Perry asks TxDOT to temporarily fund control towers

The Texas Department of Transportation may dampen the fiscal turbulence shaking the state’s small airports and potentially fund 13 Texas air traffic control towers slated for closure in the next few weeks.

Gov. Rick Perry on Wednesday asked the Texas Transportation Commission to consider providing emergency assistance to keep the control towers open for the next 90 days, calling them a “vital safety network.”

Cities across the state, including Georgetown and San Marcos, have been scrambling to find funding over the past few weeks to keep the towers open. The Federal Aviation Administration recently slashed funding for 149 control towers nationwide to trim about $600 million from its 2013 budget under the across-the-board spending cuts known as sequestration.

The commission gets the final say on whether the Transportation Department can use its $193 million aviation budget to fund the control towers. Officials estimate keeping the 13 towers open would cost a total of $7 million a year.

More at http://www.statesman.com/news/news/local-govt-politics/gov-perry-asks-transportation-commission-to-tempor/nW55t/ .