The Vicksburg Municipal Airport board got permission to reduce its membership from seven to five on Wednesday.

The board, created last August to guide renewed and improved operations of the airport on U.S. 61 South, asked the Mayor and Aldermen for the reduction in August. Absenteeism has led to the cancellation of four meetings this year because not enough members were present.

The reduction means three, instead of four, will be a quorum.

&#8220With only five active members who are business people, it’s hard to get that many,” said South Ward Alderman Sid Beauman, who approved the resolution along with North Ward Alderman Michael Mayfield. Mayor Laurence Leyens was not at the meeting.

The move sets the board members as president Kimble Slaton, vice president Don Brown, secretary Jay Kilroy, treasurer Bobby Burks and Donald Cross. Only Burks was absent from this morning’s meeting.

The only pilot among members was Dr. Mark Stanley, a physician who did not attend most of the meetings, usually set for 7:30 a.m. Stanley was asked after the March meeting to resign and sit on an advisory council, a move supported by Leyens.

The board was originally planned for five people, but was expanded to seven due to interest in the volunteer posts, Leyens said in August.

Vicksburg has owned the airport for more than 50 years, but a previous administration voted to close it in 1998 in favor of Vicksburg Tallulah Regional, completed in 1993 and operated in partnership with three other local governments. Years of litigation followed that vote with plaintiffs operating the airport under court order and eventually winning a state grant for $650,000 worth of improvements. The case ended with a ruling the city does have the power to close the airport, but the Mayor and Aldermen have decided to keep it in operation as more convenient to industries south of the city.

Both airports are almost completely self-supporting.

At its meeting this morning, the board: