[House Hearing, 112 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION
REAUTHORIZATION: FAA ADMINISTRATOR
and
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION
REAUTHORIZATION: STAKEHOLDERS

=======================================================================

(112-2)

HEARINGS

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON
AVIATION

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON
TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

__________

FEBRUARY 8 AND 9, 2011

__________

Printed for the use of the
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure

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COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE

JOHN L. MICA, Florida, Chairman

DON YOUNG, Alaska NICK J. RAHALL II, West Virginia
THOMAS E. PETRI, Wisconsin PETER A. DeFAZIO, Oregon
HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey Columbia
GARY G. MILLER, California JERROLD NADLER, New York
TIMOTHY V. JOHNSON, Illinois CORRINE BROWN, Florida
SAM GRAVES, Missouri BOB FILNER, California
BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio LEONARD L. BOSWELL, Iowa
CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan TIM HOLDEN, Pennsylvania
DUNCAN HUNTER, California RICK LARSEN, Washington
TOM REED, New York MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York
ERIC A. ``RICK'' CRAWFORD, Arkansas MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine
JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri
FRANK C. GUINTA, New Hampshire GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California
RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois
LOU BARLETTA, Pennsylvania MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii
CHIP CRAVAACK, Minnesota JASON ALTMIRE, Pennsylvania
BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota
LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana HEATH SHULER, North Carolina
BILLY LONG, Missouri STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
BOBB GIBBS, Ohio LAURA RICHARDSON, California
PATRICK MEEHAN, Pennsylvania ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey
RICHARD L. HANNA, New York DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland
STEPHEN LEE FINCHER, Tennessee
JEFFREY M. LANDRY, Louisiana
STEVE SOUTHERLAND II, Florida
JEFF DENHAM, California
JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma

(ii)

Subcommittee on Aviation

THOMAS E. PETRI, Wisconsin, Chairman

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri
FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois
SAM GRAVES, Missouri PETER A. DeFAZIO, Oregon
JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio BOB FILNER, California
TOM REED, New York EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
FRANK C. GUINTA, New Hampshire LEONARD L. BOSWELL, Iowa
RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois TIM HOLDEN, Pennsylvania
CHIP CRAVAACK, Minnesota, Vice MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts
Chair MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii
BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
BILLY LONG, Missouri ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
PATRICK MEEHAN, Pennsylvania Columbia
STEPHEN LEE FINCHER, Tennessee NICK J. RAHALL II, West Virginia
STEVE SOUTHERLAND II, Florida (Ex Officio)
JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma
JOHN L. MICA, Florida (Ex Officio)

(iii)

CONTENTS

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 2011

Page

Summary of Subject Matter........................................ vii

TESTIMONY

Babbitt, Hon. Randolph, Administrator, Federal Aviation
Administration................................................. 8

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

Costello, Hon. Jerry F., of Illinois............................. 36
Johnson, Hon. Eddie Bernice, of Texas............................ 41
Petri, Hon. Thomas E., of Wisconsin.............................. 44

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED BY WITNESSES

Babbitt, Hon. Randolph........................................... 48

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI),
written statement.............................................. 57

----------

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2011
TESTIMONY

Blakey, Marion C., President and CEO, Aerospace Industries
Association.................................................... 69
Bunce, Peter J., President and CEO, General Aviation
Manufacturers Association...................................... 69
Calio, Nicholas E., President and Chief Executive Officer, Air
Transport Association of America, Inc.......................... 69
Conley, David S., President, FAA Managers Association, Inc....... 69
Fuller, Craig, President and CEO, Aircraft Owners and Pilots
Association.................................................... 69
Johnson, A.A.E., Kelly L., First Vice Chair, American Association
of Airport Executives.......................................... 69
Rinaldi, Paul M., President, National Air Traffic Controllers
Association.................................................... 69

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

Cohen, Hon. Steve, of Tennessee.................................. 95
Johnson, Hon. Eddie Bernice, of Texas............................ 96
Petri, Hon. Thomas E., of Wisconsin.............................. 99

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED BY WITNESSES

Air Transport Association of America, Inc........................ 102
Blakey, Marion C................................................. 112
Bunce, Peter J................................................... 128
Conley, David S.................................................. 134
Fuller, Craig.................................................... 144
Johnson, A.A.E., Kelly L......................................... 152
Rinaldi, Paul M.................................................. 171

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

Cohen, Hon. Steve, a Representative in Congress from the State of
Tennessee, questions submitted for the record, no responses
were received.................................................. 181
Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association, written statement...... 182
Airport Minority Advisory Council (AMAC), Don O'Bannon, Chair,
written statement.............................................. 184
Airports Council International-North America, Gregory Principato,
President, written statement................................... 193
Americans for Tax Reform, Grover Norquist, President; Center for
Fiscal Accountability, Mattie Corrao, Executive Director, joint
letter to Hon. Mica and Committee Members urging the rejection
of any tax increase on travelers............................... 214
Helicopter Association International, Matthew Zuccaro, President,
written statement.............................................. 215
National Association of Flight Instructors, Jason Blair,
Executive Director, written statement.......................... 221
National Business Aviation Association, Ed Bolen, President and
CEO, written statement......................................... 225
Professional Aviation Safety Specialists, AFL-CIO, written
statement...................................................... 232

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FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION
REAUTHORIZATION: FAA ADMINISTRATOR

