Stephen Alexander's office is buzzing with the sound of voices coming over the radio from the San Marcos Municipal Airport's radio control tower.

"It's a pretty constant thing," said Alexander, president of Texas Aviation Partners, the firm that manages the airport.

His office could get much quieter in the next few weeks if national leaders are unable to avoid cuts to the budget, known as the sequestration. The $85 billion in cuts include more than $600 million from the Federal Aviation Administration, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation website. The cuts could potentially eliminate funding for the six full-time air traffic controllers at the airport's radio tower.

First on the list of places to trim the FAA budget are airports that had fewer than 150,000 total operations ("take-offs and landings," as Alexander called them) and fewer than 10,000 commercial operations. In 2011, the airport had just over 118,000 total operations.

On March 5, Alexander received a letter from the Air Traffic Organization, a division of the FAA that handles air traffic safety, giving notice that the SMMA "is on the list of airports for which we may cease providing funding ... we anticipate that we will cease to fund on-site air traffic control services at the vast majority of these facilities."

Alexander said eliminating the air traffic controllers' positions at the airport would not close the facility, but would take it "back down a notch, safety-wise and efficiency-wise."

"Air traffic control is a great amenity to have at this airport, and if that goes away, arguably you could say that fewer aircraft are going to come in and out of the airport," Alexander said.

Alexander and San Marcos City Council members Jude Prather and Kim Porterfield plan to meet with congressional leaders March 13 to make their case for the airport's importance to "the national interest"—the only exception the FAA will consider when determining which airports will receive funding cuts.

The case could be made, Alexander said, that closing the airport would negatively affect national interest. The San Marcos Municipal Airport is the only reliever airport in Texas that provides overflow relief to two international airports. This and the facility's instrument landing system—a system that allows aircraft to take off and land in inclement weather—make it an especially important facility, Prather said.

Alexander said he has not received any word when the cuts might take effect or when he'll know if his airport will be affected.

"We don't have control over how well partisan politics is working or not working," Alexander said. "We have control over making sure that this airport is as safe as we can get it."