GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (KKCO) - The Grand Junction Airport is raising a multi-million dollar gate administrators say is required for security. However, businesses on the grounds say the decision to build the fence is a folly.

"it's a huge inconvenience for us because we need public access 24/7," says Colorado Airlines owner Ron Rouse.

Rouse is referring to the FAA funded fence that will soon enclose hangar businesses at the Grand Junction Airport.

Airport management says TSA wouldn't accept any other means of security. Hangar owners say they believe the gate is more a of grand scheme.

"There weren't any other alternatives offered to us by the airport, but there are other alternatives that the TSA will accept," says Rouse.

Rouse says the fence will shut out their customers, a maneuver airport businesses say they didn't have a chance to navigate. "They just said, 'This is the way it's going to be and you're going to have to live with it,'" says Rouse.

Once the gate is finished, Rouse will have to make several trips transporting an entire parking lot worth of passengers about a half mile down the road to the fence's entrance.

"It's going to bankrupt our company if that gate goes in. If we can't have access, we're out of business," says Rouse.

Tristar Aviation owner and avionic mechanic Steve Bottom says it's now probably too late to reroute this gated plan.

"Now they (airport management) have a committee to explore the options... If they had done that in the beginning, we could have built a fence with the alignment that would have worked for everybody," says Bottom.

In hopes of finding a solution that does work for everybody, the airport says it recently hired an airport security consultant to mitigate the issue.

"The disadvantage the tenants have, is that they only have the ability to look at public regulations for airport security. They don't have the ability to look at the sensitive security information," says Jeff Price, of Leading Edge Strategies.

Dana Brewer runs monument aircraft service. He says federal officials would have been fine with a tightly locked door. "As long as the key is a non-duplicable key, it would have been accepted by TSA," says Brewer.

The airport businesses also question why the same kind of hangars at the Montrose Airport aren't subject to a fence.
Airport businesses have filed a complaint with the FAA and may file a lawsuit.

The Grand Junction Airport's consultant says he'll be in town next month to hopefully work out the situation. There was no direct comment from the Grand Junction Airport administration to 11 News.