----------

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Aviation,
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:03 p.m., in
room 2167, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Thomas Petri
[Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
Mr. Petri. I would like to welcome all members of the
Subcommittee to our first hearing of the 112th Congress. We are
meeting to address the issue of the reauthorization of the
Federal Aviation Administration, a piece of legislation that is
moving rapidly in the Senate, as we all know, as well. It is a
critical task, since the last reauthorization was in 2003, when
our full committee Chairman, John Mica, was Chairman of this
Subcommittee. Since that time, although the House has passed
reauthorization bills in the previous two Congresses, we have
been unable to reach agreement with the Senate and send a final
bill to the White House. Instead, 17 extensions have been
passed in order to keep the FAA operating.
I am confident that this year we can enact a
reauthorization bill that will enable the hardworking people at
the FAA to continue the important job of overseeing the safe
and efficient use of our Nation's airspace, improve our
aviation infrastructure, and move NextGen forward to modernize
our air traffic control system.
A reauthorization bill is a step toward ensuring that the
United States continues to have the safest and most efficient
aviation system on the globe, and to ensure the competitiveness
of the U.S. civil aviation industry and to enhance it.
It goes without saying that the aviation industry is vital
to our economy, contributing $1.2 trillion annually to the
Nation's economy, and, directly or indirectly, generating over
10 million jobs. It is important that this industry's stability
and its growth continue.
In addition, it is critical that we ensure that NextGen is
delivered on time and on budget. NextGen is vital to the U.S.
aviation industry's increasing efficiency and lowering costs.
I am pleased that we have today with us the Administrator
of the Federal Aviation Administration, who has I think earned
the respect of people in the industry as he has taken his
position. Thank you for joining us today to offer your insights
on the FAA reauthorization. Also, as part of this hearing, we
would welcome your thoughts and suggestions on the legislation
that is before us. And we would welcome the thoughts and
suggestions of all the members of the Subcommittee as well. We
are looking forward to any ideas that would help us to improve
the legislation as it moves forward.
Before I recognize Ranking Member Costello, I would like to
say to Administrator Babbitt that I look forward to continue
working with you over the coming months. I am confident we can
work together to complete a reauthorization bill that cuts
waste, streamlines and expedites Next Generation, creates jobs,
keeps U.S. civil aviation competitive in the global
marketplace.
With that, I recognize Mr. Costello, the senior Democrat on
this committee, my colleague last session when he was Chairman
of the Subcommittee.
Mr. Costello. Mr. Chairman, I thank you and congratulate
you on your selection as Chairman of the Subcommittee. I have
been in this chair before and I have been in that chair, and I
would much rather be in your chair than my chair. But let me
say that I look forward to working with you. And we have always
had a very good relationship as Chairman and when you were
Ranking Member, and I expect that we will continue to have that
relationship.
I also thank you for calling the hearing today on the
Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization; the FAA
Administrator, who is here with us, and we will hear from him.
Mr. Chairman, in the 110th and the 111th Congress the
Aviation Subcommittee held 52 hearings, we spearheaded 39 bills
and resolutions through the House, 25 of which were enacted.
This Subcommittee made a valuable contribution to our Nation's
economic recovery with enactment of the American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act of 2009, which included $1.3 for aviation
infrastructure.
I commend Administrator Babbitt and his agency for getting
the money out the door quickly, investing in valuable job-
producing infrastructure projects. Work has already been
completed on 694 projects, and is underway on 77 more,
representing 100 percent of the total aviation Recovery Act
funds.
Mr. Chairman, in response to the February 2009 Colgan
flight 3407 crash, we worked together to enact sweeping airline
safety and pilot training reforms, the strongest piece of
aviation safety legislation in decades. We have some members of
the Colgan families today here with us, and I want to thank
them for their steadfast support in getting our new safety law
enacted.
Last month, I asked the Department of Transportation's
Inspector General's Office to undertake a comprehensive review
of the FAA's progress implementing the provisions of our new
safety law, as well as the industry's responses to the FAA's
call to action on voluntary safety programs. This Subcommittee
must continue to provide vigorous oversight on safety issues.
Last year, we also worked with the other body and got very
close to delivering a strong, balanced, bipartisan FAA
reauthorization bill. Based on the work we did last Congress, I
believe we can complete a bipartisan bill very quickly. And I
intend to work with you to produce a bill as soon as possible.
However, we must ensure that the bill we produce continues
moving the FAA forward, the aviation community and the Nation
forward, and does not set us back. Commercial and general
aviation together contribute more than $1.3 trillion in output
to the Nation's economy. Historically, members of this
Subcommittee have fought to increase and guarantee
infrastructure funding in each successive reauthorization bill.
This Subcommittee has recognized that investing in our
infrastructure will improve the economy, create jobs, and
provide for the safe and efficient flow of commerce.
Some have suggested that for fiscal reasons we should go
backwards, downsize the FAA, and even authorize lower capital
funding levels for the FAA than what Congress provided in the
last FAA reauthorization bill over 7 years ago. I am convinced
that doing so will present major concerns for aviation safety.
I agree that we need to reduce the Federal spending, but we
cannot jeopardize the safety of the flying public in the
process. The FAA indicates that if Congress reduces the FAA's
funding level to 2008, key NextGen programs will be delayed or
canceled, that funding cuts will stall the agency's facility
consolidation efforts, efforts that otherwise would save
billions of dollars and reduce the deficit in the long term.
Funding cuts may also force the FAA Aviation Safety Office to
furlough hundreds of safety personnel.
With that, Mr. Chairman, I look forward to hearing the
testimony of Administrator Babbitt, and look forward to working
with you.
Mr. Petri. Thank you. I do as well.
I ask unanimous consent that the record be kept open for 2
weeks for additional statements. Without objection, so ordered.
At this time, I recognize the Chairman of the full committee,
John Mica.
Mr. Mica. Thank you, Mr. Petri and Mr. Costello. When you
end up with responsibility over an important committee like
ours, you try to set some priorities. And when asked what my
top priority would be, there is no question that we have to do
an FAA reauthorization. Not only is it important to ensure
something we take for granted in this country, and that is safe
flying and skies and the ability to get around like no one on
the Earth has ever known. We take some of that for granted, but
it does require our work as trustees of that responsibility to
set the parameters and the policy. No question we have got to
move forward. And I set this as the top priority.
I cannot tell you how pleased I am that Senator Reid and
our colleagues in the Senate have already begun their work. My
goal is to not have an 18th extension, and to have this bill on
the President's desk before the current 17th extension expires.
At a time when the country's hurting economically, I am told--
and I have heard different accounts--that the aviation
industry, when we were hit at 9/11, accounts for somewhere
between 9 and 11 percent of our entire GDP. That is how big
this industry is. And to not have in place the policy, the
projects, the vision for the future that we craft in
legislation, and are again supposed to be responsible trustees
for the people, that is not right. So we need to correct that.
We are going to get it done. We are going to work in rapid
order.
Today we hear from the administration, and welcome Mr.
Babbitt and his recommendations. And until the ink is dry on
this, everyone's suggestions and input is welcome. Tomorrow we
will hear from some of the stakeholders. And I ask you this
week to speak now or forever hold your peace. And I mean we do
want to hear from you, any ideas that you have. Tomorrow, when
we finish hearing from the stakeholders, I have invited all of
the--I guess we call it the big four, whatever it is, guys and
gals, and any other Members that would like to participate,
particularly the staffs on both sides of the aisle, to sit
down, and we will go through the pending issues tomorrow
afternoon, as we are going to move with lightning speed and try
to bring forth as soon as possible a very effective, I hope,
piece of legislation, one that will be lean--we are in some
lean times--but ensure, as I said, the safety of the flying
public.
I also want to welcome today, and thank for their great
work, we had problems beyond what anyone could imagine if you
lost a loved one in an aviation tragedy, but the Colgan
families have been just tremendous. We wouldn't have in place
legislation to improve the commuter airlines' safety and
effectiveness without your help. But now we have got this
important responsibility. And we want to get it done as soon as
possible, without further delay.
Let me just say a couple of things. I saw the Senate is
working on a 2-year bill. I want a 4-year bill. I had no idea
my bill would turn into what, a 7- or 8-year bill, Jerry, the
one we crafted in 2003. But we need it longer, not shorter. Our
challenge will be to do more with less. And I am still
soliciting, right up until we get the final ink dry on whatever
we do, NextGen suggestions. NextGen is our vision for the
future. So I invite and welcome anyone's recommendation. I
particularly want to hear from the Administrator on that.
So this again does set forth our policy, our projects, our
funding, and our safety program for one of the most important
activities in our economy. Again, it will be a full, open
process, but it is also going to move forward with lightning
speed.
With that, I thank you for yielding to me, and yield back
the balance of my time.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
I recognize at this time for an opening statement our
colleague from Texas, Eddie Bernice Johnson.
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Let me thank the two leaders on this committee for the kind of
professional work that we have done over the years together,
notwithstanding what side is in the majority. And I want to
especially point out that Mr. Costello made many efforts to
move this bill. I hope, like the full Chairman, we don't have
to go to the 18th extension.
Safety continues to be my number one concern. And I am
hoping that we will produce a bill that provides a meaningful
step in modernizing our air traffic control system, reducing
congestion in our skies, and provide a needed boost to our
Nation's airports. I look forward to working with my fellow
committee members on both sides of the aisle, and hope we will
be moving as quickly as the full Chairman wants us to move on
this bill. Thank you.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
At this time, I recognize the Vice Chairman of the
Subcommittee, our colleague from the Iron Range, northern
Minnesota, Representative Cravaack.
Mr. Cravaack. Thank you, Chairman Petri, and Ranking Member
Costello, for holding this important hearing today.
Administrator Babbitt, welcome, Captain Babbitt, welcome, sir.
I look forward to hearing your testimony today, and discussing
ways to improve the FAA and to further implement NextGen.
As you know, the last FAA reauthorization bill was in 2003.
And I think everyone in the room is in agreement that we need
to pass an FAA reauthorization bill this year. However, I think
there are several concerns that need be addressed before
considering this legislation. Namely, I think it is incumbent
upon the FAA to demonstrate that they can be trusted to
properly administer taxpayer dollars. I specifically raise the
issue in light of the FAA's contracts awarded to Raytheon and
ITT. I look forward to hearing what steps the FAA has taken to
improve the oversight and stewardship of the American taxpayer
dollars.
Additionally, I am very concerned about the implementation
of NextGen. It appears there are a number of factors that are
stalling the implementation of critical NextGen programs. I
hope you will address your agency's detailed plan for the
implementation of NextGen. And I am particularly interested to
hear about the NextGen implementation milestones that you
intend to complete by the end of the year.
Thank you again, Administrator Babbitt, and I look forward
to working with you during this session. I yield back, sir.
Mr. Petri. At this time, I recognize for an opening
statement our colleague from Missouri, Representative Carnahan.
Mr. Carnahan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And congratulations
or your new role with the committee. To Ranking Member
Costello, I really look forward to working with you in this
next Congress and on this reauthorization of the FAA.
Passage of a multi year reauthorization of the FAA is long,
long overdue so that we can make critical job-creating,
business-expanding, and safety-enhancing investments in our
aviation system to ensure it can properly accommodate the
anticipated growth in travelers in the coming years.
During both the last two Congresses, the 111th and the
110th, the House has taken the lead to pass legislation to
reauthorize the FAA that would have made these critical
investments in our aviation system, from airport infrastructure
to making critical investments in furthering NextGen.
Unfortunately, the final conference report was not agreed to.
As we take up this debate anew, it is critical we recognize
the level of investment needed to ensure that we can make
critical investments in our aviation infrastructure. Funding
for the Airport Improvement Program has not increased in 5
years. The passenger facility charges have not increased in
over 10 years. During this time, construction costs have
greatly increased, putting limitations on how AIP grants and
PFCs can go to help airports meet their needs. Without greater
investments, airports like Lambert-St. Louis International
Airport in my home State cannot make the investments that are
critical for their rebirth.
The last extension Congress passed made improvements to the
safety of the U.S. airline operations that bring one level of
safety to the traveling public on major and regional air
carriers. Critical to ensuring this one level of safety is
sufficient funding to implement these safety measures.
I want to thank Administrator Babbitt for joining us here
today. I look forward to hearing your testimony. I also want to
acknowledge and recognize the Colgan families that are here
today for your work on safety issues. Having lost a father and
a brother in an aviation accident, it is very important that
you are here and part of this debate. And we look forward to
working with you. Thank you.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Now I recognize for an opening statement the gentleman from
North Carolina, Howard Coble.
Mr. Coble. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate you scheduling this
hearing on a very important subject matter, but I have no
formal opening statement, and yield back.
Mr. Petri. Thank you. Representative Lankford from Oklahoma
for an opening statement.
Mr. Lankford. Thank you. Honored to be here. And thank you
so much for both you coming, and for also your availability, as
you made yourself available and your staff available for any
questions that we have had leading up into this conversation. I
am sure in the days to come we will have multiple more.
I will have a great interest in how we are handling
NextGen. That has been a project that--I am 42 years old, and
all of my life that I know of as an adult there has been a
discussion about where we are going with NextGen and what is
going to happen with air traffic control. But also, an
additional thing is I am looking forward to hearing about
discretionary spending from FAA, and how the decisions are made
on where we spend. And then also how we handle the realignment
of FAA facilities.
I have great interest on how FAA is making the decisions,
the formula you have, and setting aside which area needs to be
realigned and the timing of that realignment. So I look forward
to those conversations, and thank you again for coming to be
here.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Are there any other Members who wish to make an opening
statement? Representative Schmidt from Ohio.
Mrs. Schmidt. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to
acknowledge all the families that are here in memory of their
loved ones who have met tragedy in flight. You know, when
Continental Flight 3407 met its tragedy in Buffalo, New York, a
few years ago, my small community of Loveland, Ohio, was
touched twice. And I know the Perry family is here. And I just
want to thank all of those involved for advocating safety
first, and making sure that all of us are on our toes. Thank
you very much for all that you do. And my prayers go out to you
each and every day. Thank you.
Mr. Petri. Thank you. And at this time, Representative
Hirono.
Mr. Hirono. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon,
Administrator Babbitt. I too am looking forward to the
discussions that we will have regarding the FAA
reauthorization. And I think that all of the provisions in that
reauthorization really affect every single community.
And I would like to bring up one issue that is important to
many communities in remote areas. There is a community in my
district called Kalaupapa, which is where Father Damien, now
St. Damien, administered to the Hansen's disease patients. This
is an area that is impacted by our EAS process. That essential
air service is basically the only way that the people there can
get to medical resources, as well as tourists who now are
coming more frequently because of the connection of that area
to St. Damien.
I know that you are probably in the process of reviewing
EAS procedures. There may be people here who would like to
totally eliminate the EAS because of the funding situation we
find ourselves. But the real-life impact on remote areas and
communities all across our country, and certainly to Kalaupapa,
would be very extreme if we do not continue to support EAS and
to make sure that that program works as it was intended. And
that is to make sure that the people of our country are served,
regardless of where they live.
So I look forward to working with you, Administrator
Babbitt, to make sure that the EAS process is fair, that it is
working in the way it is intended. And again, I look forward to
hearing from you. Aloha. I yield back.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Representative Hultgren from Illinois.
Mr. Hultgren. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I
appreciate the opportunity to be here. Administrator, looking
forward to working with you. I especially want to thank the
families that are here from the Colgan flight, the tragedy
there. Thank you for your input. Thank you for your
involvement. And I want to join with you to make sure that air
travel is safe, and every day that we are working to continue
to increase the safety. And I know that is commitment of all of
us here, along with the FAA. So thank you for your input, and
thank you for turning this into something positive for future
generations as well.
Also, it is very important for me, my district is just
outside of Chicago, adjacent to O'Hare, and I have maybe the
highest number of air traffic controllers that live in my
district. So very interested in NextGen and how that will move
forward. So, looking forward to this opportunity to be working
together again for the good of all people here in America on
making sure that air travel is as safe as it can possibly be.
So thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back the balance of my
time.
Mr. Petri. Representative Farenthold from Texas.
Mr. Farenthold. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. As
someone who was touched personally with the death of my
grandfather in an aviation accident, this is near and dear to
my heart. I did want to say that I am looking forward to
working on this committee, with safety being our number one
concern, but also keeping an important eye on the economic
growth that the aviation industry and transportation in general
provides to this country.
I will be particularly concerned with the FAA and all
government agencies' stewardship of the taxpayers' money, and
remain concerned at the length of time implementing new
technologies like NextGen is taking, and how expensive that
really is in the long run to both the industry and everyone in
the American public in general.
That is all I have got right now. I yield back the
remainder of my time. Thank you.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
And now Administrator Babbitt, we thank you for the work
that went into your prepared statement, and I hope you will
summarize it within 5 minutes or so, and answer questions.

