Columbia Metropolitan Airport commissioners may be feeling pressure to lower their spending.

After Sen. Dick Harpootlian raised questions about the airport commission’s suite at Colonial Life Arena for 5 years, they voted quietly last month to give up the 16-seat suite with a basketball season left on the 3-year $457,000 contract.

According to the Charleston Post and Courier, the contract isn’t being rewritten, but they are negotiating to buy additional advertising at football, basketball and baseball games with the suite’s $30,000 remaining value, said airport finance director Gregg Hornsby.

Dropping the suite means the airport will no longer spend $13,000 to $26,000 annually on catering.

Harpootlian, who represents the Irmo area, said the airport shouldn’t be advertising at sporting events.

He believes money not spent on the suite should be refunded and redirected to cutting parking fees.

“A lot of what they call advertising is pumping money into local entities, this school or that school,” Harpootlian said. “People make choices based on convenience and price. They get that off websites.”

Sen. Katrina Shealy of Lexington agreed.

“I side with him on this,” Shealy said.

“I don’t know how many people decide what airport they’re going to fly at a football or basketball game.”

Politically-appointed airport commissioners are supposed to be unpaid.

The 5 from Lexington County are Dan P. Bell, Pat Smith, Hank Jibaja, Richard McIntyre and Bill Dukes.

The 12 Columbia Metropolitan Airport commissioners have perks worth hundreds of dollars a year, trips to Hawaii and Las Vegas and free parking next to the terminal, but no longer the arena suite filled with booze.

The perks the commissioners of the state’s 4th-busiest airport enjoy exceed what far larger Southeast airports give their governing boards, an analysis by the Post and Courier found.

“These folks waste money for their own pleasure,” said Harpootlian. “When we have an airport run like a South American dictatorship, there’s no question why it’s 4th.”

Columbia has only 3 airlines and trails in passengers and revenue to Charleston, Greenville-Spartanburg and Myrtle Beach airports.

“We have open space for another airline, and we are working on getting one to go there,” said Kim Jamieson, CAE director of marketing.

Jamieson said she believes the addition of a low-cost carrier will boost interest, but no deal has been made.

“The airlines are looking to see if a market is viable,” Jamieson said. “We want to increase our passenger traffic and we are working really hard on increasing our air service offerings.”