The Longmont City Council approved a new lease with Mile-Hi Skydiving by a 5-2 vote Tuesday. Councilwomen Joan Peck and Polly Christensen dissented and Councilman Jeff Moore was absent.

The lease replaces a problematic 20-year lease that Mile-Hi owner Frank Casares signed with the city in 2007. The 2007 lease was for 180,723 square feet of land that Casares intended to use to build a facility to house all of Mile-Hi’s operations.

Per the original lease, Casares was to pay $41,566 per year starting when he applied for a grading permit for the land. But Casares never requested that permit and so never paid any of the seven years’ lease rates in full, constructing instead a temporary quonset hut structure still in use for parachute packing.

The replacement lease that the City Council approved Tuesday is only for the 12,780 square feet under a quonset hut, at a rate of $4,507.51 per year.

The lease question has generated a lot of public comment at past meetings, and Tuesday wasn’t any different.

Raymond Cooper, at the public comment portion of the meeting, said he was against replacing the 20-year lease with the now-12-year lease.

“With the track record Mile-Hi has had in payments and working with the community, I really question whether we should approve this lease,” Cooper said. “I don’t think it’s in the best interest of southwest Longmont, and I request that you deny this lease.”

Eric Heczko said during the public comment portion of the meeting he was surprised at others’ comments from a previous meeting that living underneath the area Mile-Hi flies was like living in a war zone.

“I have lived approximately a mile and a half from the airport for the last 21 years … and I’m never bothered by the plane noise,” said Heczko, who is a pilot and a plane owner. “As a vet who has been in a real war zone, this is not a combat/battle/war zone.”

Peck attempted to amend the lease to say that if Mile-Hi were 30 days overdue on a payment, the city would collect that payment plus interest. The motion to amend the lease failed 2-4, with only Peck and Christensen voting for it.

Councilman Brian Bagley said that the added language Peck wanted wasn’t necessary because the lease already says if they’re late, the city can evict them. As for noise, Bagley said he understands the comments from people who say Mile-Hi is too loud, but he thinks the lease approved Tuesday is the best deal.

“It’s not the solution but it’s a good start. … We have a defective contract with Mile-Hi right now and the (Federal Aviation Administration) told us we need to fix it,” Bagley said. “If we don’t fix the lease, Mile-Hi Skydiving is going to sue us and they’re going to get the 20-year lease anyway.”

Karen Antonacci: 303-684-5226, antonaccik@times-call.com or twitter.com/ktonacci