TESTIMONY OF HON. RANDOLPH BABBITT, ADMINISTRATOR, FEDERAL
AVIATION ADMINISTRATION

Mr. Babbitt. Thank you very much, Chairman Petri, Ranking
Member Costello, members of the entire Subcommittee. I really
want to thank you for the opportunity to appear before you
today to discuss the need for comprehensive reauthorization
legislation for the Federal Aviation Administration's programs.
And before I begin my statement, I would like to
acknowledge that I see a number of new faces on the
Subcommittee. I have been able to meet with some of you. I look
forward to meeting with the balance of you over time. Since I
am a frequent guest of the committee, I am sure that I will get
to know all of you over time here as we get together and
discuss important aviation issues.
I think I heard you all summarize very well the fact that
the FAA's mission is in fact to provide the safest, most
efficient airspace system in the world. And we do it well.
There wasn't a single passenger fatality in the commercial
aviation system last year in the United States. That record is
hard fought and we are very proud of it.
But as we move forward to meet the demands ahead, I know
that we cannot be complacent. And I also recognize keenly that
this Congress will be extremely disciplined about how it
invests taxpayer dollars. I believe that every government
agency should make the business case for each investment in any
of its programs. And for our part, investment in aviation is
critical to this country's economic prosperity and its ability
to compete successfully in the global marketplace. Strategic
investment in aviation reaps benefits. And we are concerned
that a failure to invest may well result in negative
consequences.
First and foremost, as you have noted, is always safety.
And I know that some of the family members who lost loved ones
in the Colgan accident 2 years ago are here today. I want to
commend their continued vigilance to push Congress and to push
the FAA to enact more stringent safety standards.
The FAA has been hard at work writing the regulations
required by the legislation passed by this Congress last year.
And while aviation is clearly the safest mode of
transportation, we will never top striving to reach the next
level of safety.
I again want to thank the family members here for their
continued attention and focus on safety. Part of what will get
us to the next level of safety is implementing, in fact,
NextGen. NextGen programs and technologies will help us to be
more proactive in how we analyze risk. And with advanced safety
management techniques, we can then take the steps to prevent
accidents.
One such technology, ADS-B, is a satellite-based
surveillance system. Deploying it in the Gulf of Mexico opened
up almost a quarter of a million miles of new, positively
controlled airspace, airspace that previously had no radar
coverage.
NextGen will also reduce the harmful effects that aviation
has on the environment, while enabling carriers to operate more
efficiently. For example, Performance-Based Navigation, a term
you will hear, and we call it PBN, saves fuel and reduces
emission. It literally pays for itself while it helps the
environment. Today, we have issued more than 900 of these
highly efficient arrival and departure routes using the new
technology. And we are working on a plan to further improve and
streamline the approval process. More precise arrival and
departure routes are a sound investment. Continuing to develop
and deploy NextGen is central to our ability to meet the
demands of the future.
Now, as we continue to focus on maintaining and enhancing
aviation safety, we strive to do so in ways that facilitate
U.S. business interests. Businesses rely on the FAA to certify
their projects. And these projects range from the largest
aircraft being built today to the smallest avionics box that
goes in that airplane. Every improvement in aviation requires
certification in order to ensure safety, and failure to invest
in our ability to expedite certification could result in
important safety initiatives taking longer to obtain
certification, and therefore taking longer for products to get
to market.
The FAA must be able to support the demands of the industry
when they develop that next good idea. These ideas translate
into jobs. So investment in these areas is extremely important.
Now, the FAA will never permit the safety of the existing
system to ever be compromised. But if that priority consumes
all of the agency's resources, then our ability to support
industry innovation becomes affected.
And finally, it is critical that we invest in the airports
to meet what I see as an anticipated and increasing aviation
demand. The Airport Improvement Program, AIP, has been
disrupted somewhat as a result of the short-term extensions
that we have experienced over the past few years.
Administrative and project costs therefore get increased due to
the need to have multiple grants to be issued over and over
again for a single project. All of the investment that we make
in routes, procedures, and certification will never eliminate
the need for a place to land the airplane.
We worked very hard to expand capacity at our Nation's
airports over the past several years, and it is vital to our
continued success that our investment dollars are optimized.
And that can only happen through a long-term extension of the
AIP program. We have worked for several years to get
comprehensive legislation in place. Our 17th extension will
expire at the end of March, and the need for stability and
certainty has never been more important.
I think we all understand that the challenges of
implementing NextGen, improving the safety and efficiency of
aviation come at a time, unfortunately, when tough investment
choices will have to be made. I plan to continue to make the
case that investment in aviation is important not only to
airlines and passengers and pilots and all the other airline
employees and people that serve in this industry, but to the
strength of the overall economy and the businesses around the
country.
This committee in particular demands a lot of the FAA, and
rightfully so. But meeting these demands will require an
investment. And I think our case is compelling, and the return
on our investment is one that no one can or should ignore.
That concludes my opening statement and remarks, and I
would be happy to answer your questions, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
I would just explore two areas briefly, and leave plenty of
time for all the members to ask questions. I think I would be
remiss if I didn't begin by asking a question about safety,
because that is the number one priority, and your agency is to
be commended for the remarkable record of the past year with no
fatalities. There have been, though, as you know, a spike up in
reports of near misses and a growing concern about that. We
don't want to play ``gotcha.'' We do want, though, to have
people know that we are concerned and we are watching.
I wonder if you could discuss that whole subject and place
it in context so we understand what we are talking about. Is it
an improvement in reporting so it is apparent? Or just what is
going on with the near-miss situation?
Mr. Babbitt. Sure. That is a fair question. We certainly
have made some very serious changes. One of the things that we
have been very open about in our approach to aviation safety is
asking every person, every party involved, to be very open
about what happens. And we have a number of reporting programs
so that we can gather more information, and we have done just
that. We have invited people to be open and confess the fact
that they have seen an error so that we understand what went
wrong, and can therefore implement a change in the system, and
implement a change in the training, implement a change in
procedures. But we have to know what happened first.
So, by implementing these programs, and some of them
include abilities today to electronically track some of these
operational incursions into what we would like to call safety
zones or protected areas, we fully expected that we would get
more reports. That was anticipated. And that is the good news.
What is even more important, though, is what we have done
with that information. Three years ago we had no loopback
mechanism. So when we found out a safety incident had happened,
a near miss had happened, we acknowledged it. And at best we
might go to the facility and speak about a particular
procedure. Today, we take all of those instances, and when we
see a pattern we change the training. That is something we
weren't doing years ago.
So while this rise was certainly expected because we have
better and more ways and more avenues of reporting, what we
have taken from that is putting that information to good use
with the goal being to make the system overall more safe.
Mr. Petri. Well, we want to be kept in the loop, too, and
fully informed, because we know that there is a lot of interest
in this. And it is vital for everyone, both employees and the
traveling public. And we may want to have further hearings to
help explain different situations as they arise, and what steps
are being taken to hopefully minimize the opportunities for
them to happen again and the like.
Mr. Babbitt. I would be remiss if I also didn't acknowledge
the great partnership that we are enjoying today with the
members of PASS, which is one of our professional unions, as
well as NATCA. Both of those unions have stepped up to the
plate with their leadership and engaged in voluntary safety
reporting programs with us, which was a courageous move on
their part, and a huge step in safety for all of us.
Mr. Petri. Mr. Secretary, I thought I would just spend a
minute or two on--our Chairman mentioned, and it is my sense, I
don't know if it is yours, that over the last year or two there
has been a growing sense of momentum toward the movement toward
deploying NextGen. More companies in the industry are beginning
to voluntarily step forward and equip themselves.
I understand the industry is equipping a lot of the new
planes being made with devices, or building them in such a way
that they can easily be installed to minimize the costs of
deploying the system. And you mentioned it in your opening
testimony. We are looking forward to doing what we can in the
reauthorization to give greater focus to the responsibility for
deploying NextGen in our government and in the FAA, and also
setting reasonable benchmarks for implementing it.
And we will be hopefully having a series of hearings and
roundtable discussions to make it clear what is happening and
also anything that we can do to help NextGen. And it is my
understanding that this is not just some sort of--it is a
technical thing, but it is also moving the industry to a whole
new level. Just as we saw with high-definition TV and all of
the cellular and so on and so forth, this is moving from
analog, radar, to digital, satellite, transponder, expanding
the capacity and safety of the system. And it certainly will
help the environment. And it may mean you won't have to spend
as much in physical expansion of the air because what we
already have will operate more efficiently.
But I wonder if you could expand on your remarks in this
regard. I understand Southwest is already using it and thinks
it will pay itself back within a year or so for the investment
they are making in equipment. UPS and FedEx, a number of other
airlines, are using to the extent it is available, the new
equipment that is being deployed. The savings for our country
and for the environment are enormous. I just wonder if you
could spend a bit more time talking about NextGen.
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman. Just listening to you,
you should be sitting down here. You have made my case. Thank
you. You have absolutely summed it up very well. We are making
a great deal of positive and forward motion here. And the
momentum is clearly there. And I think we need to appreciate
where that momentum comes from. That momentum comes from
reaching critical mass in a number of areas.
Using your analogy of high-definition television, if we
were to broadcast high-definition television all over the
country but nobody had a television set that would receive it,
we wouldn't really have achieved much. Conversely, if everyone
had a television set that would receive it but we didn't
broadcast it--well, that is the balance that we are seeking as
we deploy more and more stations on the ground and equip more
