- October 30, 2024
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A half-dozen residents with homes near the Flagler Executive Airport told the Flagler County Commission Dec. 16 that the planes are creating too much noise.
Jay Siciliani, a resident of Zinnia Court, was the first to address the commission about the issue during its Dec. 16 meeting. He threatened to sue for emotional distress, and suggested the county limit flight school traffic to 8 a.m. to 5 pm. on weekdays and 8 a.m. to noon on Saturdays, with no flight school traffic on Sundays or holidays.
"The airport should grow with the community, not against it. People move to Palm Coast because of the peacefulness and the natural beauty."
— JAY SICILIANI
"I talked to Roy Seiger, the airport manager, again last week about this issue, and his response to me was, 'The airport has been here since 1942, before the homes were built.' My response to him was, 'The homes were here before the flight schools were allowed at the airport,'" Siciliani said. "The airport should grow with the community, not against it. People move to Palm Coast because of the peacefulness and the natural beauty. If the county does not control how it grows, then Palm Coast will become undesirable."
He added that the County Commission has ultimate authority over the airport.
"If you refuse to help us, then we the people of this community that suffer from this will file a class-action lawsuit against the county and the airport for emotional distress," he said. "We at home have been monitoring our stress levels while these planes have been operating over our homes where we should be relaxing with very low or no stress."
One woman said said she'd been in a "really PTSD, not safe place" in the days before Thanksgiving, and that the noise was so bad that she called the airport management.
Gina Weiss, a resident of Zinnia Trail, said the noise from flight schools had become "intolerable." She'd bought her home in Palm Coast 15 years before, she said, and had been "blown away by its pristine beauty, and Palm Coast was also built on the premise of being a refuge, for its environment and its wildlife."
When residents approach airport management, she said, "They mock us, they make fun of us, they don’t take us seriously."
“I knew I bought a house near an airport, but the planes were — you could tolerate it," she said.
She said the area's real estate values were "plummeting" because of noise. Records from the county Property Appraiser's Office show that the area's real estate values have been rising.
County Administrator Jerry Cameron said the matter was a "complex issue."
"I think the time has come to do a presentation to the public and to the board as to exactly what challenges we have and what might be done," he said.
He said the issue will be placed on an agenda for a meeting in January.
