The Des Moines International Airport board today chose to give the National Guard Bureau a pointed statement rather than a lease termination.

But the panel made it clear in a statement that its patience is running thin.

Airport authority board members said they want the National Guard Bureau to decide how much land it needs at the Des Moines airport now that the fighter jets have left the 172-acre Iowa Air National Guard base, and how much the government is willing to pay.

The current lease is $1 a year and runs through 2060, but was signed when the federal government was pitching in more than $1 million a year in firefighting assistance that isn’t there now that the jets are gone. The Federal Aviation Administration has contended that the remote drone operation now at the base doesn’t qualify for the discounted lease, but military officials say it should. They add they may move helicopters or another mission to Des Moines that would qualify under for the discount offered to aeronautical missions.

A market rate lease for the land would cost as much as $5 million. The airport at one point offered to cut that in half, but got no answer from federal officials.

The board today said it would leave more time for negotiations that had their roots in the military’s 2012 decision to pull the fighter jets from the base. The statement, read by board chairman Ed Hansell, said the airport wants a lease deal that is good for ratepayers. It also added that the military should pay the $200,000 it owes the city for sewage fees. The airport is run by an independent authority but could be liable for the sewage charges if the military doesn’t pay because it serves as the landlord.

“The airport reserves all its rights to terminate the lease, and urges the National Guard Bureau and the Air National Guard to become good citizens and good tenants and do what they have said they were willing to do for the past two years,” Hansell said in a prepared statement following a closed meeting of the board. “There is an approaching point in time when the airport will be required to proceed to exercise its rights under its lease if the National Guard Bureau and the Iowa National Guard continue to delay resolving this issue.”

Col. Greg Hapgood, spokesman for the Iowa National Guard, said federal deliberations can be lengthy, but the Guard hopes to avoid a court fight. He said much of the issue depends on how federal officials rule on what missions qualify for the lease discount. Hapgood said the Guard is reluctant to give up much land when its future missions in Des Moines are undecided.

Read a previous story on the issue at BusinessRecord.com.