Despite a rocky start that brought some flared tempers to the Redmond City Council’s March 28 meeting, the council made progress on multiple fronts — most notably in raising Redmond Airport parking fees up from $15 per day to $24 per day and awarding multiple bids to developers.

According to Redmond Airport Director Zach Bass, the airport doesn’t have enough money on hand yet for the expected $142 million terminal expansion.

“We’re looking for any kind of money we can get from anywhere,” Bass said.

Bass said the airport has seen a 115% increase in enplanements in the last decade and exceeded one million passengers in 2022, yet 89% of passengers come from outside Redmond.

“Ordinarily, if you looked at a fee increase from $15 to $24 you would be aghast at it,” said Redmond Mayor Ed Fitch. “(But) the city of Redmond is a relatively small city, yet it is in charge of a regional asset — the airport. It’s a huge undertaking.”

Parking fees, in turn, make up the largest portion of the airport’s operating revenue. Without the change, the parking fees were estimated to bring in nearly $6 million in 2023 or about a third of all operating revenue.

Fitch said that the only way to receive financial support from the entire region was through the airport’s fees and charges.

“We have to charge fees that are applicable to the entire region,” Fitch said. “We are operating a regional asset which takes a lot of expense and to meet that expense we need to ensure that there is sufficient revenues out of the airport.”

The airport is fully self-sustained and operates on it’s own revenue without funding from Redmond’s general fund footing the bill.

“We do not want the taxpayers of Redmond to subsidize the airport,” Fitch said. “That’s never happened and I don’t believe we want to see it happen on our watch either. It won’t happen.”

According to Bass, parking fees give them the greatest amount of funding for infrastructure projects outside the Federal Aviation Administration.

And this comes as the airport has begun to max out on parking space during peak travel surge times such as during spring break, which was happening during the council meeting.

“9 hours today we had no parking spots and that is with the addition of 500 spots we added during covid,” Bass said. “(When) you start overflowing your lot, the surge is when you have to decide on creating either new parking or raising fees to decrease some of that utilization”

While they’re focusing all of their money into the terminal expansion, Bass said they’re hoping to create a long-term parking lot at some point after the expansion is compete.

Bass said he believes and hopes parking lot use will fall with the price increase from $15 per day to $24 per day and even out the spaces available during peak times. He expects the new price to bring in around $2 million in new revenue per year.

The new pricing will cost $1 for less than 30 minutes, $2 for between 31 and 60 minutes and $2 for every additional hour up to 12 hours. Visitors will hit the $24 max at 12 hours and according to Bass, days on that they stay they will keep hitting that $24 max.

The price increase will not take effect until May 1. During the busy Spring Break travel season, the Redmond Airport lot has been completely full at times, according to the airport.

Well 9Council also unanimously approved a $1.6 million contract with Schneider Water Services to drill and construct a new water well for the proposed Well 9 Improvement Project.

According to the City of Redmond’s staff report, a new water drinking well is needed to meet the growth of the city and will provide a continuous water supply to meet peak demand if other wells in the city fail.

The city will install a new 800-foot-deep well and an accompanying well house at 1515 W Antler Ave. near the Dry Canyon dog park and disc golf course. The entire project is estimated to cost $6.4 million and is anticipated to finish in the summer of 2024.

Schneider Water Services beat out Holt and Western Water for the contract, with their estimated cost coming in under the city’s expected budget of $1.7 million.

Construction of the well house, parking lot and restroom improvements will be presented to the council at a later date.

Other council news— Council unanimously approved an $816,580 contract with K & E Excavating, Inc. to install a traffic signal at the intersection of NW Maple Ave. and NW 9th St., which will replace the current 4-way stop sign. Construction is estimated to be finished by November 2023.

— Council unanimously approved a $280,460 contract with Jaron McKernan Enterprises to replace 480-feet of asbestos-lined sewer on North Canal Boulevard despite the bid coming in above the estimate of $200,000.

— Council unanimously rejected the bids received for a remodel of the Redmond Senior Center’s kitchen after submitted bids were incomplete and exceeded project estimates and budget.

In 2021, the center received $550,000 from Redmond and Deschutes County federal funds and additional funds. The total project cost was estimated at just under half a million dollars, but the only bid received came in at $100,000 over the estimated budget. The center plans to reevaluate design and go out for rebids after updates are approved.

— Council unanimously approved designating April as Fair Housing Month and the week of April 2-8 as Arbor Week.

— The public comment period before the meeting started drew a packed house and some raised tempers. Numerous people spoke and provoked disagreement with the audience and specific councilors. Redmond Police Chief Devin Lewis escorted one speaker from the podium and council recessed briefly to reduce tensions.

Read about: Redmond airport terminal expansion project