IE Business Daily Business news for the Inland Empire.
Los Angeles is scheduled to hand over control of Ontario International Airport today to the Ontario International Airport Authority.
The agreement, which both cities reached during the summer of 2015, will give Ontario full control of the airport, allowing it to move forward with plans to upgrade the facility and increase its passenger traffic, according to city officials.
Although it has increased slightly this year, traffic count at the airport – which is owned by Los Angeles World Airports, an agency of the city of Los Angeles – has dropped severely since 2007, to levels not seen since the mid-1980s.
LAWA officials blamed the drop on the recession, but Ontario accused the agency of neglecting OntarioI International in favor of its other major airport, Los Angeles International.
The shift in ownership is a major event not just for Ontario but the entire Inland Empire, said Michael Krouse, president and chief executive officer of the Greater Ontario Convention & Visitors Bureau and the Ontario Convention Center.
“We’re going to market ourselves even stronger than we have in the past,” said Krouse, who plans to attend an invitation-only event Wednesday in Terminal 4, put on by the local airport authority, that will celebrate the transfer of power. “We’re going to be better destination with a stronger airport.”
