How goes the signature drive to overturn Kalispell City Council’s decision to upgrade the city airport? An answer will be known soon.

People opposed to a Kalispell City Airport upgrade to B-II design standards have until 5 p.m. Friday to turn in 1,759 registered voter signatures and stop any more work on the project unless it’s approved by voters.

Meanwhile, Kalispell is looking for an engineering firm to complete an environmental assessment needed for work on the upgrade to proceed. A request for qualifications was issued last week and engineering firms have until Wednesday, Sept. 26 to apply for the job.

“We’re just going forward with the start of that process,” Kalispell City Manager Doug Russell said.

“We’ll see if anything occurs with the petition going around. That’s part of the public process as well, and we have no problem with that. But we want to keep moving forward on the direction we’re currently working under.”

Chad Graham, who spearheaded the referendum drive, is confident enough signatures will be turned in to put a hold on the project. “We have until Friday to keep gathering signatures, so that’s what we’re going to do,” he said.

Even if Friday’s deadline is not met, upgrade opponents still have until Tuesday, Oct. 30, to collect 1,759 signatures to put an airport referendum on the ballot in November 2013.

The referendum would ask Kalispell voters to either reject or affirm the Kalispell City Council’s recent 5-4 decision to upgrade the airport to B-II design standards with money from the federal Airport Improvement Program.

The upgrade was recommended by Stelling Engineers after a two-year study that evaluated more than a dozen options for Kalispell’s public-use general aviation facility, including closing or moving it.

An environmental assessment is needed before any more work on the estimated $16 million upgrade can start.

The engineering firm selected to do the assessment would “look at the impacts the airport currently has and what the impacts of the suggested work at the airport would be,” said Charlie Harball, Kalispell’s city attorney.

The assessment’s scope would be defined with input from the Federal Aviation Administration.

But the study must be returned with a finding of no significant impact for the upgrade to continue, or identify ways to mitigate any findings of impact.

FAA would pay for 90 percent of the assessment’s cost. The study would take six months to a year to complete and include public hearings.

The proposed B-II upgrade is nearly identical to the airport layout plan that emerged from a 1999 planning study. That layout plan went through an environmental assessment in 2002 and emerged with a finding of no significant impact.

“They’ll certainly look back at the 2002 [assessment] that was accepted and approved, and look at what has changed in terms of growth around the airport. That could be any number of things, including the controversy that has come up over the last couple of years,” Harball said.

The old environmental assessment expired after several years because Kalispell could not mitigate two KGEZ radio towers that extend into what should be protected airspace south of the airport.

The radio towers have a new owner who is willing to negotiate with the city, Harball said.

Then as now, Kalispell must negotiate to mitigate the radio towers and acquire 114 acres of land needed for the airport upgrade before FAA will release any funding.

That funding could pay for up to 90 percent of the upgrade’s cost and reimburse Kalispell for about $3 million already spent on land and airport improvements related to the proposed B-II upgrade.

Reporter Tom Lotshaw may be reached at 758-4483 or by email at tlotshaw@dailyinterlake.com.