The FAA issued a three-year debarment on Nov. 3, 2014, against the Syracuse Suburban airport (SSA) and its co-owner, David Pizio, based on Pizio’s earlier criminal conviction in a U.S. District Court for conspiracy to commit bank fraud. Between 2004 and 2009, SSA received five FAA grants totaling $2.97 million intended to be used for planning and development of the reliever airport on 93 acres in Hastings, N.Y.

SSA established a line of credit from First Niagara Bank (FNB) with loan proceeds, reimbursable by the FAA grants, to be used solely for airport expenditures. Instead, Pizio and co-conspirators devised a scheme to submit false and fraudulent invoices to FNB purportedly to pay for airport equipment.

In conjunction with an FBI investigation, the FAA said approximately $125,000 was diverted to an unrelated real estate project in Texas while another $97,604 was diverted to an unrelated business owned by a co-conspirator, in upstate New York.

SSA is a designated reliever airport for the Syracuse (N.Y.) International Airport.