In its ongoing dispute over alleged discrimination, Southwest Airlines has made new claims against the City of San Antonio that airport officials misrepresented the facts to the court and taxpayers in defense statements.
The lawsuit that the largest carrier at the San Antonio International Airport (SAT) brought in September against the city and its director of airports over being shut out of new terminal plans reached a new fever pitch on Thursday when the airline filed an amendment to its initial complaint.
The amended complaint states that internal city documents, recently obtained by lawyers for the airline, confirm airport officials showed a “subjective preference” for certain airline services — despite their denials under oath — and made gate assignments based on whether airlines would be a better “fit” for the new terminal.
Southwest is seeking damages for what it calls misrepresentations by city and SAT officials.
The city attorney’s office released a statement saying, based on a preliminary review, the amended complaint “recasts Southwest’s previous allegations but adds distortions and misrepresentations,” and the claims are without merit.
“The city’s processes in negotiating an Airline Use and Lease Agreement with all of the airlines and in assigning gates were legal and appropriate,” it states. “We look forward to the court hearing on these matters where we will address Southwest’s allegations. We will continue to move forward to expand the airport in a way that makes sense for our customers and our airlines.”
Southwest’s recent amended complaint claims the city’s documents show that during negotiations over a new lease agreement, officials “deliberately concealed from Southwest its plan to keep Southwest in Terminal A.”
Lawyers say that action prevented the airline from insisting on the many more millions it deemed necessary for renovations to the old terminal.
The conflict goes back to September when Southwest Airlines refused to sign a new lease agreement with the city, following two years of negotiations, after it was denied a spot in the planned new airport terminal.
Southwest has said Terminal A won’t meet its future expansion plans.
Seven other airlines committed to signing the 10-year agreement outlining what they will pay to use the airport and what gates each will use. The future terminal and gate assignments are based on carriers’ requests and projected demand, airport officials have said.
Director of Airports Jesus Saenz has said his team has gone through a “a very rigorous, fair and equitable process to define specifically what is best for the airport, the airlines and the passengers.”
After refusing to sign the agreement, Southwest Airlines sued over how it said the city “unlawfully and unfairly applied subjective criteria” to bar Southwest from the new terminal because its passenger “profile” was deemed an inappropriate fit for the new accommodations.
When later in September a federal judge rejected Southwest’s request to pause the reassignment of gates at the airport — an early piece of the larger legal action — an airline executive vowed to continue challenging the legality of San Antonio’s criteria for choosing the airlines assigned to terminals in the first place.
“First, and most importantly, we need to go through the preliminary injunction hearing, to go through discovery, to better understand how the city of San Antonio came to their decision on how Southwest is not a fit,” Southwest Airlines Vice President of Airport Affairs Steve Sisneros said at the time.
On Feb. 12, the city produced approximately 27,000 pages of discovery, or documents related to the terminal, gate assignments and lease agreement.
The Feb. 27 complaint contains screenshots of gating scorecard worksheets, officials’ text messages and a passenger survey. Southwest said those documents demonstrate that the city gave preference to airlines that catered to business travelers, offering first-class service and club lounges, penalizing Southwest and its leisure-travel customer base.
The filing also points to documents from the principal architect, Corgan, for the new terminal and instructions given to Corgan directing it to design the terminal around other airlines and lounges.
Attorneys for Southwest accuse airport officials of also misleading taxpayers, and prioritizing lounges even after the results of a passenger survey showed most San Antonio travelers preferred other amenities first.
In addition, the complaint states that airport officials used a “bait and switch” tactic in rushing to have City Council approve the new airport use agreement “with only $200 million to renovate Terminal A over Southwest’s strenuous objections, which is woefully inadequate to complete the necessary renovations.”
That rendered Southwest “powerless,” the attorneys say, to modify the agreement unless other airlines consented, and solidified the lease.
Airlines that do not sign the lease agreement pay premium rates compared to signatory airlines. Also, fees are based on landings and takeoffs so carriers with the most flights in and out of SAT pay the most fees.
Those fees are used to make capital improvements at the airport, like building a new $1.4 billion terminal. Southwest takes issue with paying the largest share of the new terminal but having no gate assignments there, the complaint states.
The complaint asks the court to declare the lease agreements void under the Airline Deregulation Act.
The court has set April 23, 24 and 30 for a preliminary hearing on the case.
