We need honestly from the Memphis Airport Authority Board

The “Delta Does Memphis” FaceBook site has awakened the community to the realization that quality of life issues in Memphis are not limited to “Greenways and bicycle paths”. Having a competitive airport – an airport where we have decent fares and multiple airlines serving the city, is critical to the future of Memphis business and the quality of life of its citizens. 

The Memphis Airport Authority Board (MAAB), whose 7 members have been re-appointed for 7 year terms for the past 20 years, have responded to the public outcry by offering a total of $1 million in financial incentives to other airlines to relocate some of their capacity to Memphis International Airport (MEM). The board members have accumulated a vast knowledge of the airport/airline business over those 20 years, and it appears to me that this “incentive” was a not-so-honest effort to tap down the outrage without dealing with the core issues at the airport.

First and foremost, a $1 million dollar incentive may seem like a lot of money if you are relating it to buying groceries, but we are talking about trying to affect business decisions in an industry that spends billions to grow and protect their market share. The core issues at the Memphis Airport are “price gouging” by Delta when they DON’T have competition in Memphis, and “predatory pricing” to run competition off when a new airline does relocates on Delta’s “Memphis turf”. So, this $1million dollar Public Relations band-aid is, in my opinion – doomed to failure. Both price gouging and predatory pricing are against the law and the Department of Justice has brought cases against the airlines before for both passenger and freight vi0ations in the past. I would have expected the MAAB to address these issues in tandem with incentives.

If the MAAB incentive package is doomed to failure, then the next question is why the MAAB is passing this off as a solution? Why haven’t they put teeth into the core issues of price gouging and predatory pricing?  There needs to be a public hearing held by the Shelby County Commission and/or the City Council where the board members spend the day answering questions regarding these issues and explain what appears to be a $1 million dollar superficial public relations stunt dressed up like an incentive.  The MAAB may have a certain amount of autonomy, and the $1 million may come from fees generated by the airport, but the Mayors both appoint the members and the public has a right to know.

The MAAB may be doing a great job, and are doing the best they can with the region’s current demographics and the current state of the airline business. Then again, they could also have been asleep at the wheel and maybe too comfortable with the status quo after 20 years on the job. Either way, we expect honest answers to problems, not $1 million thrown down the toilet.