Mayor Rob Harrington has called a special meeting of Charlotte City Council for 4 p.m. Monday, Oct. 19, with one item on it: the motion he vetoed a week earlier, a six-week review of the airport's proposed airline lease with a decision Nov. 23.
The vote was coming either way. Under the city charter, a vetoed action "shall automatically be on the agenda at the next regular or special meeting of the Council." By calling a special session an hour before council's regular zoning meeting, Harrington made it that next meeting. The city's notice does not say why he called a separate session. It says only that the meeting is for council to vote on readopting the Oct. 12 motion to "have a period for review and a decision to be made by this Council at its meeting on November 23."
Harrington vetoed that motion immediately after council passed it, saying council hadn't had "sufficient discussion of the timeline." The bar is higher this time. Under the charter, passing a motion normally takes six votes; a vetoed action takes effect only if council readopts it "with at least seven members voting in the affirmative." Council has 11 members. The motion passed Oct. 12 on a show of hands; the count was not read aloud.
The meeting is in the Council Chamber of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Government Center, 600 E. Fourth St., and streams on the city's YouTube channel and its Government Channel. The zoning meeting follows at 5 p.m.
What rides on the vote
If seven members vote yes, council is to decide on the lease Nov. 23. If the vote falls short, the lease has no decision date; no other date has been set. On Oct. 12, Harrington said he would work with council on "the appropriate time, the best time, consensus of council for it to come back."
The lease carries its own deadline. An airline that signs it "on or before December 31, 2026" gets a one-time payment of its share of 40% of the terminal's fiscal 2026 net remaining revenue, if there is any. That is the money left after the terminal's operating costs, debt payments and certain other charges. The payment is due by Feb. 28, 2027. An airline that signs on or after Jan. 1 gets none of it. A Nov. 23 decision would come before that deadline.
What's in the lease
The airport has now posted the full proposed agreement, 242 pages with exhibits. Read it here, page by page. Its cover carries a disclaimer calling it a draft and says "minor modifications to language may occur as final legal approval is underway." Among its terms:
- How long. Jan. 1, 2027, through June 30, 2037. It can extend five years, to June 30, 2042, including if a gate project of at least $500 million is approved. (Pages 8, 9 and 15)
- What gets built. A list of projects totaling $2.12 billion. An airline that signs the lease approves $1.72 billion of it, including a $700 million Concourse C expansion and a $500 million central tunnel. An international concourse expansion and an atrium expansion are approved for planning and design only. (Pages 19 and 129)
- The revenue split. The airlines' share of the terminal's net remaining revenue is 42.5% in fiscal 2027, blending the old lease's 40% for half the year, then 45% from fiscal 2028 through 2036. (Pages 11 and 153)
- Gates. As of Jan. 1, 2027, American Airlines holds 93 of the airport's 123 gates; Delta has 6, United 3, Frontier 2 and Southwest 2, and the city keeps 17 for common use. An airline must average 5½ daily turns per gate (a turn is one plane arriving and departing) or 675 daily seats across its gates, or the city can take some of its gates back. (Pages 29, 31 and 127)
The lease does not set wages or benefits for airline and contractor workers, though worker issues drove much of the Oct. 12 discussion. City attorneys told council that night they believe state law bars the city from using the lease to set wages or benefits.
Where members stood Oct. 12
Council Member Dimple Ajmera, who made the motion, said council needed at least 45 days "to review this long document." Council Member Victoria Watlington said she wanted to make sure "we hear from the public."
Others spoke about the lease itself. Mayor Pro Tem James Mitchell Jr. said, "I will be supporting it whenever this comes on our agenda." Council Member Ed Driggs called it "a good deal for the city." Council Member Malcolm Graham called the lease vote "probably one of the most consequential votes that we will take."
How any member will vote Monday is not on the record.