{"id":50965,"date":"2020-10-16T01:40:29","date_gmt":"2020-10-16T07:40:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-city-council-renews-contract-with-cortez-flying-service\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:54:00","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:54:00","slug":"cortez-city-council-renews-contract-with-cortez-flying-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/cortez-city-council-renews-contract-with-cortez-flying-service\/","title":{"rendered":"Cortez City Council renews contract with Cortez Flying Service"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"The
The Cortez City Council awarded the operation contract of the Cortez Municipal Airport to the Cortez Flying Service over another company it had considered Tuesday evening.<\/span>The Journal file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The city of Cortez awarded the operator contract for the Cortez Municipal Airport to Cortez Flying Service during its meeting Tuesday night after considering a new national company.<\/p>\n

Pilots from Cortez Flying Service and supporters of the local business filled the Town Hall meeting room to express their opposition to a new company, Right Rudder Aviation, at times interrupting City Council\u2019s discussion.<\/p>\n

Councilors considered switching to the new company to reinvigorate the airport and turn it into a source of local economic growth.<\/p>\n

\u201cCortez Flying Service is more or less kicking the can down the road,\u201d Councilor David Rainey said. \u201cWe are looking for the future of the airport.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both companies gave presentations to the City Council, revised with feedback from the council committee that worked on the original recommendation of Right Rudder Aviation.<\/p>\n

Cortez Flying Service created a web presence to show how it might advance and improve the city-owned airport.<\/p>\n

In addition to Rainey, Councilor Amy Huckins also was on the committee. She said Right Rudder Aviation offered upwardly mobile job placement and community programs such as a flight school, aviation STEM curriculum for high school students and scholarships and learning opportunities for students interested in aviation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can see how there is a lot of room for growth,\u201d Mayor Mike Lavey said.<\/p>\n

Cortez Flying Service should \u201ctake note\u201d of the programs Right Rudder Aviation is offering, Lavey said. \u201cWe want Cortez to thrive and prosper.\u201d<\/p>\n

Councilor Orly Lucero said he has never heard a complaint about the airport\u2019s operation under Cortez Flying Service.<\/p>\n

Gregg Tripp of Cortez Flying Service said the company has \u201cgeared up and is already moving ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease give us a chance and let us prove ourselves,\u201d Tripp said.<\/p>\n

Andrew Chan, chief operating officer of Right Rudder Aviation, said he was grateful for the opportunity. Cortez Flying Service has had \u201cover 50 years to improve the airport, and they\u2019ve remained stagnant,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Chan said Right Rudder Aviation would hire 13 people at the airport and move two others to Cortez.<\/p>\n

But the city voted to maintain Cortez Flying Service on the condition that it follow through with improvements and advances.<\/p>\n

Cortez Flying Service employs six people.<\/p>\n

The city offered Cortez Flying Service a five-year contract, with an automatic renewal unless the city chooses to terminate or reconsider the contract.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe city can\u2019t commit to something for 25 years that isn\u2019t working,\u201d said Mike Green, the city attorney.<\/p>\n

The contract requires Cortez Flying Service to provide a higher level of rental car service to make it easier for visitors to explore the area.<\/p>\n

ehayes@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Council considered switching to a national company<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13559,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-50965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50965"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50965\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87863,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50965\/revisions\/87863"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50965"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=50965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}