The city of McKinney and city leaders who continue to push the commercial airport have been struggling with the “budget” alternative to their dream airport since the failed $200M commercial airport bond in 2023.
Instead of the widely hinted at major airline carrier city residents were promised in the lead up to the bond vote, citizens ended up with an ultra-low budget carrier by the name of Avelo.
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| Residents of McKinney were promised Network/Legacy Airlines before the bond vote. |
Avelo is a carrier known for cutting and running from other small city airports. Many voters knew McKinney would never attract even mid-tier airliners, which was why many voted down the airport bond in the first place.
Put aside the reality that it will be very difficult for the
city to make money on a commercial airport with a flighty, low-budget airline
like Avelo. Other ways the city was banking on to add to the airport revenue
stream are parking, concessions, car rentals, and retail at the airport. Airports
need multiple revenue streams to achieve profitability rather than just
covering their operational expenses.
In June of this year, the city council formally rejected all bids in response to a request for proposals for airport terminal food and beverage concessions. I filed an open records request for the RFP and bids that were
dated around March to June 2026. I wanted to know what the requirements were and what
interest the request brought. The viability and self-sustainability of the
commercial airport is the question at hand for taxpayers.
From viewing the RFP and seeing the city’s letters to the AG
to exempt certain bids, I was able to piece together the quality of bids the city is attracting.
It looks like there were only four bids submitted. Of those
bids, two were so poorly written and useless that the city attorney saw no point in hiding them behind any trade secrets or confidentiality requests.
One of those was a vending machine company that turned in a two page bid. The
other was from a small coffee company that turned in a three page bid. Neither
completed most of the RFP requirements.
Of the remaining two, both entities were CCed on the AG letter.
Those two entities were also notified by McKinney that they were considered affected
third parties and that they should submit arguments to the AG to protect their bids. Here
is a snip of the city’s letter to the AG wanting to exempt their bids from my
request:
At this time, the City has not yet finalized a contractual agreement with any bidder. In fact, the City rejected all RFP response via official City Council Action (Resolution No. 2026-06-107(R)), a copy of which is attached as Explanatory Exhibit “1.” For this reason, the City believes that the circumstances present a “ongoing competitive situation,” where disclosure of the pre-final contract bid information and proposed terms of the bidders would “harm [the City’s] interest” as defined by Section 552.104(a). In particular, the detailed operational and pricing information, as well as proposed contract terms, would likely impact the City negatively as it seeks to enter into another RFP situation for these services. In addition, this bid is of the type that, is likely to be “set to reoccur;” in addition, this is the type of contract (airport concessions), that will likely need to be filled in the near future, indicating a “specific and demonstrable intent to enter into the competitive situation again in the future.” Ibid.
From what I can gather based on the four documents I got from the city, these two bids were also rejected, but the
city might still be actively negotiating with them. This fact shows how desperate
the city is to secure any kind of concession vendor at the airport. Again, I am unable to see the bids from these two entities. Given that nothing comes up for either of these entities related to food, I am not confident in their track record with concessions.
The first one is Zoned Consulting. Other than a website
parking page at GoDaddy, I can’t find much.
No active website for zonedconsulting.com as of 9/5/26.
The second one is May Mahboob Holdings, LLC. The person
looks to be into internet-based businesses. I see nothing to show a strong
track record in food or concessions.
Here is a screenshot of the Affected Third Party email sent:
Here is a screenshot I found on the recently filed LLC:
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