NAS PENSACOLA, Fla. -- A petition with close to 6,000 signatures is asking for public access once again to the Naval Aviation Museum and Pensacola Lighthouse at NAS Pensacola.
The base has been closed since the terrorist attack that killed three sailors in December 2019. NAS Pensacola announced Thursday that for one day only on June 4, it will allow public access in honor of the Battle of Midway.
Senator Doug Broxson says getting public access back to the base is a sensitive topic. But local leaders are still committed to working with the Navy to try and make it happen.
"We've enjoyed a relationship with them for nearly a hundred years," Broxson said. "And to not be included in who they are is very painful to the community."
Broxson tells Channel 3 he's been fighting for over a year to reopen the base to the public.
He says the state is prepared to build and pay for a secure road leading from the gate directly to the museum -- but when the plan was presented to Navy leadership, they had concerns.
"They pushed that over to their leadership in Jacksonville. We had a conference call with them and frankly it did not go that well," Broxson said. "They had a lot of questions about security and they're not sure how this fits into their mission."
Channel 3 reached out to Rep. Matt Gaetz on Thursday about the topic, as well as the petition. He provided this statement:
I appreciate and support the Northwest Florida effort to save our Naval Aviation Museum. Unfortunately, the Navy has been resistant to multiple solutions presented by local, state and national leaders. If the Navy wants the museum to remain a jewel of aviation history, they must join us in supporting a re-orientation of the gates and physical barriers protecting the mission. COVID and the terrorist attack at NAS Pensacola have both already cost our community so much. They shouldn’t now be used as a basis to smother our beloved museum.
Rep. Gaetz also applauded Broxson's efforts in trying to regain access for the public.
"Senator Doug Broxson has moved heaven and earth to provide state resources to solve this problem," Gaetz said in his statement. "I pledge to continue working in Congress for a solution. Hopefully, this petition will help us get a more willing partner in the Navy.”
One family drove all the way from Indiana to visit the museum at NAS Pensacola -- only to be turned away.
"The kids were just super disappointed," Jim Halverstadt said.
"The museum can't survive if they don't have people," Broxson said. "It's just too big of a deal. I wish the Navy would have considered what has happened 30 years ago when we were looking at putting the museum inside the gate. You can't move that museum. It's too much of a structure and there's millions and millions of dollars that have been invested in that location."
Broxson says local leaders plan on having another meeting with base leadership about base public access. A date hasn't been set yet, but Broxson says it should happen in the next couple of weeks.