Hawthorne Cuts Hangar Fees, Ends Dispute With Pilot Group

The Hawthorne City Council has reduced hangar fees at Hawthorne Municipal Airport, ending a disagreement with a pilots group that said the previous $280 monthly fee was too high.

On Monday, the council approved a $234 monthly rental fee that went into effect immediately.

“I don’t consider (it) a victory,” said Emil Michaels, president of the 160-member Hawthorne Aircraft Owners and Pilots Assn. “There was no war. There was merely a misunderstanding, and it was taken care of.”

In September, the group accused the council of violating a 1985 fee-setting agreement when it increased the hangar rental rate from $210 to $280. The fee had been raised from $200 to $210 in July.

The 1985 agreement said the hangar fee, then $125, would be raised each year until it reached $200, after which it would be linked to increases in the consumer price index, Michaels said Wednesday.

The $10 increase in July was prompted by the rising cost of living, but the $70 increase in September was one of several steps taken by the city to reduce its $2.5-million budget deficit for 1989-90.

Airport Administrator Robert Trimborn said Tuesday that the market rate for hangars in the Los Angeles region is $280 a month and that the $234 fee will cost the city $32,568 a year.

But Michaels said fees at the Hawthorne airport should be lower than those charged elsewhere because the hangars are in poor condition.