By Niel Ritchie, Guest Column

When the Wright brothers first took to the skies in 1903, they used a long field outside tiny Kitty Hawk, N.C. Ever since, small planes have connected rural areas all over the U.S., bringing everything from people, food and medical supplies from places like Albert Lea Airport to the icy plains of Alaska. But now, Bush administration proposals threaten to cut down on this critical method of transportation for rural areas.

When the airline industry was deregulated in the 1980s, major airlines abandoned service to many rural communities. Seeing the need to keep our heartland connected, the government created the Essential Air Service Program and later, the Small Communities Air Service Program, which pushed incentives for the airlines to provide service to our rural communities. Congress and presidents of the past have always recognized that it is in our national interest to keep businesses and families connected, even from the most remote locations across our wide country.

But now the president is proposing to break this legacy, releasing a budget backed by the major commercial airlines that would eliminate funding for one of these programs &8212; the Small Communities Air Service Program &8212; and drastically reduce funding for the Essential Air Service Program, roughly cutting the program in half. The budget also slashes funding for the Airports Improvement Program, which means that rural airports won&8217;t get grants to improve their facilities while the bulk of funding goes to the major commercial airports in big cities.

Adding insult to injury, the administration has also backed a radical &8220;user fees&8221; plan pushed by the big airlines that could result in a huge tax hike on general aviation &8212; everything from crop dusters to &8220;puddle jumpers&8221; to aircraft used by small businesses. This tax burden on general aviation would add up to a significant tax increase on each business per plane, effectively grounding many of these small piston and turboprop planes.

These planes are the lifelines to rural communities, and weighing them down with new taxes would severely impact the lives of local rural businesses and residents, limiting their access to specialized medical care, educational institutions and wider markets for rural products.

General aviation also played a crucial role in efforts to evacuate Hurricane Katrina survivors and continues to play an important role in our preparedness for future disasters.

This tax shift would have a devastating effect on this disaster relief resource.

This tax hike on small planes would be used to directly offset a proposed tax break for the commercial airlines, which are on the brink of realizing record profits in 2007. The big airlines justify this tax break by saying that we need to increase funding to modernize the air traffic control system. But this proposal would reduce funding for the system as a whole to the tune of $600 million; taking what should be funds to modernize our air traffic control system and giving a huge tax break for the airlines instead. Moreover, the current funding system has generated a $1.7 billion surplus and increasing airline profits suggest that it will bring in even more revenue in the coming years.

The elimination of the Small Communities Air Service Program; the reduction in Essential Air Service grants; the reduction of grants for improving rural airports and a giant tax shift onto small planes that would hurt rural communities: taken together, these policies are disastrous for rural residents who are proud of where they live, but still depend upon small planes to get access to health care or visit their relatives. It&8217;s appalling that rural communities will lose out with these new policies while big airline companies will win, but it offers our local and national representatives an opportunity to shine by being a strong voice for rural interests.

Our politicians often say that they recognize the economic importance of our heartland. It is now time for them to demonstrate that by rejecting this big tax break for the airlines and protecting our rural communities.

Niel Ritchie is the executive director of the League of Rural Voters, founded in 1985 as a nonprofit organization dedicated to increasing the representation of rural people in the public policy making process. The League seeks to build awareness of the economic challenges facing rural communities while advocating for federal and state policies that focus government resources on education, health care and local and regional economic development.