Every once in a while, just a few times a month, if that, a JetBlue aircraft flies over our house late at night — hours after the 10 p.m. flight curfew. We’re not sure why it picks on our house, but it has something to do with Long Beach Airport’s main runway being closed for maintenance or calamity. Our house is under the flight path for a smaller runway that is just long enough for a major carrier to land on and they rarely monkey with it.

Does the noise bother us? Not terribly. Yes, we do run out of the house in terror, grabbing cherished belongings along the way, but after our wife sings us back to sleep, we realize that JetBlue, or whatever airline is landing late, will be writing a check to the Long Beach Public Library Foundation.

Fines paid by airlines for violating Long Beach’s cherished noise ordinance are paid directly to the foundation to be spent equally among the city’s libraries for resources. Yes, books and magazines, but also for audio books, online courses, homework help and other services to patrons.

It’s not an insignificant amount of money that the library receives through the foundation. The numbers tell two stories: One, the foundation is getting a lot more money from the fines each year and, two, which logically follows: Airlines (and obviously, because it’s by far the biggest and most far-flung airline at the airport, JetBlue, is the biggest violator) are breaking the curfew a lot more often, incurring a $6,000 fine each time.

From 2012 through 2015, the total fines averaged $342,000 per year. Last year, they jumped to $594,000, and, perhaps alarmingly, in just the first six months of this year, the fines totaled $639,900.

The Long Beach Public Library, of course, appreciates the money it has been receiving since becoming the beneficiary in 2007. But at least one member of the Airport Advisory Commission wonders if maybe it might make more sense to use that money to help people most adversely affected by the noise.

Airport commissioner Jeff Rowe is advancing an item at the commission’s meeting at 4 p.m. Thursday at Skylinks golf course that would recommend the City Council ask City Prosecutor Doug Haubert to examine the feasibility of redirecting fines from the library to noise mitigation projects.

“The Airport Advisory Commission’s charge is to give the best advice, and I think in this case it would be taking those fines and giving them to the people most affected,” said Rowe. “It just seems to be the right thing to do. Find those who need to have their homes more soundproof by installing double-pane windows, is one thing we can look into.”

It’s likely the idea won’t go anywhere. Just figuring out who best deserves a five-figure window-replacement gift is problematic, short of a lottery.

Kate Azar, the Long Beach Public Library Foundation’s executive director, is staying out of the fray and doesn’t plan to speak on the foundation’s behalf. Maybe it strikes her as unseemly, but her official response is the foundation doesn’t “play a part of being involved between JetBlue and the city prosecutor.”

Still, the fees are a huge boon for the library and its patrons. Azar says the money accounts for one-third or more of the library’s materials — it cannot be used for staffing. “The library hasn’t changed its budget because of the money we get from the noise violations,” she said. “We consider them excess funds to close the much needed gap.

“The library and the foundation has never taken the money for granted,” said Azar. “We’ve always known that it could all go away.”

Contact Tim Grobaty at 562-714-2116, tgrobaty@scng.com, @grobaty on Twitter.