles Conerly to begin an effort to collect against Paulding’s Airport Authority and Silver Comet for reimbursement of the $401,000 bond payment the county made as part of a $3.6 million bond issue to the PCAA for expansion work to the runway and taxiway. Commissioners, apart from Chairman David Austin, contend that Silver Comet was legally obligated to make the February installment.

In a January 28 letter Silver Comet Terminal Partners LLC (SCTP) notified the airport authority that it would not make the scheduled bond payment due on February 1st, in the amount of $401,140, or continue to make future payments. Further, the letter urged the Airport Authority to seek to be reimbursed for principal and interest payments made in February and August of 2015 totaling $441,756.50, since those payments were and remain the “absolute and unconditional” obligation of Paulding County. Conerly in a letter to the PCAA asked Chairman Calvin Thompson “...to take immediate action to remedy Silver Comet’s breach of the Silver Comet agreement.”

Conerly’s letter further states that in the absence of any action by the PCAA by April 2, the county would pursue its own legal action to force the company to make the payment. According to Airport Director Blake Swafford the airport did issue a letter asking SCTP to respond within 15 days with regard to making the bond payment, which they would have until later this week to respond to. But Swafford said that Silver Comet had filed suit against the county and the airport authority, which he said, the bond payment was “...probably a part of.”

Propeller Airports LLC, through affiliated company Silver Comet Terminal Partners, filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in Rome.

The suit against Paulding County and the Paulding County Airport Authority asks a judge to clarify if the airport authority was legally empowered to sign a contract with Propeller in 2012 to recruit an airline and ask the Federal Aviation Administration to authorize the commercial service under Part 139 of FAA’s rules. “I’m not sure the airport authority is going to try to take any additional action until we know what is going on with the lawsuit,” Swafford said. Propeller Investments CEO Brett Smith, contacted last week by phone, said that the company has been forced by the county to act. “We’re happy to make the bond payments, but the county says they’re not valid -- but pay them anyway. You can’t have it both ways,” Smith said. “And if you look closer at the bond agreements – nowhere are we mentioned,” he said.

Smith added that the original business relationship hadn’t been at his company’s suggestion. “[Initially] we were asked to come in and do this. We didn’t approach them. We were asked if we’d do this so we took a look at the market and said, ‘yeah, we’ll do it.’”

Swafford said any further actions would depend on the outcomes of the existing litigation. “I really don’t see that we’ll be looking to file an additional lawsuit. We’ll just be looking to see where the resolution will be, based on these other suits that have already been filed,” he said.

(Photo: R. Grant)