By Marc D. Anderson- al.com
February 22, 2013
FAIRHOPE -- By the time Airbus starts pushing out airplanes in Mobile in coming years, Baldwin County students and adults will have an opportunity to be well prepared for a future in aviation thanks to a planned $2.5 million training center at the H.L. “Sonny” Callahan Airport.
City, state and county officials gathered in Continental Motors' hangar at Fairhope’s municipal airport Friday to announce and celebrate a partnership between Faulkner State Community College, Enterprise State, the Fairhope Airport Authority and the Baldwin County Board of Education that will open the door for preparatory and college students to pursue aviation careers at a new 15,000-square-foot-facility beginning in January.
“We’re proud to be one of the college partners here,” said Nancy Chandler, president of Enterprise State. “But, most importantly, we realize that we have to partner with our businesses and industry. We cannot stand separate and apart from economic development. We all must join hands because together we are much better and much stronger than we would be separately.” Baldwin County Public Schools Superintendent Alan Lee said plans for the center have been 5 years in the making and a dream of a few individuals.
“This facility is going to train young people for a career,” Lee said. “It’s going to give young people skills that they will take with them for the rest of their lives and it’s really not just about education it’s about a change in the model of how we do education in Baldwin County and hopefully in the state of Alabama, where junior colleges, communities, the state and school districts come together to bring a dream to fruition.”
The deal calls for the Fairhope Airport Authority to building the facility that will include three 5,000-square-foot classes on the west side of the airport on Baldwin County 32, according to Chuck Zunk, chairman of the authority. While the authority will hold the bank note, the county school board will lease the building.
Courses in industrial maintenance and welding and other technical aviation skills will be offered by the community colleges as a dual enrollment for high-school juniors and seniors, and they will also be open to adults attending FSCC or Enterprise.
“These courses that we will be offering here are in A&P mechanics,” Chandler said, referring to aircraft maintenance technicians who are also called A&Ps, short for airframe and power plant mechanics. “These students will be trained to enter a workforce in aerospace. The aerospace industry and the entire Gulf Coast of Alabama will have futures that are linked forever. Our programs not only will provide students a good career, they’ll be able to bring the standard of their family up forever. And also these courses and this program will enhance the community’s economic development initiatives.”
Faulkner State President Gary Branch said the center is a business model taxpayers can support as it will “provide state-of-the-art career training in high-paying fields and in high-demand fields and at the same time save the taxpayer of this state money.”
“We’re going to be enhancing lives offering education and training abilities to people that want to better themselves and who want to become a better taxpayers,” Branch said. “They’ll be able to support their communities and their families. As you can tell I’m excited about this.”
Zunk said the building will be constructed so that it can be expanded easily.
“The site will be designed so if we are as successful, as we believe we will be, and we need to add capacity, we can easily duplicate another 3 units onto it. So we can accommodate growth very well.”
Zunk said the next step is to draw up contracts with architects and secure financing.
“We think it will be around $2.5 million and we’ve been negotiating with a couple of local banks for the financing and we think we have that pretty well in hand,” he said. “There are really no obstacles of pushing forward. We have everything ready to go.”