By Lexi McFarlane, Times Chronicle
A series of lease changes at the Oliver Municipal Airport have been approved by the Town of Oliver Council as ownership changes and expansion by Transwest Helicopters required rejigging the leases.
At the October 27 Regular Council meeting, leases for four different parcels of land at the Airport site were brought forward for discussion by Rochelle Lougheed, Corporate Officer for the town.
Two different, two-bay hangars, known as Hangars 40 & 41 and Hangars 42 & 43, along with one of the two lots belonging to Transwest Helicopters, were the focal points of these lease discussions.
Hangars 40 & 41 were given separate motions, on account of the previous owner, Visual Telecom, selling the leases to two different companies.
Visual Telecom’s new focus is on Hangars 42 and 43, and their development on the allocated parcel of airport land. Having built Hangars 40 and 41, and sold them off to separate parties, Visual Telecom seeks to build Hangars 42 and 43 for their own use.
Because all four hangars were previously together on the same lease, that lease has to be terminated in order to accommodate the new ownership arrangements.
The total area of all four hangars is 953 square metres. Visual Telecom’s new lease for Hangars 42 and 43 covers their 478 square-meter plot size, while each of the other two leases covers 239 square metres.
New ownership of Hangar 41 belongs to BC Helicopters, while ownership of Hangar 40 has been sold to a numbered company.
Meanwhile, Transwest Helicopters is acquiring a lease previously held by Oliver Aviation Services Limited.
The lease is for a plot of land being accessed by Transwest via a Temporary Use Permit, and the lease had been granted to Oliver Aviation Services this past June, pending the Temporary Use Permit (TUP) approval.
The TUP granted Transwest permission to place sea cans on the vacant lot next to their Airport property. The terms of the lease remain the same, and Transwest still has options to renew the lease and permits for the sea cans until they are ready to construct a new hangar.
When the new hangar is ready to be built, a new lease will be written up for that purpose, similar to the current development with Hangars 42 and 43.
Councillor David Mattes brought forth a lone point of discussion, seeking more insight on the value of the lease rates.
“When was the last time we had our lease rates reviewed by an appraiser?” Mattes asked, while seconding the motion on the revised lease for Hangars 42 and 43.
“We had them done in 2024, and they were put in place at the beginning of 2025,” Lougheed answered.
All four motions on the lease revisions were carried by Council, and have now taken effect as of October 31.