and more airports and airport areas with the technology that
ADS-B can be used in, and have operators that can utilize those
new procedures, that is where we see the gains. That is where
we see the efficiency.
And you were perfectly on track when you talked about the
efficiency. The fact that we can more accurately see where
aircraft are with the NextGen technology and them using NextGen
procedures, we can use more efficient use of the airspace.
You mentioned Southwest. And that is a wonderful partner
that we have. And we have several that we are doing different
things. We have made partnerships with a variety of carriers so
that they can utilize the equipment under a supervised basis;
we get the information, they get the benefit of the improved
efficiencies.
Southwest, by their own accord--I will let them announce
the numbers they spent--but when fully deployed they expect to
enjoy a gain of about $60 million a year, which means they will
recapture their entire investment in a period of about 3 years.
That is a remarkable investment. If you were a small business,
you would ink up for something like that.
We see that same situation, we have partnerships with
Alaska Airlines and the Green Skies Initiative up in Seattle.
We have ADS-B fully active in several airports around the
country--Philadelphia, and Louisville, Kentucky. I mentioned
the Gulf of Mexico. People say, well, that is the Gulf of
Mexico. I wasn't aware until we deployed it out there that on a
daily basis, every day, we transport 10,000 people on and off
oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. Every day. And we did it
without radar. We did it with literally 1950s navigation until
we employed NextGen. Today they fly direct routes. They are in
positive controlled airspace. They see each other and we see
them. These are enormous savings, and progress in safety as
well.
Mr. Petri. Thank you very much. I now recognize Mr.
Costello.
Mr. Costello. Mr. Chairman, thank you.
Administrator Babbitt, I read your testimony. We have, as
you know, this Subcommittee has been pressing the FAA and the
industry to implement NextGen and to move forward. We have made
great progress, and I have commended you publicly for the
progress that we have made. You detailed progress that we have
made with the industry. I know that as you just spoke about
Southwest Airlines, JetBlue, others are coming on board and
moving forward.
However, we also know that as we are meeting here today in
this hearing, that the Senate is debating an FAA
reauthorization bill that would roll back funding levels to the
2008 level. I think that members of the Subcommittee and the
public need to understand what the consequences of rolling back
to the 2008 funding level would be on NextGen, on the number of
safety inspectors that in fact inspect repair stations today,
and other issues that you will have to deal with, rolling back
to the 2008 levels.
So let me begin by asking you what specifically, as far as
NextGen is concerned, what would be delayed and what would be
canceled if in fact you end up with a budget at the 2008 level?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, let me sort of take a top-down approach
to that, if I could. Obviously, we would protect the safety of
the current system. And we would have to then prioritize and
take a hard look at what moneys were left, the gap between what
we have requested in the President's budget that will come out
next week and 2008. That gap would have to be realized
somewhere.
And so, as I said in my opening statement, we certainly are
going to protect the safety of the system. But I think I could
give you in general terms a few areas. One of great concern to
me, we have a number of people involved in the certification of
new projects and new facilities. We are seeing a new facility--
for example, Boeing wants to build a new plant, I believe, in
South Carolina. We have Honda looking to build Honda jets in
the central part of Florida. These all require certified
inspectors. And if that staff was reduced, those types of
projects would simply be approved more slowly. We would want
them done, we would want them done right.
In the terms of safety oversight, we have a number of
pieces of regulations that we have either been inspired to
bring forward either from our own research, direction from the
NTSB, or direction from this Congress. And we are diligently
doing those. But we want those regulations written properly, we
want them to do what they were asked to do. And it is a very
time-consuming process. We simply would not have the staff do
that at the pace we do it today. I know what we can do today. I
don't know what time in concrete terms that we could.
NextGen would be in the third area. We know, and I am
pleased to say, that we are on that pretty progressive schedule
today. And I am happy to say we are meeting the benchmarks that
we have reestablished. We did have some setbacks. But I am very
proud of the way we have project oversight changes today. I am
proud of the changes we have made to adopt acquisition
strategies more in line with good business practices.
But given less money, then we certainly would have to again
take a look at the priorities, work with you, and decide what
is it that we can do with less of. And it certainly would slow
down the deployment of NextGen.
The concern that I have in all of these is that it has a
very direct and correlating impact on the economy. If we slow
down NextGen--we are projected right now if we deploy NextGen
on the schedule that we have, in the year 2018 we propose and
we suggest--and people like JetBlue and Southwest Airlines and
Alaska Airlines are proving our case--I have a sheet here that
Southwest expected in their first month of operation was a 70
percent usage of NextGen. They actually realized 91 percent. It
is better than they even hoped. But with those type of
projections and what we would save en route, we would save 1.5
billion gallons of kerosene in the year 2018, and ongoing
savings every year thereafter of a billion gallons of kerosene.
That is a lot of carbon emissions, that is a lot of money. On
average, if kerosene is $4 a barrel, we can all do the math, it
is $4 billion a year. The system we are proposing to build, you
would recapture that investment in 2 years. So I don't think we
should think about being penny-wise and pound foolish. Yes, we
could save the penny, but in the end it is going to cost more
money over time to delay a lot of what we are proposing.
Mr. Costello. Before my time is up, I have information here
concerning one of the priorities of this Subcommittee, the
agency. And in a bipartisan way, we have been pushing the
agency to move forward with consolidation, because not only is
it more efficient, but it will save a lot of money over time.
Tell me what would happen to the consolidation program at the
FAA with 2008 funding levels.
Mr. Babbitt. Well, 2008 funding levels over what we have
proposed would certainly slow that down. Again, you know, we
would have to look at the moneys and decide what would be
prioritized, and certainly work with this committee and others
to make those determinations. But our consolidation adds to a
great deal of efficiencies. And I would note for the record
this is an agency that has sought efficiencies.
I wasn't here for all of it, but I can tell you in the last
5 years the Federal Aviation Administration has saved $560
million in efficiencies that we have found. We are projecting
more going forward. I can talk about, with more time, some of
the studies we are looking at. But we simply wouldn't be able
to enjoy some of those consolidations.
Mr. Costello. I am told that the consolidation program
would be delayed until 2014, and that there would be no
construction or implementation. Is that correct?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, if you looked at 2008 versus what we had
proposed, I would have to have it in front of me, but that
sounds reasonable.
Mr. Costello. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Petri. Thank you. Mr. Graves.
Mr. Graves. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I have more of a statement, I guess, rather than a
question. I appreciate, Administrator Babbitt, you coming in.
We have had numerous conversations about the FAA. And I would
just suggest, and I know we put a lot of concentration today on
the airlines and NextGen, which it obviously affects all of
aviation; but let's not forget, too, about the flip side to
this coin, and that is general aviation and the thousands upon
thousands of GA pilots out there and aircraft out there that
are also flying.
When you talk about going to that next plateau and always
achieving that next plateau in safety, I think that is a good
thing. But let's also remember that there is a point also where
it becomes just far too restrictive to even in some cases do
what people love to do in the case of flying and owning their
aircraft. You can do the same thing, you can say the same thing
about driving vehicles around or maritime or whatever the case
may be.
But I would like to use a little common sense. We talked
about that, and I am not going to get into the specifics of it
here today. But you know over the years FAA has become very
much a regulatory agency, and advocacy for aviation has been
dropped from your mission statement. But I would hope that
regardless if it is in your mission statement or not, and I
know you care deeply about it, but I hope that we remember that
and continue to talk about the greatness of aviation and how it
is so safe, or why it is so safe, and just how important it is
to this economy.
That is really all I had to say. Just a suggestion, Mr.
Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Representative Johnson from Texas.
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Thank you very much. And thank you
for appearing before us today.
Let me first compliment you on the efficiencies which you
have shown. And one of my questions has just been answered by
Mr. Costello on the cutbacks. The other one is the expansion of
intermodal projects involving aviation as we craft this bill.
Do you have any suggestions?
Mr. Babbitt. Specific suggestions on?
Ms. Johnson of Texas. The intermodal process involving much
more connectivity between the areas of transportation.
Mr. Babbitt. Oh, intermodal side. Well, I think one of the
key ingredients, while we focus primarily on the airports
themselves, and of course the safety when you leave the
airport, I think more and more of the country in general is
looking at the connectivity so that we can be efficient.
One of the things that I think we could learn from some of
our European counterparts is the way they have connected a rail
system so that people can go from the city to the airport
efficiently, maximize air travel when possible, and have the
alternative modes.
We certainly have had discussions within the Department of
Transportation. The Secretary has an intermodal council where
we discuss these things so that whether it is light rail,
whether it is transit systems, whether it is even port
adoptability for cargo, all of those get discussed at the DOT
level. So we are certainly aware of it, and we would be
certainly willing to work with you and this committee for
specifics.
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Thank you very much. Let me say that
the people present who have lost loved ones, this won't make
their pain any lighter, but there were no death loss in
aviation last year. And I am very proud of that. So thank you.
Mr. Babbitt. Thank you.
Mr. Petri. Representative Schmidt.
Mrs. Schmidt. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you, Mr.
Babbitt, for coming. I understand that the FAA has some
discretion to amend the ATP license requirements on training
hours and that this is currently under review.
Sir, do you believe that classroom hours should count
toward the 1,500-hour requirement? And does the FAA have a
position on how much time pilots should have in the cockpit of
an aircraft? And if you don't believe 1,500 hours of cockpit
time is required, do you believe there is a minimum number of
hours that should be required?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, let me tell you that we are, based upon
some direction from the last Congress and this Subcommittee, we
are in the process, it is in executive review right now, a
proposed new rule. And that proposed new rule was based upon
the formation of an aviation rulemaking committee, which
included a variety of sources and inputs. They have put
