Pilots from surrounding towns such as Waterford, Andover, Newry, Greenwood and Rumford regularly touch down at Bethel Regional Airport — but none of those towns contribute to its upkeep.

Despite a 2021 request from then-Bethel Town Manager Loretta Powers for shared regional support from Newry, Greenwood and Woodstock, the airport continues to rely on Bethel taxpayers to pay overhead and keep its North Road runway open and maintained. The letter, which asked for $15,000 from the three towns, went unanswered.

Capital expenses such as a new weather observation center are paid for by the Federal Aviation Administration. About $137,000 in revenue for 2025 comes mainly from fuel sales and a Maine Energy Systems mortgage on airport property.

At the June 2024 town meeting, Bethel Town Manager Sharon Jackson noted the facility had not supported itself for several years and was drawing money from the town’s enterprise fund. Voters reclassified the airport as a town department, adding transparency, and approved a budget of $305,987 for it.

At the 2025 town meeting, operating costs dropped to $282,688 but in October, voters backed an additional $100,000 purchase — a bucket loader to plow the runway — further cementing the town’s financial commitment.

REVENUE

All revenue flows into the town’s General Fund.

Current revenue estimates are:

• Tie-down fees: Capped at $30/month per aircraft; up to 18 spaces available, with about seven occupied.
• Hangars: Four generate $7,800 annually.
• Fuel sales: About $79,000 annually.
• Mortgage income: Maine Energy Systems pays $41,388 annually.

Jackson also noted that Oxford County had historically contributed to Bethel and Fryeburg airports but that stopped recently. A $5,000 request submitted this year — and narrowly rejected last year by a one-vote margin — is still pending.

Former Bethel Select Board Chair Meryl Kelly said Bethel Airport was undercutting other airports on fuel pricing, which is why the county refused to provide the money.

Airport Authority member Ed Lovejoy said, “Some people ask ‘why don’t you make the hangar lease or the fuel sales high enough to pay all your operating expenses?’ But they forget that we are in a market where we have to be competitive or we lose all the business.”

Kelly said the airport “gives people who have second homes an easier way to get in. If they pay for it, that’s fine. Newry should put money into that airport. It’s absurd that they don’t.”

Another Maine community airport generates enough revenue to give back to the town. At Wiscasset Municipal Airport, “The airport receives revenue in the form of payments from fuel sales, hangar land leases, tie-downs, hangar rentals and excise taxes paid on all based aircraft,” its website says. “Property taxes paid on hangars go into Wiscasset’s general fund, not into the airport fund. Actually the airport is paying money into the general operation of the town on top of paying its own way.”

BENEFITS

Bethel Regional Airport is open 24 hours a day, is self-serve and focuses on general aviation.

The airport also boosts the local economy, Airport Coordinator Randy Autrey said, noting that the “fancy-pants” people flying in on weekends to check with their builders may hire locals to work on their homes.

The airport logbook lists about 250 entries. None are from Bethel except Autrey. Of the seven planes on the tarmac, one is registered to a Bethel resident — former Select Board member and Cross Roads Diner owner Frank Del Duca. Autrey noted that not everyone signs the logbook. Of the entries that are legible — many are not — pilots are from other parts of Maine and from out of state. Nearly all of the remarks in the logbook are favorable, with many simply noting “lunch,” “breakfast,” “fuel,” “clean” or “love Bethel.” At least four people list Gould Academy in Bethel as their destination.

Until about a year and a half ago, town residents could reserve use of the airport’s conference room. Autrey said he closed the room because people were taking advantage of the space. One woman, he said, was operating a jewelry business from the room. Others left marks on the walls that required repairs.

Autrey points out that the FAA covers about 90% of airport costs, as is typical at rural airports nationwide. Most recently the FAA funded a $600,000 weather observation system that LifeFlight of Maine will use to obtain certified weather information. The instrument approach, with a better guidance system, is “super sophisticated,” helping connect medical services in the town, he said.

“This is a critical area for life support,” Autrey said, “especially with the mountain behind us, with skiers and mountain hikers. If someone is in critical condition, they can pick them out of the parking lot using a helicopter.”

Kelly points out that a LifeFlight helicopter wouldn’t require as much space as the airport has and the airport could have been a part of an emergency services complex that hosted Bethel Rescue and even the Fire Department. 

“The airport is not for Bethel. To have an entire airport that is of little useful nature to the majority of Bethel residents when we could have an ambulance barn there which actually helps many people all the time,” she said. “It just seems like the airport was a promise sold to the public but never delivered.”

A 10-year, FAA-backed, $240,000 master plan in three phases will add more hangars at the airport. Each hangar owner will pay for the lane to the new hangars, with the FAA contributing $650,000 for its construction. However, plowing snow to access the new hangars will potentially add to the town’s snowplow budget, Kelly said.

“Eight of the nine proposed hangars have ‘letters of intent’ behind them,” Autrey said. The FAA requires that assurance before funding runway construction.

When Bethel residents ask, “what’s in it for me,” Autrey said they are being narrow-minded.

“You could say that about anything — the food pantry, the fire department, the schools,” he said. “We are a community.”