Hollister City Council approves Wisk testing and ground-lease expansion at Hollister Airport

HOLLISTER — The Hollister City Council on Nov. 17 approved an airport use agreement allowing Wisk, an eVTOL manufacturer based at Hollister Airport, to test a temporary, deployable vertiport and adopted an amendment to Wisk’s 2016 ground lease to add roughly 2.8 acres for parking and circulation improvements.

City airport staff told the council the vertiport arrangement is temporary: Wisk will install a deployable final approach and takeoff area for testing and, until its Gen-6 aircraft are ready, will operate some approaches and departures using a Bell 206 helicopter. Assistant airport staff said the airport use agreement carries a $2,300-per-month rate for the temporary use.

The ground-lease amendment modifies Wisk’s existing lease (which includes a 14,000-square-foot hangar on about 1.5 acres) to add the adjacent ~2.8-acre parcel. Staff described two lease-rate tiers: an open-space rate of $0.05 per square foot and an improved rate of $0.23 per square foot that would apply if and when parking or other improvements are added to the leased acreage. Staff estimated the 2016 lease currently generates about $7,500 per month (roughly $90,000 annually) and the additional acreage at the open-space rate would add about $6,000 per month (roughly $72,000 annually) until improvements change the rate.

Councilmember Resendiz moved to approve the airport use agreement; Councilmember Morales seconded, and the motion passed. Later, councilmembers approved the ground-lease amendment by the same procedural motion-and-vote sequence.

Council questions focused on the lease rates, the temporary nature of the vertiport, and safety around vehicle-aircraft interactions on taxi areas. Airport staff said the new ingress/egress configuration and the planned 25,000-square-foot parking area are intended to separate vehicle and aircraft movements near existing T-hangars used by a flight school. City staff said the lease amendment corrects a shortcoming in the 2016 approval by reconfiguring access and adding the leased area to Exhibit A-1 once the square footage is surveyed and improvements are completed.

Wisk representatives attended the meeting to answer questions, though no Wisk employee gave extended testimony during council discussion. The amendments permit temporary testing and establish how rent will be calculated as improvements are completed; future permanent vertiport planning would require additional airport planning and approvals.

The council’s action allows the company to proceed with short-term testing and creates a mechanism for the city to capture additional revenue if the leased area is improved.