Wake County, North Carolina Superior Court Judge A. Graham\nShirley ruled today in favor of the Raleigh-Durham Airport Authority in a\nlawsuit filed by activists who oppose the land-lease agreement between the\nAuthority and Wake Stone Corporation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the ruling regarding the agreement that could expand an\nexisting quarry on airport property, Judge Shirley found that, \u201cas a matter of\nlaw, RDUAA has the statutory authority independent of the Cities of Raleigh and\nDurham and the Counties of Wake and Durham to enter into the Lease, and\ntherefore, summary judgment in favor of Defendants is proper.\u201d The judge also\nfound that:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 \u201cThe original RDU Charter gave the RDUAA board complete\nauthority over the airport. Nothing in the amendments that followed reflects an\nintent by the legislature to diminish that authority. Plaintiffs’ argument runs\ncontrary to a reasonable reading of the legislation and ignores the General\nAssembly’s broad authority to the RDUAA board.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 \u201cAs a matter of law, RDUAA has the statutory authority\nindependent of the Cities of Raleigh and Durham and the Counties of Wake and\nDurham to enter into the Lease, and therefore, summary judgment in favor of\nDefendants is proper.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 \u201cFurthermore, the Court concludes that the Lease is not\ninconsistent with any grant or agreement under which the airport is held. The\nphrase \u2018grant or agreement\u2019 must refer to the grants and agreements by which\nRDUAA operates an airport under the guidance and regulation, and with financial\ncontributions of the Department of Transportation\/FAA under the Federal Airport\nAct. The FAA has approved the industrial\/quarry use designation of the Property\nand maintains that its approval is not necessary for RDUAA to lease the Property.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 \u201cBecause no federal funds were used to acquire the\nProperty and because the Lease is not subject to the FAA approval, the Lease\ndoes not violate any federal laws.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The case was dismissed with prejudice, which prevents these\nclaims from being refiled in the future but does not prevent an appeal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe are pleased the judge affirmed RDU\u2019s authority to\nexecute the land-lease agreement with Wake Stone,\u201d said John Kane, Chairman of\nthe Board of Directors, Raleigh-Durham Airport Authority. \u201cThe agreement is\nconservatively projected to generate at least $24 million for the airport at a\ntime when it has a nearly $2 billion funding shortfall for critical airport\nprojects. The revenue from the quarry expansion will help RDU keep pace with\nthe community\u2019s aviation demands.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Wake County, North Carolina Superior Court Judge A. Graham Shirley ruled today in favor of the Raleigh-Durham Airport Authority in a lawsuit filed by activists who oppose the land-lease agreement between the Authority and Wake Stone Corporation. In the ruling regarding the agreement that could expand an existing quarry on airport property, Judge Shirley found […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-north-carolina"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14198"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14198\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14199,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14198\/revisions\/14199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}