ZAMORA, GALLEGOS JR. BACKBITE NEW AIRLINE

By Juan Montoya
It is the stuff that makes economic developers' mouths water.
With violence driving the economically active upper-middle and entrepreneurial classes north from Mexico with desperately-needed capital to start up business along the border and in the interior, communities in the U.S. are all trying to lure them to relocate there.
Brownsville is no different.
Some are looking to capital from northern Mexico to revitalize their struggling downtown and boost local business. Others as far as San Antonio are offering fleeing Mexican businesspeople incentive packages ranging from tax abatements to assistance in immigration issues and real estate packages.
While in Brownsville helping the parents of local special needs children in the Brownsville Independent School District that resulted in three new trustees, Carlos Quintanilla, president of the community action group Accion America saw the potential for this border community to tap into the torrent of commercially-active Mexican businesses fleeing violence in northern Mexico and attempting to invest is a more secure market.
Monterrey, 179 miles from Brownsville is the capital city of the northeastern Mexican state of Nuevo León. It has the second largest metropolitan area in Mexico, after Greater Mexico City, and is the country’s third most populous after Greater Mexico City and Greater Guadalajara. Monterrey serves as the most important commercial center in the north of the country, being base to many important Mexican companies and multinational corporations. Monterrey is also Mexico’s second largest economy with an estimated GDP of 105 billion. Monterrey is one of Mexico’s most developed cities with one of the highest per capita incomes in the nation.
If one were to drive (not counting crossing time at international crossings), it would take about 3.25 hours through what can safely be called a militarized zone. A Fly Frontera flight gets you here safely in 45 minutes.
Similarly, Tampico, 317 miles away, is the main city in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas. It is the nation’s chief economic powerhouse on the Gulf of Mexico. Economic development during the 1920s made the city a pioneer in the aviation and soda industries. Oil is the chief export, but the city also is a major exporter of silver, copper, and lumber, together with wool, hemp, and other agricultural products. Containerized cargo, however, is mainly handled by the neighboring ocean port of Altamira.
To drive from Tampico to Brownsville, it would take you six hours through Zeta and cartel controlled highways. Fly Frontera can get you here in a mere 55 minutes.
His immigrant-advocacy group had developed numerous contacts in northern Mexico and he thought that they would be attracted here if only they had a safe, inexpensive way to get to the border. What better idea than a regional airline to service this niche market, he thought.
Using the group's numerous business and social contacts on both sides of the US-Mexico border, Quintanilla found fertile ground for his idea.
Thus, Fly Frontera was born.
He got in touch with Charter Air Transport (CAT) a U. S. Direct Air Carrier (certificate number GNOA005I) authorized by the FAA to operate under 14 CFR Part 135.
CAT presently operates five (5) Embraer EMB-120 “Brasilia” 30-passenger regional airliners in addition to other turbine-powered aircraft and has a TSA-approved full aircraft security program permitting operations into and out of “sterile” airport terminals. CAT has significant experience in operating scheduled public charter programs, both in the continental US and internationally.
Jim Gallagher, president of Public Charters will start offering competitive airline service primarily between Tampico, Tamaulipas, and Monterrey, Nuevo Leon and Brownsville by June 1 out of the Brownsville-South Padre Island international Airport.
“We're thinking of initiating flights between Monterrey and Brownsville once a day, four days a week, and twice on Friday, Saturday and Monday," Gallagher told Notimex.
Gallagher said Fly Frontera will also fly to Tampico three times a week.
The cost of a round trip to Monterrey with Fly Frontera would be about $260. A one-way flight would cost $130."
“It will be a tremendous saving for the customer,” Gallagher said, pointing out that private charter planes charge $400 return, while Continental Airlines charges $500. “And with Continental you can only get to Monterrey by changing flights in Houston. We are going to cut this in half."
Now, regardless of who first thought of the idea (Quintanilla) or pushed for it on the city commission (commissioner Charlie Atkinson), you'd think that local leaders who are looking at double-digit unemployment and shrinking purchases from neighboring Mexican shoppers would at least back the new airline bringing in needed infusions of capital and commercially-active businesses.
However, Quintanilla said commissioner Melisssa Zamora and others such as Ruben Gallegos Jr. have started to bad mouth the new venture and cast aspersions on the enterprise.
"When we were helping a local PAC defeat Rick Zayas and Ruben Cortez on the BISD, we inadvertently defeated the efforts of commissioner Zamora and Mr. Gallegos," he charged. "Now, instead of getting behind this new enterprise which will bring hundreds, if not thousands of new investors and capital and jobs to Brownsville, these folks would rather focus on the individuals behind it to discredit their efforts. What kind of leadership and vision is this coming from elected officials and individuals representing the needs of the community?"