BTR hopes emergency response center will anchor business park

Anthony Marino, director of aviation for Baton Rouge Metropolitan Airport, says experiences after the hurricanes of the past several years have demonstrated the need for an aviation-friendly response center that is close enough to the coast to be accessible but far enough away to be safe. The airport is gathering funds from various sources for a “regional preparedness response center” that could also serve as the anchor tenant for an aviation business park. Marino says they’ve raised a total of about $8.5 million so far for a road and the 44,000-square-foot building, still in the design phase, without yet taking on debt. “If we have to incur a little debt, it’s going to generate some revenue,” he says. The airport currently is building the infrastructure for the site, spokesman Jim Caldwell says, with further development expected later this year. There will be a taxi lane suitable for military aircraft, loading docks for trucks, and enough room inside for response teams to set up camp. Marino says FEMA and several other agencies have asked about office space in the new facility. He stresses the center will complement, rather than replace, existing state and city-parish homeland security operations. BTR recently has been promoting the vacant land around the airport as a future site for an Aviation Business Park. —David Jacobs