Inside the hangar at the Hollister Municipal Airport, Kirk
VanOsten practiced mending holes, using rivets to patch the
structure.
Inside the hangar at the Hollister Municipal Airport, Kirk VanOsten practiced mending holes, using rivets to patch the structure.
“When you’re really good everything is flush and square,” he said. “The goal is to make it as structurally sound as it was before.”
These patches are just like the ones that would be used to mend a hole in a plane, VanOsten explained.
The 55-year-old Gilroy resident is pursuing aviation maintenance, a second career after working at IBM for a quarter-century. He is one of about 25 students currently enrolled in the two-year program through Gavilan College.
Gavilan College’s Aviation Maintenance Technology program has existed at the Hollister Municipal Airport since 1967 attracting students from the greater South Valley area. The program prepares students to take the test that qualifies them as licensed aircraft technicians.
But despite the program’s popularity among its students and its long-standing history at the airport, lead faculty member Dave Connal said there’s a chance the program could be looking for a new location, and soon.
The college has a month-to-month lease with the city of Hollister, and Connal said it makes the prospect of investing any money into remodels and building updates impractical.
“The school doesn’t want to invest any money (in the building) because we’re month to month,” said Travis Flippen, the program’s other full-time teacher.
Connal said they are looking at the airport in San Martin as a potential alternative.
“We don’t want to budge, but we’re looking at the possibility of relocating … What’s best for Gavilan College is a long-term lease,” Connal said.
Connal said he feared that the school, which pays a discounted rental price because it’s an educational institution, could be ousted for a higher-paying lessee.
Still, Jan Bernstein Chargin, spokeswoman for Gavilan College, said that currently “there are no plans to move out of Hollister.”
City Manager Clint Quilter said while the program has a month-to-month lease, he’s “not opposed” to negotiating a longer deal with the community college.
Airport Manager Bill Gere said the school pays about $275 a month, well below the market rate of $5,000 to $6,000. Gere said that if they renegotiated to a longer-term lease, the rent would increase significantly.
“It’s our duty to the taxpayers to charge a fair amount,” he said.
Gere said there had been aviation enterprise businesses that had expressed interest in the space the college currently leases – and in paying full price for it.
Ruth Erickson, president of the Hollister Airmen’s Association, said she had heard about a possibility that Gavilan’s aviation maintenance technology program might leave.
“We don’t want to see them go, especially with the history,” Erickson said. “What we’re doing is losing 40 years of aviation technology history to another airport who will welcome them with open arms.”
Erickson said if the program went to another airport, it would be a loss from an educational standpoint and a loss to the community.
“It provides something for the future for some of the people in this and surrounding counties,” Erickson said. “There’s a limited amount of training here in hands-on jobs, and we don’t have another facility like that for lots of miles.”
While a move to the San Martin airport could be good for commuters from San Jose, it would be less beneficial for San Benito County residents, Connal said.
“We could relocate to San Martin – at the same time it’s going to be detrimental to the city of Hollister,” he said. “Lots of students are local – at least 25 percent.”
Several of the graduates stay and work locally, Connal said. Many are currently employed by the Hollister airport and other local airports.
“We’re serving the community,” Connal said.
Flippen said there is a high demand for aviation maintenance technicians, and the school got many requests for current students and graduates from employers.
“There’s a shortage of technicians right now,” Flippen said. “We can’t really fill all the demand.”
Connal said the program draws “everyone from a high school grad to a retired person.”
“We’re unique in that we’re the only school that gives this type of training for quite a few square miles,” he said.
Kayla Morrow, 20, is in her first semester in the program.
“I used to hate going to school, but I love it here,” she said.
The Aromas resident plans to one day become a helicopter pilot, but for now she enjoys learning about the mechanics of planes.
This love of all things aeronautical is shared by her classmate, Hollister resident Robert Reed, 22. Reed is a self-described “airport bum.” After getting his pilot’s license two years ago, Reed decided to go back to school to learn about the mechanics of the planes.
“I’ve learned so much that I didn’t know before,” Reed said.
