[TheNoonans]

I am very happy to report that I just spent the last hour on a conference call with the Airports Division directors in Washington, DC, and that for the first time in 3 years in this process, I was surrounded by nothing but positive people. They recognize the failures in the current system and are committed to getting a resolution in place by years end.

They want accountability as much as we do.

They believe that an airport sponsor that signs a federal funding grant assurance contract must do everything within it's power to live up to it's obligation to ensure equal access to all aeronautical activities.

AND

When this process is concluded, they (the directors) intend to enforce the contract obligations personally.

So.....what does that mean in terms of the LAA?

Well, for starters, here is a question that will be asked by the FAA directors that I would not want to have to be the one to answer if I was on the LAA:

"The Noonans first contacted you in July of 2008 expressing an interest in bringing a legal and viable aeronautical activity to the Laconia airport. It is now December 2011, so please tell us, with the millions of dollars you have received in federal funding since first being made aware of the Noonan's intent to operate a skydiving operation on the airport, what have you done in the last 3 and 1/2 years to make the airport more accessible? What did you do to mitigate those safety concerns you raised? You were given millions of dollars intended to be used to make the airport accessible to all aeronautical activities, including skydiving, so what have you done?"

That question is coming, trust me. And it is not going to be coming from the local FAA, it's going to have a postmark on the envelope that reads "Washington, D.C.", and it won't be coming from a secretary.

And answering "Sorry, we didn't know we were obligated to do that" just isn't going to cut it, not when the millions of dollars that the airport received in the last ten years in all tallied up.

Regardless of the outcome of this process, in many respects, we have already won. The "Skydive Laconia" issue reached the desk of Randy Babbitt, the Chief Administrator of the FAA. (His boss is Ray LaHood, DOT Cabinet Member. Ray LaHood reports directly to President Obama.) Hence, there is no one higher in the FAA to bring the issue to, it reached the top of the organizational structure. When I say this is coming from the top down now, that's where I base my position.

Additional victories:

- Within the FAA, the LAA have become the case study on the breakdown of the federal funding grant assurance program and the lack of a national standard of FAA enforcement when such violations occur. Every agent of the FAA from Boston Harbor to San Francisco Bay will be briefed on Skydive Laconia and the LAA before this issue is finalized.

- The local FSDO and ADO ignored us every step of the way. As this nationalization process continues to reach it's conclusion, the directors level of the FAA have personally pledged to include Mary and I in the opinion forming process. What we were not given the opportunity to do on a local level, we will be given the opportunity to do on a national level.

- The conversation ended like this, (paraphrasing): "We recognize the short comings of the system and are intent on correcting them. We cannot get back the three years you lost, but we can ensure, when this process ends this year, that neither you, nor any other aeronautical activity proposer will ever have to go through this again on a federally funded airport."

- It's not just skydivers that should be happy about this. If you fly gliders, powered para gliders, sea planes or any aeronautical vehicle for fun or for business, this process will protect you as well down the road from ever having to go through what we have been forced to endure.

And lastly, now that the FOIA info has finally arrived, Mary and I are in the process of writing our memoir on this ordeal. Thanks to the creator of this thread we even have a wonderful outline of the last three years to keep the story straight. It's a 12 month project for sure, but in the end it will be worth it to put a public record out there that is veritable and just.

So much for "Put up enough red tape and delays and maybe they will just pack up and go away.......". Eh?

I said from the start that we were committed to seeing this through and I meant it.

Blue skies to all and to all a good flight,

Tom