together several of the points that they wanted to see and
thought were appropriate.
We have that, and along with being consistent with the
direction and legislation that was here, have put what we
gathered and created as a proposed regulation. That will be put
out as a new proposed rulemaking shortly. People will be
available to comment. I think it does incorporate--I saw the
drafts--it incorporates all those levels that you talked about.
And it is consistent with the legislation direction that you
should provide some acknowledgment for two things. Number one,
1,500 hours I think was the direction of this committee. It
also said you should acknowledge that if classroom time is
deemed to be replacement on an equal basis, people will be able
to comment. Additionally, military service should play a role
in that. That the people out defending us in combat zones come
back and have a thousand hours of combat time shouldn't have to
go get another--they have been defending the country, carrying
our troops and doing those things; that time should be
acknowledged, and that level of skill should be acknowledged.
So those will be all contained within the notice of proposed
rulemaking.
Mrs. Schmidt. Thank you so much. Because you know, the
concerns that have been brought to my attention, especially
with Continental Flight 3407, really exemplify the fact that
there is no substitute for training. That is so paramount with
safety. And I really appreciate your input. Thank you.
Mr. Babbitt. Well, thank you. And I think you may recall
that we put forward an advanced notice of proposed rulemaking
before this ever became an issue. We sought to raise the
minimum number of hours.
Mr. Petri. Representative Carnahan.
Mr. Carnahan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you again,
Administrator Babbitt, for being here.
I wanted to ask about the Safety Management Systems
proposed rulemaking for the part 139 airport areas. And while
it is critical, I agree, to have these industry-wide safety
standards, I have specific concerns that the proposed rule does
not propose to protect safety data that is gathered. This seems
to stand in conflict to data protections that are in place for
air traffic and airline safety.
What steps is the FAA taking to ensure this data is
protected so that we get to that goal of a strong industry-wide
safety standard?
Mr. Babbitt. That is an excellent question. And we have had
some issues with that in the past, as I think you are aware.
One of the areas in specifically talking to this, oftentimes we
put out a regulation for comment, a proposed notice of
rulemaking, and I would acknowledge that sometimes we are not
perfect. And sometimes we will get feedback, very positive and
constructive feedback that says I think you overlooked
something. And we take those into very serious consideration
when we write the final rule. And while this is in that
process, and I am not really at liberty to talk too much about
it, one of the things we do is go back and see how we could
mitigate that issue.
Now, as you are aware, when data comes to the FAA, then it
is subject to discovery. And so sometimes we would approach you
with finding ways to help us protect that data and do so with
legislation, which you have done in the past. And if that is
the case, there are two ways to solve that problem. One is,
don't let us be the holder of the data, which is what most of
our ASAP programs do with the carriers. So when a mechanic
turns over something, he turns it over to the carrier. It is
not in our hands. A safety committee looks at it, decides what
is appropriate action, how it should be handled, what is the
safety improvement. That is one solution. And we could possibly
rewrite the guidance to say that, look, it is OK that you have
the data, we don't need it because it would be discoverable and
therefore not protected.
The other alternative is we would come to you and say, you
know, if we need this data, you need to make certain that the
people that turn it over have immunity in their reporting.
Because these voluntary reporting programs are wonderful
sources of data. The reason that I think we have achieved the
safety record we have achieved is programs like this spanning
all of aviation, from mechanics, dispatchers, flight
attendants, pilots, air traffic controllers. Everyone can put
their hand up when they see something wrong and voluntarily
report these things so that we can then take corrective action.
So it is really important that these people be immune,
because otherwise they will go back to the way things were in
the fifties. They will just hide them, and they won't tell us,
and we will never know.
Mr. Carnahan. I think it is critical we have a free,
nonpunitive sharing of this safety data. And I think we look
forward to really creating a mechanism that works, but also to
be sure that, as in my prior comments, that airports are not
being left out of that process as well.
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir.
Mr. Carnahan. OK. Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Petri. Representative Reed.
Mr. Reed. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Babbitt, I have a question concerning safety. I come
from a rural district in western New York adjacent to the
district where the tragedy happened over a year ago. Can you
tell me exactly what the FAA is doing to achieve a one-level
safety standard for regional airline safety, especially in the
area of pilot experience and qualifications?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, as you are aware, the standards of part
121 are equal for all carriers, and so the standard itself is
uniform. What we found post Colgan, the accident in Buffalo,
was that we had people performing and performing better than.
And so then the question became, well, why doesn't everyone
perform to that?
We had a series of safety stand-downs around the Nation.
The Secretary and I went around to 10 different cities,
interviewed literally thousands of pilots and aircraft
operators, people from air carriers, including regional and
major airlines. We requested that the major airlines take every
one of their co-chair partners and have meetings with them and
have safety sharing programs.
The good news is we had wonderful compliance; and I am
happy to sit here and tell you today that, as a result of those
meetings, that every carrier, every co-chairing partner today
has a focal program which is a flat operations quality
assurance, which means they stream data from their airplanes so
that it can be read so we can see the overall performance of
that. We had less than 70 percent compliance prior to these
meetings. The Aviation Safety Reporting Programs, the ASAPs,
again every co-chairing regional carrier today has or is in the
process of being approved one of those programs, which went
from about 50 percent to where it is today. So these are
dramatic improvements.
The carriers themselves, the major carriers, again to their
credit, have stepped up and taken a very active duty role to
make certain that they export as mentors of the larger carriers
their good safety programs. And we ask them to demand the same
safety standards of the regional carrier that they demand of
themselves, and the compliance has been excellent.
One of the things that we say from time to time--this
safety record we have achieved was not accidental. I hear
people refer to all the time the miracle on the Hudson. It
wasn't a miracle. The airplane that landed in the Hudson landed
in the Hudson safely because it had a superbly trained crew in
the cabin and in the cockpit, a first-class traffic control.
Everybody was in coordination that were flying the airplane. It
was well made and built to certain standards--obviously not
enough to ingest half a flock of Canadian geese--but,
nonetheless, that airplane landed safely because we have a
system that over the years built every safety component that
was utilized in that 30 seconds when that airplane hit the
water.
Mr. Reed. Excellent. So the regional airline carriers are
bringing their standards up, in your opinion?
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir. Everything we have seen we have
done.
In addition to what I mentioned to you, every team had
white glove or the equivalent of white glove inspections of
those regional carriers, spot checks on their training
programs.
Today, every carrier--to my knowledge, every carrier now
requests all of the pilot training data. You may recall or may
not, but one of the areas that we have had to work around was
when you ask for a pilot's training records from the FAA--in
other words, their history of taking flight checks from the
FAA--well, when you turn that information over it is yours, and
for someone else to request it they have to get your approval.
We suggested to the carriers if you have an applicant who won't
release their training records to you, that in itself ought to
tell you something.
Mr. Reed. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate that.
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Ms. Hirono.
Ms. Hirono. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I was particularly interested in your testimony section on
the airports improvement programs. Because aviation is in a
global competitive environment, you see all these countries or
places like Singapore, China where just wonderful state-of-the-
art airports are being built. And then we come to our airports.
And I know that certainly the Honolulu International Airport, I
would say probably a mix of a lot of other airports in our
country where we are falling behind in our AIP program.
And so you cite the real impact of the extension process
that we have been using for reauthorization; and I would hope
that with this Congress that we will be able to come up with a
reasonable, fair, and forward-looking FAA reauthorization.
However, short of that, is there something we can do to save
money in this program? Because you have shown us that we are
losing money, we are not being very smart about how we are
proceeding with our AIP program in this environment of wanting
to make sure that we get the best bang for the buck. So I want
to ask you, short of a reauthorization, what can we do to
address the AIP issue that you have laid out for us?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, I think one of the important points that
I made in the testimony, to answer the question, was the fact
that 17 consecutive extensions and continuing resolutions have
led to a lot of stopping and starting. When equipment has to
come to a halt and taken off the field, it is expensive to
bring it back. People will give you a much better bid if I know
that I get the entire project.
If something, a runway extension, costs $100 million to
build you 1,000 feet of runway, as we both know, it is going to
cost a lot more to build it 100 feet at a time 10 times. And
that is what we are running into with these constant short
extensions.
Ms. Hirono. You certainly made that case. So my question
is, short of a long-term reauthorization--and I am hopeful that
we will be able to get to that--is there something we can do to
address the concern you raise--which I share, by the way.
Mr. Babbitt. Well, short of reauthorization, I am afraid we
are going to have to simply have to live with the fact that we
can't authorize people to do things with money we don't have
access to, and therein lies the problem.
We certainly have tried, and under the Stimulus Act we did
I think a wonderful job. We had close to slightly over $1
billion, and we got our money out the door. The advantage that
we had, we had projects in the cue, they had been
environmentally approved, and we were able to go right to the
bidders and actually got a lot more leverage out of that. It
was a tough time in the economy, and people were very
aggressive with their bidding, which actually let us let more
contracts. And I think we were very prudent with that money.
And I think any scrutiny you would like to put us under says
these were handled very efficiently and the taxpayers got a lot
of benefit. The airports were better served, the projects were
completed on time and, in many cases, under budget. So I think
we do a pretty good job. Just the choke on us is the short-term
process.
Ms. Hirono. So we know that we are $1 trillion--at least $1
trillion behind in infrastructure projects all across our
country. We are talking about harbors, highways, airports. So
if we just were to hone in on the aviation part, would you
