In keeping with the Port Administration’s hope that revenue generated from leases of its airport property — especially the industrial park lots — will be given to them for the development of the airport, Samoa News has obtained a copy of the Department of Commerce’s “Industrial Park Tenants Database” to find out how much money this would be, ‘as it stands’.

According to the document, there are more than 50 business tenants at the Industrial Park, leasing about 70 lots, comprising 60+ acres of land on the Tafuna plains area.

It should be noted that the ASG agencies and departments do not pay rent for the land they use, and it is noted as such on the database spreadsheet. There are 17 lots indicated as being used by the Department of Agriculture, Department of Public Works and Department of Education.

The spreadsheet has ASG collecting $78,286.39 monthly or $939,436.68 yearly from its tenants at the Industrial Park.

However, it's unclear exactly how much is actually collected by ASG, as Samoa News reported last year that the Attorney General's Office has taken some of the businesses to court for non-payment, and sent eviction notices to others. The status of these eviction notices is unknown at this time.

Samoa News further notes the spreadsheet report is somewhat inaccurate as a random sampling of businesses listed in the database were contacted, and it was found that some tenants are paying more than listed, while some are paying less.

Of interest is the variance of lease payments in terms of what the government is charging per square foot. The database indicates that the lowest amount currently being paid is 12¢ per sq. ft. (not 15¢ as reported in Samoa News’ airport property story in Tuesday, May 20, 2014 issue), with the highest amount at a $1.65 per sq. ft.

Further, there are tenants that are paying a flat amount for their lots, which Samoa News calculated for one of the tenants is 04¢ per sq. ft.

Other interesting asides to the database listings are:

The lot where Pacific Products used to be is now leased to Jane Chen, who’s paying a flat monthly rate of $3,100 or $37,200 yearly to ASG. However, Samoa News has been told that the lot is in contention as the ASG wishes to use the lot to build a gymnasium for Nu’uuli VocTech, which is located right next to it. Chen acquired the property after Pacific Products defaulted on its loan from ASB-ANZ Bank.

Bank of Hawaii seems to still be paying for its lease, as does Pizza Hut/KFC, as well as Samoa Napa. All three companies are no longer doing business in the industrial park. The Pizza Hut/KFC building is now occupied by Island Pizza, while G.H.C. Reid Co. Ltd. now runs Samoa Napa, and BoH has only it’s branch in Utulei.

Two companies Samoa News was unable to locate were: Ocean Star Int/Spencer/South Sea/Warehouse/Wholesale and Samoa International Media.

The American Samoa Armed Forces, which occupies two lots (across from the ANZ Bank), is paying $1 monthly or $12 yearly for 1.285 acreage. Samoa News notes that many people were asking if the lots to the ASAF were ‘free’.

The Director of the Port Administration Taimalelagi Claire Tuia Poumele, in speaking with Samoa News, said that two officials from the FAA are looking into the Airport’s revenue or cash flow from the tenants on the Airport property. She spoke of a 1973 map that showed over 800 acres of land committed by the government for airport use. (See Tuesday, May 20th issue)

She said, “Part of everything that’s listed as airport property that’s on this map and with the grants that we are applying for have grant assurances. If we’re applying for grants, we are going to need to meet these conditions and part of these conditions is that everything on airport property has to be fair market value.”

Taimalelagi said for instance, the property at the Industrial Park seems to be leased out for less than market value, i.e. what ASG is currently charging per square foot.