The Report The Airport Advisory Group Doesn’t Want You To See

Granted, that is a cliché title, but we can defend it. Twice, Show-Me Institute staff reached out to the Kansas City Airport Terminal Advisory Group (ATAG) about incorrect claims they were making in their presentations. We know from an open records request that they received our offer, considered it, and then ignored it while trying not to seem like they were ignoring it.

Dave Fowler, co-chairman of ATAG and a former managing partner at KPMG in Kansas City — one of the world’s largest auditing firms, — shockingly wasn’t ever concerned with the cost details. And whenever people provided financial information that did not align with the city’s talking points, it was dismissed. The affordability of the whole scheme was never seriously considered.

Until now.

Joe Miller, a policy researcher at the Show-Me Institute, has compiled all the cost data and concluded that over 30 years, it would be cheaper to renovate the Kansas City International Airport (MCI) twice than to build a new $1.2 billion terminal. Add this analysis to the many other points we’ve raised about the environmental or competitive need for a new terminal and it becomes impossible to find any worthwhile reason to tear down one of the country’s finest airports.