support another infrastructure stimulus kind of a bill?
Mr. Babbitt. Could I give you an answer that if Secretary
LaHood were sitting here would give you? I could say, yes, I
would support it, but then they would fire me.
No, the administration has a budget that they are going to
put forward, and I think you are going to see as it comes
forward that there are a variety of infrastructure
improvements, I think.
I certainly share this administration's view that
infrastructure is one of the areas that we absolutely have to
put resources into; and nothing highlights it more, in my
opinion, than aviation. We can do all the improvements, we can
land them with closer spacing, we can do everything in the
world, but at the end of the day at La Guardia Airport when it
is a one-runway operation you can still only land them once
every 54 seconds.
Ms. Hirono. I think I am on the same page with you.
Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Petri. Mr. Hultgren.
Mr. Hultgren. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman; and,
Administrator Babbitt, thank you so much.
And I want to thank the FAA and the pilot and the crew and
the flight folks that all helped all us get here safely this
week. I felt it today. With a very windy day up there, I was
thankful for the well-trained pilot and I think a pretty
difficult airport, maybe, to land in, Reagan Airport there, but
glad to be here safely and thankful for the hard work that you
are doing.
I do recognize, as others, that this coming Saturday is the
2-year anniversary of the crash of Flight 3407. Independent of
having passed safety legislation, do you personally feel that
it is safer today to get on a regional airline than it would
have been 2 years ago when the crash of 3407 crashed?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, we certainly have implemented and gotten
a lot of response. We have implemented a number of safety
changes. We have put out safety bulletins, advisories and
gotten a lot of compliance. Those were areas that I think
needed addressing, and I am appreciative of the compliance that
we got from those. So if those safety programs themselves
brought us to a higher level, then the answer is yes.
We certainly have a lot of people--we have raised the
awareness. We have got self-reporting now, which helps us to
understand where shortcomings are happening. Even in the best
of intentions, procedures move and technology changes and you
have to find out where things are not working well and get
people to report it so you can change it. And with those
changes that we have in the system today, not only in the
regional world but elsewhere, air traffic control, large
carriers, a lot of procedures have changed and a constant
strive to be ever safer.
Mr. Hultgren. Thank you.
One other quick question here. There are people here whose
family members were victims of the crash, obviously are
passionate about continuing that safety and making sure that we
do all we can as a Subcommittee and as a Congress, along with
the FAA, to make air traffic as safe as possible. What do you
see or what would you to suggest to them today are ways that
they could be helpful to the FAA? How could they provide input?
What are things that they could come alongside? Obviously, they
have shown their commitment by being here today. But what would
you suggest to them to help us in this process, again, to make
sure that we continue to have at least another 2 years or many,
many more years beyond that without a fatality?
Mr. Babbitt. Sure. Well, I have applauded them publicly and
privately. I probably--and you can confirm this with them--have
had the opportunity to meet with them a number of times, and
what I am extremely appreciative of is the very positive
attitude. They suffered a horrible tragedy. I have lost crew
members professionally, people I have known, friends I worked
with, people I learned to fly with, I have lost them, and I
understand. But never will I understand like the loss of a
family member.
And I have to say that the positive attitude that they have
carried that they want to do something, we will never do
anything to bring their loved ones back, but what they will
enjoy is the legacy of saying the contributions that we made,
the positive positions that we took, the positive steps and the
focus that they kept on all of us, has been and will bring
changes to the aviation system of improvement and safety that
will be felt forever. So I applaud them for that, and I think
they have made an enormous impact, and they have done so in a
positive, constructive fashion.
Mr. Hultgren. Thank you, and we all thank you as well for
the work that you have done and ask for your continued input.
One last thing, and then I will be done.
I mentioned that my district is just adjacent to O'Hare,
obviously a very busy airport. But just a question of how
quickly--shifting gears to the NextGen--how quickly you see
some of the beneficial impact of the work that is being done
and what the plan is to have an impact with some of the busiest
airports, say 35 busiest airports, what your plan is to have
that so we start seeing that impact.
Mr. Babbitt. Sure. Well, we have--and I would love to come
back and perhaps have a meeting with you and your staff or some
other members to lay out a little more clearly--but we have a
very expansive plan that talks about that.
But let me use O'Hare as a specific. We are already seeing
some benefits there. You have two airports that we consider a
metroplex up there. We have Midway on the one side and O'Hare
on the other. Five years ago, that was one massive airspace.
So, at Midway, we are landing 20 airports an hour of its
capability of 45. But if O'Hare was saturated, Midway suffered.
Because those two airports in that airspace is interlinked.
Today, using RMP technology, we can very accurately
navigate into Midway with aircraft and never touch O'Hare's
airspace, so we make them independent of each other.
Think of a lot of areas. Think of the New York metropolitan
area. We have to sometimes--unfortunately, GA sometimes
suffers. We have to literally close Teeterboro so that the
three airports of Newark, La Guardia, and Kennedy can operate
with large volumes of traffic. But using, again, RMP procedures
we can delink those airports so it doesn't matter to someone
going into Teeterboro what is going on in Newark. And we can do
that with more accurate--and we are doing that today.
So we are seeing that type of delinkage in a number of
airports around the country. That is just one example.
Some of the optimized profile descents that we are using
today, dramatic savings in fuel. Alaska Airlines cites 60
gallons per approach, 60 gallons of kerosene every time they
land coming down from Alaska, their high-altitude approaches.
They literally glide all the way in. I mean, those are
tremendous savings. It is savings in fuel, savings in
emissions, noise. The noise footprint of people doing optimized
profile descents, we can show you what goes on in Louisville,
Kentucky, it is dramatic.
So as we roll these out it is not just a schematic anymore.
These are real, live operations. We deploy them as people get
equipped, and we get the procedures and training in place. And,
as someone mentioned, the momentum and the pace is there; and
it will continue to accelerate.
Mr. Hultgren. Well, thank you very much, Administrator. I
do look forward to having that time where we can talk more
directly, and I want to thank the Chairman and yield back.
Mr. Petri. Mr. Capuano.
Mr. Capuano. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you Mr. Administrator. I think you are doing a great
job. I think you have the right priorities, and you are the
right man for this job, and I appreciate what you have done.
I want to talk specifically about what you can do. Correct
me if I am wrong, but my math indicates that if you roll back
to 2008 levels from today's operating levels it is a little
over $1 billion worth of cuts. Is that a rough ballpark figure
that sounds right?
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir, that is accurate.
Mr. Capuano. So with a $1 billion left you will clearly not
be able to do--or less--you clearly will not be able to do what
you are doing right this very minute, is that fair?
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir, that is correct.
Mr. Capuano. Have you made the decisions yet as to what
specific programs would be cut out if you lose $1 billion?
Mr. Babbitt. No, sir. We certainly would want to step back
and reprioritize. I mean, we would have to protect the safety
of the system as we know it today. So then we would look at,
well, now what is left. So we would have to move some of the
assets over to protect the safety and integrity of our system
today. Then we would look back and then prioritize and
certainly work with constituents to say, well, we are going to
have to slow this down, that down.
Mr. Capuano. That is why I appreciate--I mean, first of
all, your priority is 100 percent correct. But we agree then
that after safety is taken care of you would still have some
discretionary funds within which you have to make tough
decisions.
I would strongly suggest--Mr. Administrator, you are the
first person I talked to in the administration since the new
Congress. I would strongly suggest that you have those cuts
prepared now. I think it is only fair.
I represent Logan, as you know. I fly into DCA all the
time. If one of those airports is getting cut and can't do
whatever it might be, I think it is only fair that my
constituents and the constituents who fly into both those
airports know what is not going to be done. What if it is
O'Hare? What if it is somebody else? I mean, they should know
what this means. As opposed to a $1 billion cut, which is a
nice round number, I can't count that high. I am not sure
exactly how many zeros there are. But if you tell me that the
taxiway at Logan is not being done, I have a better idea what
that means. It means something specific to me and my
constituents.
And I would strongly suggest that you and actually the
entire administration go through this. This is not a new
number. This 2008 magic candle item has been talked about now
for months. It is coming. You know it is coming. And I think it
is only fair to be putting faces and names and specific
projects to thoughtful--not political but thoughtful decisions
as to what will be done with $1 billion less. So that when I go
to the well and defend the FAA and other agencies that I know
specifically what I am talking about. Otherwise, it is just a
number.
Plus, I think it is important for the people who want to
advocate these cuts to look to their constituents and say, my
constituents have to take a cut, whatever it might be. We are
not going to be getting NextGen quite as quickly as we had
hoped, or whatever it might be.
So I would strongly suggest to put real names, real items,
on this list thoughtfully, independently, as you would do if
these cuts come through, so that we in Congress and so that our
constituents will know what we are talking about.
And I would, finally, just to say, as you do, some of that
money is discretionary, things like which noise abatement plans
get done next. I would also strongly suggest you remember who
was with you when the time comes to make those discretionary
commentary. It has always bothered me, always bothered me--and
you just said I believe the FAA got close to $2 billion in
stimulus funds--of that $2 billion I am willing to bet that a
fair amount of it went discretionarily to people who voted
against that money. I respect their vote. I do not respect the
hypocrisy, and I do not respect the administration for not
noticing that.
So I would say the same thing here. When the time comes,
after safety--safety is safety, safety off the table--when it
comes to nondiscretionary items like noise abatement, they all
have to be done. Which one goes first? Cut out the ones of the
people who aren't willing to pay for it and be honest about it,
not trying to play games. Be honest and open about it.
There is a cost to an effective FAA. And for those who
don't want to pay for it, I respect that position, but you
can't have it both ways.
So, Mr. Administrator, again, I think you have done a great
job. I hope that you don't have to go through these cuts
because I think NextGen and other items you are doing are
critically important. At the same time, if you do, I hope that
you help us make the case to the American people of what they
