Finance committee strikes occupancy-charge language from airport SASO agreement with Capital Flight

The Middleton Finance Committee voted to strike paragraph 2a — language addressing rental/occupancy charges — from the Specialized Aviation Service Operations (SASO) agreement with Capital Flight LLC and approved the change subject to city-attorney review.

Committee members said the clause appeared to be a carryover from an earlier template and provided inconsistent signals about whether occupancy charges could be considered. One member noted the clause was not present in comparable SASO agreements the staff reviewed. A member identified in the record as Matt summarized the background and said the clause had been difficult to justify historically; others noted the clause carried little immediate legal effect because any discussion of occupancy charges under the prior wording would not occur until the end of an initial term.

Several members argued for aligning any conversation about occupancy charges with a proposed 15‑year SASO term so the discussion would coincide with the agreement’s term, while others pressed for exploring a separate municipal commercial land‑lease policy for entities operating commercially at the airport. The chair objected to what the record shows as an operator’s characterization of the city’s actions as "blackmail," calling that description "completely false and insulting." (The transcript records the operator’s accusation as reported in committee discussion; the operator’s full remarks are not a speaking-credit in this transcript.)

A motion to strike paragraph 2a from section 2 of the SASO agreement — removing the sentence that would have made occupancy charges the subject of future discussion — was moved (the record names Lohrmann as the mover and Jackson as the seconder) and approved by voice vote, with the committee also making the approval contingent on city-attorney review and approval of the revised contract language.

Committee members requested several clarifications for the attorney review, including consistent references to "the premises" and replacing a locally referenced liability-insurance phrase with "established by the city of Middleton." Members also discussed how any future commercial-land-lease structure would need to be applied consistently across commercial operators and how lease negotiations may be handled separately from the SASO operational agreement.

The motion carried and the committee approved sending the edited SASO agreement back for city-attorney review before final execution.