Mason City Airport Commission rejects commercial terminal bids

(ABC 6 News) – This week, the Mason City Airport Commission had to reject bids by three separate construction companies in their new commercial terminal project. It could be a setback for the $17 million project.

The little airport is getting a big upgrade. Construction just wrapped up on phase one of the project, but the Mason City Airport Commission has seen some hiccups on the way to phase two.

Bobbi Black grew up going to the Mason City Airport. The current terminal was built in 1945.

“Oh geez I remember it in the 60s. It’s been here a long long time.”

Black is in the skies every three months. If you ask her about the new terminal, this is what she’ll say:

“Excited! Excited.”

But in order for the next phase of construction to take off the Mason City Airport Commission has to pick a construction company to build the terminal. The decision was supposed to come in November, but none of the bids met federal regulations.

“Each bid that we received, there was some document that was incomplete,” said David Sims, the airport manager of Mason City Municipal Airport.

It’s a necessary step because the federal government gave the city around $14 million for the project. Now, the decision won’t come until January.

“It does require us to completely rebid the entire project and start the process over again,” Sims said.

For Black, the local airport is what makes the city great.

“This is an absolute god-send. Otherwise we’d be going to Des Moines or Minneapolis and we’d have a two hour drive,” she said.

According to the airport manager its still unclear whether or not the bid rejections will impact the project’s timeline. As of now, construction is scheduled to be complete in July of 2024.