are actually suffering through these cuts.
Thank you very much. I yield back.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Mr. Cravaack.
Mr. Cravaack. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I had to smile when you were talking about going across the
Gulf. As a new ``nugget'' pilot flying an old aircraft with
steam gauges, following a very weak ADS signal that we had
finally lost halfway across the pond and notifying ATC we lost
our navigation, he says, take a look up 2:00 high. Do you see
contrails? And I said, yes, we do. Follow him. That was our
navigation.
So your safety record, obviously, is to be applauded, sir.
Thank you very much for that.
But, as you know, this year the reauthorization bill could
authorize the spending of billions of American taxpayer dollars
to operate the FAA and related aviation programs. After
reviewing several Department of Transportation Inspector
General reports, I am troubled by the FAA's repeated failure to
provide basic contract oversight in management.
Today, I specifically would like to focus on the 2008
contract the FAA awarded to Raytheon for air traffic controller
trainer and the 2007 contract awarded to ITT to deploy the ADS-
B infrastructure system. In regards to Raytheon contract, in
the first year, this contract exceeded baseline cost estimates
by 35 percent, or $28 million. In the second year, the contract
exceeded planned expenses by 20 percent, or $18 million. During
the first year of the contract, in 11 separate invoices,
Raytheon billed the FAA for $45 million, but the FAA did not
have the controls or the metrics in place to verify that the
government received the services it was being billed for.
Perhaps most troubling is the FAA allowed Raytheon to
determine the performance measures and the data used in
determining how the contractor could earn award fees. Inspector
General Gazetti said the proper award fee and incentive fee
structure alone could have prevented the misuse of 22.6 million
taxpayer dollars.
Inspector General Lou Dixon on October 12, 2010--I
understand that the contract for ITT was not on your watch, but
the report was. The report of the FAA's contract with ITT
Inspector General Dixon stated the FAA did not conduct a
comprehensive financial analysis before deciding that a
service-based contract would save the government more than the
traditional method of owning and operating the system. The
FAA's data showed that if the agency had owned a system through
the first phase of ADS-B the government could have saved over
$600 million in the contract's initial phase alone. That is
$600 million.
I realize this contract, again, was not awarded under your
tenure as the FAA administrator. However, the FAA employees
failed to conduct proper oversight and perform due diligence to
fix an established pattern of FAA irresponsibility in
administering Federal contracts. I ask that you provide my
staff with the names of the presently employed FAA personnel
that were charged with mismanagement of this oversight in the
2007 ITT contract and the 2008 Raytheon contract.
Was Inspector General Dixon wrong in his assessment that
the government could have saved $600 million by not entering in
a service-based contract for the initial phase of the ADS-B
infrastructure?
Mr. Babbitt. You have touched a number of things there.
First, I appreciate and should acknowledge it is super to
have someone with your background on the committee. I know that
as a professional pilot and a military pilot as well you have
got a lot of understanding, so I appreciate it and the focus
that you have.
One of the things that--and let me sort of get to the
answer here through a couple of steps. Oftentimes, the IG,
based on a report, will go out and make a series of statements
in a report which we are allowed to then respond to. And I find
I have sat here in this very seat and testified to things that
have either been repaired or we objected to, but it doesn't
change what the initial report said. We have said, and, by the
way, you didn't realize that we did this; and they were, oh,
golly, you are right. We didn't. That is the second half of the
page.
So there is a number of things that you cited in the
initial reports that we simply did not concur with and have
supporting evidence of why we didn't, and that is the other
side of the story. So I want to have the opportunity to share
with you some of those instances.
We did have certainly an increase in the training costs,
but at that same period of time that wasn't a static time in
the environment. The controller workforce had an enormous
spike. Like four times what was predicted in normal retirements
spiked, and we had to undertake one of the most massive
trainings in that period of time.
And, yes, it did in fact lead to--these were the people in
charge of training, and so they had to respond with additional
and were authorized to.
You make a good point on some of our oversight capability.
I welcome the opportunity to spend a little more time and show
you what we are doing to sort of upgrade ourselves to what
corporate America would expect of a well-run company in terms
of project oversight, acquisitions from the beginning. There
were acquisitions that I have now on my watch that were made
that I would never enter under the same rules and
circumstances. We know better today, and we would manage the
acquisition itself better today.
With regard to the ITT, that is a subject--we are under
discussion. But one of the things I think that people should
appreciate, the difference between--this will be a corporate
decision. If you and I were sitting on the board of an airline
and someone said, should we lease the airplane or should we buy
it? And we can lease it for $300,000 a month or we can buy it,
if we had the $50 million it would take. Well, we don't have
the $50 million. Therein lies the ITT contract.
Yes, it would be operationally less expensive to have
bought all that equipment, but what wasn't noticed was how many
billions of dollars it would have cost to acquire the equipment
to avoid it. In a company, you would make that decision. You
would decide do you want to go out and borrow that money, put
it in place, and save the operational costs over time, or do
you go ahead and lease? I mean, it is the classic argument buy
versus lease. And so we have to make those decisions, and we
are having an ongoing discussion with the IG on some of those.
Mr. Cravaack. Have you done a cost analysis between the
traditional method versus the fee for service? Have you
completed it?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, no, we haven't in the sense that--
appreciate that we don't get to depreciate equipment like the
private sector does. So there is no depreciation allowance and
no recapture for us. But we certainly try in our acquisitions
and certainly going forward will do a better job of letting out
the differences.
Mr. Cravaack. I yield back, sir. Thank you.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Mr. Long.
Mr. Long. Thank you, Mr. Chairman; and thank you,
Administrator Babbitt, for being here today.
There has been a lot of talk today about NextGen, and there
will be in the future. I am more concerned about today's Gen,
and I want to go back to I think the Chairman's original
question to you about the dramatic rise in near midair
collisions and air traffic controllers' operational errors that
are up the past year, both nationally and here in the
Washington, D.C., area. And I believe, if I understood your
answer, it was because of this new voluntary reporting system.
However, in the Washington Post there was an article
December 31, about 5 weeks ago, and the FAA and the controller
union have admitted that the self-reported errors from this new
nonpunitive error reporting system are not included in the
official count. Therefore, I don't see how that could be the
reason for the rise in the official published errors. Is that a
correct statement?
Mr. Babbitt. It is correct in the sense--remember, we are
changing the overall environment. We are also asking people in
this partnership for safety to admit things that might not be
an infraction. So they don't need immunity. They are just
telling us about them, not under that system.
We have a much more open culture today than we did 5 years
ago, 4, or even 2 years ago. And so they don't necessarily use
ADSAP to report errors. They are free to report anything. They
will--if they think voluntary reporting might indicate their
exposure to something and they are looking to have some--not
immunity but certainly coverage of disclosing this publicly,
then they will file it under the ADSAP program.
But we are getting a lot more reports from all corners
simply because we have a partnership for safety that we have
engaged in. We also have better electronic observations in
places where we deploy ADS-B. Remember, ADS-B reports full
time, all the time, not every 12 seconds in a sweep. So we can
more accurately track operational areas.
Mr. Long. So you think that it is more due to the increased
reporting, wherever it comes from, than actual issues that we
are having?
Mr. Babbitt. We actually expected--as each of these comes
on line, each of these enhanced capabilities, we actually
expect to get more reports. Maybe not a good analogy but the
one I use often is the difference between we have an
intersection and for years we have been writing one or two red
light tickets a week. Somebody is running the red light. We put
a traffic camera up, and we got 40 one week. Did 40 people run
the light that week? No, we just caught all the ones that did.
And, remember, operational errors do not necessarily mean
we had a dangerous lapse in safety. What it means is we have an
established safety margin that we want to be respected.
An airplane, for example, in the terminal area we like to
keep them three miles apart. An airplane in front of you slows
down a little bit, unbeknownst to anyone else. The following
aircraft moves in to 2.9 miles. That is an operational error.
All of a sudden the controller realizes he has got a 2.9 mile
separation instead of three because somebody slowed down and
didn't tell him. That is an operational error. He has to slow
the airplane down or give a turn or something. That is an
operational error. Those are the things we want to understand
how they happen, how to train so they don't happen again.
Mr. Long. OK. One other question about--just curious about
what your reaction is to today's revelations about the
unprofessional behavior in New York, the air traffic
controllers there, and do you plan disciplinary action for
them?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, first, we are going to get the facts. We
have sent a team up there. People make allegations from time to
time, and just like everybody in the country we want to look
into this and get the actual facts of what is going on up
there.
That is a very complex series of airspace. We move traffic
through it in a day than some countries move. So it is a very
intense traffic area.
I read some of the allegations. But the bottom line is we
have got a team up there, and the controllers have been very
open. They will work with us as well, and we will get to the
bottom of this. And if in fact some of those allegations are
correct, obviously, we will take disciplinary action.
Mr. Long. OK. And, again, I thank you for being here.
I got routed through Dallas yesterday, DFW, after the Super
Bowl. Normally, I think on a Monday they have 19,000
passengers. At National they had 50 and moved very fluidly.
So I thank you for all your work, and I yield back.
Mr. Babbitt. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Representative Meehan.
Mr. Meehan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman; and thank you, Mr.
Babbitt, for your appearance here before us today.
I have some specific questions, and I am glad that you
opened the door to the issue of New York being a very sort of
intense airspace region. I am just below that, representing a
district that includes the Philadelphia airport, my county, and
you may be familiar with some of the issues with regard to
that.
But one of the--I just finished a GAO study that looked at
congested areas, and their conclusion was that regional airport
planning could help address congestion if the plans were
integrated with FAA and airport decision making, realizing not
just a class B like Philadelphia, but there are other--Lehigh
Valley, Atlantic City--other airports that may be able to
