Airport Manager Mike Chambless followed up with costs so far to fix the old restaurant building at the Hollister Municipal Airport and said earlier this week it had totaled $65,000 to date.
Chambless and airport commissioners are heading up the renovations to the former Ding-A-Ling eatery spot. The city is renovating the former restaurant building on the airport grounds to lease the space for another eatery. When initially interviewed in August, Chambless didn’t have cost numbers readily available to said he would follow up with those. He did so this week.
For the $65,000 in taxpayer funds so far, the costs have included $30,000 for the roof, $13,000 for a hood ventilation unit, $10,000 for electrical, $12,000 for plumbing. The funds come from the Airport Fund, which is separate from the city’s discretionary General Fund.
The small structure at 155 Skyland Drive near the airport office was built in 1942 as a Navy-owned structure. Most memorably for locals these days, though, it had been home to the Ding-A-Ling breakfast restaurant for many years followed by a short-lived successor establishment when Ding-A-Ling moved to Fourth Street. It’s been closed in recent years and badly in need of refurbishment, which the city is now providing.
The city-owned and funded airport in the past couple years has been planning and now executing that renovation — with the building in need of repairs to bring the small structure up to code.
Now the city is within months of a scheduled completion, and several possible tenants already have shown interest, officials told San Benito Live.
“There are absolutely a few tenants that have shown interest,” said Chambless, who runs the airport and public works for the City of Hollister, in a previous interview.
At the latest airport advisory meeting in late August, commissioners were talking about having the restaurant building ready to rent out in a month or two, Airport Commissioner Gordon Machado said.
-Kollin Kosmicki
