MacArthur Airport Doesn't Deserve An Award -- OP-ED

This morning, I read an article here, on Patch, reporting on a USAToday story about how MacArthur has been nominated for an airport award. It’s a nice life to be an incumbent Town Supervisor, when you can mismanage an airport and still get a puff-piece in a national newspaper. Let’s talk reality at MacArthur:

• Service has declined dramatically. Newsday reported that since 2012, departing flights from MacArthur have declined 37%. American has entirely pulled out of the airport, ending countless connections and a convenient shuttle to their hub in Philadelphia. New ultra-budget airlines seem to come in and out of the airport, with what seems like a new ribbon cutting to replace the last that gave up on ISP every year.
• Southwest has reduced service & direct flights to key destinations like the Florida cities where so many of our families live, leaving residents trying to use a hometown airport with lengthy connections
• For many national destinations, the onerous connections make it so taking the train to JFK, with an expensive LIRR ticket, AirTrain costs, and the price of a ticket still is a cheaper and quicker option than flying out of the airport we all pay for. A one-way flight from ISP to Boston via Southwest on September 30th would take 4 to 7 hours, with a layover in Baltimore and cost you at the lowest $200. From LaGuardia on JetBlue, the flight would be direct, just an hour, and cost $39.
• MacArthur is running at a massive deficit ($1.9 million for fiscal year 2023), unusual for an airport in the 4th largest city in NY with a large potential base of business and vacation travelers. Angie Carpenter’s solution is not to fix the service gaps – but instead, cut the benefits of the airport employees. As per the 2023 Town Budget, “reductions in the areas of overtime for sick and vacation leave will be paramount.”
• MacArthur has been declared a Superfund site — and the Town of Islip declared culpable. Not only will we town taxpayers now be on the hook to pay for an expensive clean-up of the toxins the town’s incompetence in operating the airport has let seep into our groundwater – residents in Ronkonkoma and surrounding the airport now question the safety of their drinking water. I’ve met residents who are convinced their cancer is a result of the airport’s pollution of the groundwater and soil – and looking at the data on toxins, it’s hard to argue

All of these failures at our airport raise the question: how have things gotten so bad? It’s simple. Most airports, especially those serving large areas, are staffed by career professionals with specializations in airport operations and management. They’re hired on merit. Airlines look for that – and count on it. They don’t want to deal with incompetence, corruption, and political officials with interests other than running the airport as best as possible. Unfortunately, Islip is not run like other airports. It’s run by political appointees, hired because of their political value to Angie Carpenter and town officials. Our airport shouldn’t be a jobs program for the political elite, but it is. As a consequence, serious airlines won’t come here. The ones we have had pulled out or cut service, and worst of all, the airport is now poisoning us.

My name is Ken Colón, and I’m running for Town Supervisor because I’ve had enough of the incompetence, neglect, and corruption. With the taxes we pay, we deserve a world-class airport with real service to key destinations, run by professionals, and most importantly: one that doesn’t actively hurt our health. I’ve worked on health and health policy my whole career — from starting and running companies in healthcare; to helping shape policy at city, county, and state levels; to publishing peer-reviewed scientific research. In graduate school, I studied public administration at Syracuse and environmental health sciences at the Yale School of Public Health. I know what it takes to fix the environmental crisis at MacArthur and protect our drinking water – AND – what it takes in the policy arena to reform the airport, put professionals in leadership, and make the airport functional and profitable without slashing the benefits of the rank-and-file civil service employees who try their best to keep things running. On November 7th – together – we can and we will end the era of grift and failure in Islip. We can make government actually work for the taxpayer. You can learn more about my run for Islip Town Supervisor at KenForIslip.com.