Prince George is one of 21 airport authorities in Canada that will see its ground lease rents waived until the end of the year.
Airport Authority CEO, Gordon Duke told MyPGNow.com the rent relief is a big help since YXS has seen a huge drop in revenue and passenger service due to COVID-19.
“Going at full tilt with good passenger loads we normally pay around $25,000 a month and we’ve lost about 85% of our revenue starting in mid-March.”
Duke states all of the PG Airport’s partners are hurting right now, that includes rent-a-car services, the restaurant as well as the ground handling companies.
“I am not going to candy-coat it, it’s been tough but I am really proud of our team for staying on task and our first focus is always going to be safety and security and strong operations and our staff has done a really good job at that.”
Since the virus outbreak began, the local airport has had to make changes to its workflow in order to respect the physical distancing measures announced by Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry.
“We’ve had to adjust our shift schedule and we have a significant number of our staff working from home, or staggering the time that they are in the office so that we can respect the social distancing.”
Duke admits this is a one-of-a-kind type of situation, something you can’t really fully prepare for.
“This has evolved at such a rapid rate and is unprecedented. We don’t have a contingency plan for this situation, we do have a pandemic plan, we’ve got contingency plans for a reduction in service, however, the loss of 85% of our revenue stream and passenger service is something you can’t really plan for.”
The measures announced by Ottawa this week are part of the federal government’s COVID-19 Economic Response Plan.