Connect With Your Community For Airport Success

by John Chmiel
President, Wausau Flying Service, Inc.
Manager, Wausau Downtown Airport (KAUW)
Wausau, Wisconsin
Published in Midwest Flyer Magazine April/May 2023 Digital Issue

John Chmiel

Last October marked Wausau Flying Service, Inc.’s 30th anniversary as the FBO and management company at Wausau Downtown Airport (KAUW), Wausau, Wisconsin. A milestone like this, forces you to look back and take inventory and critique your performance over the years. The roller coaster ride down memory lane can be fun, but a melancholy exercise.

When we arrived in 1992, KAUW hadn’t had a healthy FBO since 1976, and there was talk in the community that maybe it was time to close one of the oldest airports in Wisconsin. Many people told us we were crazy to try to make an FBO work in Wausau, as it would be an uphill battle. To the contrary, we only saw potential in this airport and the business.

Wausau Downtown Airport, formerly referred to as Alexander Airport.

Our first five years were spent just trying to win over the existing airport tenants and the aviation community in our area. We accomplished this the old-fashioned way by giving our customers what they wanted: full staffing during business hours; quality flight instruction and aircraft rental; evening and weekend general aviation activities; and a friendly voice on the phone, in person, and over the unicom. Little things like cleaning windshields, having a courtesy car, and airport advisories went a long way with winning customers over.

Our other goal was to gain the confidence of the city leaders. We began by sending the city council and mayor a monthly report regarding airport statistics like fuel flow, aircraft rental hours, operation counts, number of locally based aircraft, and a list of local and transient customers patronizing the airport. We immediately saw success from our communication and were rewarded with the ability to set operational and capital budgets for the airport. We also created a “six-year plan” for the airport which we updated on an annual basis. This one tool applied consistently over 30 years has created unflinching support from city leaders and the Wausau community. Improving communication with the city and the community about the airport has been relatively simple, and it has paid huge intangible benefits. It’s a never-ending process that is essential to airport success.

The last 10 years, our goal has been to begin our focus on how Wausau Flying Service, Inc. and the airport could truly connect with our community. Our airport name was changed to Wausau Downtown Airport in the late 1990s, because, from a pilot perspective, we are located in a neighborhood in the middle of the Wausau metro area. Location is everything and that can be a bad thing or a good thing. We were determined to make it our greatest advantage.

We started with connecting with the Southeast Side Neighborhood group. They needed a place to meet, and we made the airport available for their monthly meetings. Pretty soon 30-60 neighbors were walking over and perusing our lobby and introducing themselves. Airport updates were on the monthly meeting agenda giving our neighbors the latest news regarding airport activities and our plans for the future. We found that our neighborhood loved the airport and many people had very positive and personal memories of it, and stories to go with those memories.

Soon after this neighborhood connection was established, the group asked for our assistance regarding upgrades to a park which is located on leased airport property. They suggested an aviation themed park. Wausau Flying Service, Inc. and the neighborhood group immediately partnered with local foundations to pay for new aviation themed upgrades designed to recruit elementary school aged children to aviation. Private funding in excess of $750K was raised to prevent the upgrade from impacting taxpayers. The success was overwhelming, and today, the facility is as much a park as it is an aviation education center for kids.

Shortly after the success of Alexander Airport Park (which is the namesake of the foundations and the family that originally established Wausau Downtown Airport), the demand for private hangars warranted creating an east hangar development area adjacent to the park for eight large hangars. Instead of neighbors fighting against the new hangar expansion, they embraced the fact that airplanes would now be closer to the park for the kids to see the aviation activity. I had spent years worrying about the negative impact airport growth might have on the neighborhood, but instead, because of our new relationships and supporting each other’s activities, the neighborhood became the #1 supporter of airport development!

The next partnership forged was with EAA Chapter 640. After the chapter was gifted money from a late chapter member, the decision was made to use the money to finish EAA Founder Paul Poberezny’s last homebuilt project, the Mechanix Illustrated “Baby Ace.” That project received national attention and it revitalized the once dying chapter. The decision was made to form a new entity, “Learn Build Fly” (LBF) to introduce youth to STEM (Science Technology Engineering Math) engineering, and fabrication skills through the building of homebuilt aircraft. The new organization built their first hangar in the new east hangar development area, on the other side of the fence from the park. It was the perfect recruiting location.

The organization meets twice weekly with 50-plus kids and adults in attendance. The success has been so great that the organization finished their second hangar in 2022. EAA Chapter 640 has encouraged the local radio control aircraft club, Wausau R/C Sports, to return to the airport. Their meeting and activities in the LBF hangar have attracted people of all ages to participate in aviation, but especially middle and high school students through their flight training programs.

Aviation 101 Group, Wausau, Wisconsin.

Next came the partnership between Wausau Flying Service, Inc. and the Wausau School District to form “Aviation 101.” Aviation 101 was developed to encourage high school students to become professional pilots. The ground school course is managed by the Wausau School District through “WAVE,” an online virtual school. This portion of the course uses the private pilot “Angle of Attack” course produced by Chris Palmer. In addition to ground school, the students are then paired up and attend “flight lessons” at the airport on the FAA-approved Wausau Flying Service flight simulator and fly 17 lessons with a flight instructor from a specifically created syllabus to teach students everything about flying an airplane before they actually take the controls of a real airplane. The goal is for the students to take the course in their junior year, then pass the FAA knowledge exam and solo the summer of their junior year. If those goals can be obtained, then the students can easily earn their Private Pilot Certificate in their senior summer before attending a collegiate flight program. Students earn high school credit for the Aviation 101 program.

Students using the Wausau Flying Service flight simulator as part of the “Aviation 101” program to encourage them to become professional pilots.

Next, we partnered with Fox Valley Technical College. Students earning their Private Pilot Certificate through Aviation 101 also receive shared credit with the college simultaneously which gives them a head-start on their flying career. Our thought has always been to keep Wisconsin students in Wisconsin. This makes it more likely that these young people will remain in our community. Wausau Flying Service, Inc. now has a steady source of Certified Flight Instructors (CFIs) and pilots to choose from after they graduate from a collegiate program. This also eases the local strain from the impact of the national pilot shortage. Our plan is to now try to apply what we’ve learned to create a similar feeder program for Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) technicians.

This year we were able to partner with the Lewitzke Foundation to fund the cost of the simulator training for Aviation 101. Through the generosity of the foundation, the Aviation 101 program will be fully funded for up to 20 students per year over the next three years. We’ve just begun our fourth year of the program and have averaged 10 students per year using only organic promotion. The new funding will allow the program to double in size!

I could ramble on-and-on about the return of the annual Wausau Airshow in 2022, the Annual AirVenture Cup Race activities, and Hamburger Nights, but in conclusion, the thought I would like to leave with Midwest Flyer Magazine readers is this: We wouldn’t have most of this success if we had to do this alone! It was only after we forged important partnerships within our community, both inside and outside aviation, that our airport began to experience its true potential. This success has allowed Wausau Flying Service, Inc. to grow from a husband and wife, two-employee operation in 1992, to a 22-employee FBO in 2023. It has allowed us to negotiate contracts, plan meaningful airport capital plans backed by the taxpayers, gain loyal, well-trained employees, and keep loyal, happy customers. But most of all, it has allowed us to serve a community that equally reciprocates appreciation for our partnership.

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