Alpena County, airport sued
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ALPENA -- A business contracted to provide fueling and other services at the Alpena County Regional Airport is suing the county and airport, alleging airport staff tried to interfere with its business operations, solicited bids from other companies, and manipulated the business relationship with SkyWest Airlines.
The business, Huron Aviation Services, seeks in excess of $25,000 in damages.
In a filing in 26th Circuit Court, the county denied all the allegations. County Commissioner Bob Adrian, who chaired the county's Airport Committee before the county changed its committee structure earlier this year, would not comment on Wednesday, nor would Airport Manager Steve Smigelski.
In the complaint filed by Huron Aviation, which is owned by Bob Currier, of Alpena, and managed by company President Brad Shriner, the company claims Smigelski and Assistant Manager Edward Higgins tried to sabotage the business's fuel purchasing agreement with SkyWest, knowing that, if Huron Aviation lost the airline as a customer, the county would have grounds to void its deal with the company and claim ownership of the fuel farm Huron Aviation claims it spent heavily on to provide fuel to planes at the airport.
Huron Aviation claims Smigelski and Higgins wanted to replace the company with Alpena Ground Services, with whom Higgins is also employed. Alpena Ground Services has a contract with the county to perform ground maintenance, snowplowing, and other jobs.
If the county were to terminate its contract with Huron Aviation, it would take control of the fuel farm and hire Alpena Ground Services to take over operation of it, the complaint says.
The complaint claims Smigelski and Higgins were negotiating a deal with Alpena Ground Services that included better fuel rates for SkyWest to forward to the commissioners on the Alpena County Airport Committee.
The alleged actions took place in summer 2021.
The complaint also claims airport staff and the county are trying to eat into Huron Aviation's revenue by building new hangars at the airport. The business leases hangar space for airplane storage and it claims that the county building new hangars encourages customers to not use Huron Aviation's hangars but the county's instead.
The county has considered building hangars after it received about $18 million from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act. None of the hangars have been built yet.
Huron Aviation claims that the airport's alleged manipulation forced it to lower fuel rates to appease SkyWest, which costs it more than $25,000, and added that, if it had lost SkyWest as a customer, it would cost them $700,000 in lost revenue.
It would also put Huron Aviation in non-compliance with its lease deal with the county, setting the stage for the contract to be terminated.