$5 Million Customs Facility, Trade Zone Status Coming to Airport

Lansing’s Capital Region International Airport expects to open its expanded customs inspection station in May, a month ahead of schedule. Even so, goods have been clearing customs at the north Lansing site for nearly a year.

Chris Holman took receipt of a United Parcel Service (UPS) shipment of rugs from Beijing March 20 at the airport, and he was clearly pumped.

Holman is generally known as the publisher of the Greater Lansing Business Monthly magazine, and a radio personality. But few know that for years he has owned a factory in China where rugs are hand-tied.

“I don’t think people realize how big this new international capability will be for the region,” he says. He also chairs the airport authority, its governing board. “People will be able to clear customs returning from Ireland, Canada, or Mexico."

Already the airport allows goods and up to 20 passengers per flight to be processed by the two customs officers stationed there. But when the $5 million space opens, the Federal Inspection Station will be able to process up to 200 passengers per hour, says Nicole Noll-Williams, the authority’s regional marketing director.

So far, the airport authority has invested $21 million in state and federal funds in the effort to put the “international” into the facility, including lengthening a runway to carry larger planes and expansion of parking for cargo planes.

It expects a Foreign Trade Zone designation within the next few months, and that’s when the need for jobs will take off, says Noll-Williams.

Warehouses will be needed to be built with cargo plane parking on one side, and truck pick-up stations on the other. Custom brokers and freight forwarders will be needed to arrange for shipments and the cargo airlines will need workers.

Both Lansing Community College and Michigan State University are ramping up the needed training, she says.

“We expect to become a mini Chicago or Detroit when it comes to handling international business.”

Source: Nicole Noll-Williams, Capital Region International Airport

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

All Photographs © Dave Trumpie