Midway airport has funds
to stay open this monthLong-term funding could be
secured in a bill before Congress
Funding has been found that will allow the airport and other facilities at Midway Island to continue operating through the end of the month while an omnibus appropriations bill that would secure future funding can be voted on in Congress, officials said.
Funding for January was secured through the help of the Federal Aviation Administration, the U.S. Coast Guard and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said in a news release.
The Fish and Wildlife Service operates the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge.
Operations of the airport and other minimal infrastructure on the tiny atoll have been handled by Anchorage, Alaska-based Chugach McKinley Inc. since April. The contract is renewable on a month-to-month basis.
Last month, officials issued a "stop work" order that was set to take effect yesterday.
Officials said they wouldn't have the funds to operate past Dec. 31 because future funding was contained in a budget bill that isn't scheduled to be voted on in Congress until Jan. 20.
"It has always been our desire to keep the airfield fully operational and we hope the long-term funding can be secured in the near future," said Jerry Leinecke, the wildlife service's project leader for national wildlife refuges in the Pacific.
The site of a key U.S. naval victory in World War II, Midway is now a national wildlife refuge and home to thousands of seafaring birds and other wildlife. The atoll is about 1,200 miles northwest of the main Hawaiian islands.
A contractor that had operated island facilities and ecological tours since the mid-1990s terminated its contract with the Fish and Wildlife Service in 2002. Midway Phoenix Corp. left citing restrictions that made it too difficult to be profitable.
The federal agency has been looking for a long-term contractor to resume many of the services that Midway Phoenix had provided.