handle overflow from the main hub. What is your opinion with
respect to the importance of the essential nature of regional
planning as we deal with the issue of congestion?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, I think there is certainly a place for
regional planning, especially in these metropolitan areas.
One of the things that we certainly take into
consideration, reliever airports that are near major airports,
that they can help unburden some of the traffic that is going
into a metropolitan airport. That is a good thing.
The other side of that coin, of course, is the commercial
reality of the carriers operating in those big airports and the
connectivity of their traffic. Someone who wants to go through,
for example, Newark, land in Newark and then go somewhere else
isn't going to be well served by going to Atlantic City or an
airport not too close by. So the connectivity plays into that.
But to the extent these airports add to the overall
improvement of the national air space system we certainly
consider that, and it is not unique that you have regional
planning authorities that do take into consideration, and we
certainly consider them when we talk about adding airport
improvement funds.
Mr. Meehan. Well, in reviewing this study, I was concerned
about some of the language. If I can, it was that the airport
officials in Philadelphia International stated that the airport
does its own planning without input from regional planners.
This is the language of the GAO study. And another one. Airport
officials in Philadelphia stated that regional airport planning
has little influence on the decisions made by the City of
Philadelphia or Philadelphia International Airport.
And then I see a concluding paragraph, a major hindrance is
the differing interests of airports in the region. Their
language, airport officials in Philadelphia told us they do not
want to support Federal efforts, including regional airport
planning, that could--because the City of Philadelphia which
owns Philadelphia International does not want to lose revenue
generated at its airports to other airports. Is it a revenue
question or is it an efficiency question?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, the decision that is made by the Federal
Government whether or not to support a request by an airport
authority, an airport sponsor--and remember that most of the
airports in this country are owned by the cities, the counties,
in some cases, the State, and they make their own independent
decisions. They would then request improvements. They would--
using forecasts. And, of course, we do the same thing. If those
forecasts indicate to us that we would improve the overall
transportation flow, we grant those requests. But they are on a
very solid foundation of a very thoughtful overall contribution
to the national airspace system.
But what an individual airport does, whether it wants to
build a hangar on the north side of the field or the south
side, a new terminal wing and so forth, those are airport local
decisions and not subject to our approval.
Mr. Meehan. I concur with the idea of the airport local
decisions, but I am concerned about one issue that respects the
Philadelphia situation. Because they do have great autonomy,
and they have proposed extending an airstrip to accommodate
congestion. Are you aware that in the context of that 78 homes
are going to be taken by purported eminent domain?
Mr. Babbitt. I am aware of that, yes, sir.
Mr. Meehan. Well, sir, the power of eminent domain does not
come from them locally. It is your power of eminent domain that
they are stepping into. So they are making their own
independent decisions. They are not using any kind of regional
association because they choose not to--by their words, not
ours--because of revenue streams, and yet your power of eminent
domain is what they are using to take these homes. Is that fair
to those homeowners that they are not looking at what the GAO
suggests may well be an alternative to dealing with congestion?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, I think the gap in what you and I are
discussing is captured in our ability to force them to join in
any type of regional planning authority. We simply don't have
that authority, nor could we compel them or restrict them from
that.
We went through a record of decision process. They made
their plan, which did in fact include capturing some land. And
in the interest of expanding the overall flow and contribution
to the system it is a reasonable plan. It met all of our
criteria, federally established criteria, and a decision was
based on that.
Mr. Meehan. It only looked at two things. It only looked at
two separate entrances and the status quo. It did not consider
the opportunity to perhaps lay off flights into other airports,
including its own northeast Philadelphia airport in a city less
than 10 miles away from Philadelphia International.
Mr. Babbitt. Well, again, the amount of--one of the things
that you would look at in that case if you were Philadelphia is
how much originating and departing traffic is yours and yours
uniquely, as opposed to connecting traffic. And if an airport
has a high volume of connecting traffic realize this is a
commercial discussion outside of the authority of the FAA.
Mr. Meehan. But, Mr. Babbitt, they are using your authority
to take those properties. And--I am sorry--may I just ask one
quick question?
Mr. Petri. Sure.
Mr. Meehan. One last issue is, in addition to this, there
has been noise abatement that has been used for some of those
properties. I am sure you may be aware there are 78 properties
that are potentially affected. Yet at the same time the airport
and the FAA have done noise abatement on some 27 of those
properties which are slated to be taken at a cost of--I
understand it is close to $1.2 million. Who is making that
decision?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, that would be part of the record of
decision, as I understand the process. That the overall airport
plan goes through a very high-intensity, robust review which
includes environmental protection. Certainly the noise levels
forecast, all of those come into play. In some cases, you can
mitigate the noise levels. When traffic picks up in an airport,
we have some criteria. The EPA through the NEPA has a baseline
criteria, and when that is exceeded we have an obligation and
do often go out and provide mitigation by soundproofing homes,
giving them money because the situation has changed.
But in this case the record of decision obviously was a
little stronger than that and said if you are going to make
this extension we need this land and therefore you take this
next step.
Mr. Meehan. But they are mitigating homes that they are
going to take.
Look, may I just ask if your staff can answer these
questions?
Mr. Petri. I am afraid--you can ask someone next to you to
yield time for you to be recognized.
Mr. Meehan. Mr. Chairman, I will submit a question to Mr.
Babbitt.
Mr. Babbitt. Congressman, we would be more than happy to
come over with a team and meet with you and your staff. I would
be more than happy to do that and discuss that at length, yes,
sir.
Mr. Meehan. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Petri. Mr. Lankford.
Mr. Lankford. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thanks for coming over and spending time with us today.
Let me run through just a couple quick questions. Is there
a ballpark figure that you are dealing with at this point for
NextGeneration, what it has cost to date to implement and what
you anticipate it will cost to complete the process? And I know
there are multiple elements. NextGen is this large broad term,
and there are a lot of other random pieces. Give us a round
figure what it has cost to date and what you think it will cost
to complete.
Mr. Babbitt. Well, there is a number. That is a difficult
question to answer. And I could probably give you a more
accurate and better answer by pulling all these figures
together, but it is in the multiple billions.
Mr. Lankford. Right. It is a figure that I have been
looking for and have not been able to find it. That is why I am
asking, to say if there is a way to be able to pull those
figures together, to just give us a number, to say here is what
it has cost to date, here is what it will cost to complete,
that would be very helpful. Because the numbers seem to be all
over the board.
Mr. Babbitt. Sure. And then, too, what complicates it,
Congressman Lankford, is the fact that some of these components
are NextGen itself. In other words, if we define NextGen as the
ability to communicate with the aircraft, navigate the
aircraft, surveil the aircraft, and the technology that
surrounds that, does it also include training for the, for
example, the controllers? How about the digital communication?
How about the facilities that we may have to build? How about a
need to modernization and so forth?
So all of these things support NextGen. We can break that
down for you and say, this is direct NextGen, this is
supportive of NextGen, this will be desirable to accelerate
NextGen.
Mr. Lankford. That would be terrific.
Tell me about the interaction between us and Europe. We
have got the two most frequently used airspaces in the world,
and I know they are implementing their own process. How is that
communication going relating to their process which is
different than our process?
Mr. Babbitt. Right. They are looking to have their own
NextGen system, SESI, which is the Single European Skies
Initiative. They are far more in the drawing board stages. We
actually use it today; they don't. It is simply a discussion
item with them. But we are in very close communication with
them.
For that matter, we are working with all of our
international partners. It would be foolish for us to have a
system that was not interoperable. We want an airplane to go
from anywhere in the world owned by anyone in the world to any
other place in the world and use the technology to the fullest
extent.
Mr. Lankford. So you feel confident at this point once we
are implementing NextGen it is going to be interoperable with
whatever is being constructed in Europe and the relationship is
already there?
Mr. Babbitt. Yes.
Mr. Lankford. What I don't want is our commercial aircraft
to have to have two different systems to be able to cross.
Mr. Babbitt. No. And nor do they. We have had good dialogue
with them.
I would say we are very, very far ahead of them. I mean, we
actually have, as I noted, a number of cities, areas. The
whole--the area on the east coast of Florida in the Melbourne
area completely equipped. All the training aircraft use NextGen
today. It is a wonderful system. We have it deployed a lot of
places.
Mr. Lankford. Just relationship again, not to get off the
European conversation here. I am hearing lots of conversation
about a taxation, a cap-and-trade-type implementation that is
happening on a commercial airline basis and an increased tax
possibly coming to fly into European space. Are you aware of
that and can you bring me up to speed with what is happening
with that?
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir. We like to address those as a
country. We have used ICAO as the vehicle to address these. We
don't think it is appropriate for any individual country to
stake out on their own so we have our standards and anyone
coming in here would have to live by our standards. So we have
very much been active participants in ICAO. We are very
supportive.
Certainly as the FAA, this administration and this country,
in coming up with a uniform worldwide trade or--I am sorry--
system that would acknowledge what we want to do for the
environment and work on something that, if you comply, you will
be invited to participate and fly into any airspace anywhere in
the world. We think that is the way to go.
Mr. Lankford. Terrific.
A couple more quick questions on it. One is dealing with
the alternative fuels. There is, again, a lot of chatter about
moving to alternative fuels. There is some research projects
that have been put into previous versions that obviously did
not pass through at this point. What are alternative fuels that
you would look at and say in this authorization I would like to
see this in there, or are there any?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, we have--you should be aware of a couple
of initiatives that we have. We have a CLEEN program, which is
Continuous Low Energy, Emissions, and Noise, which we have a
great partnership with people in the community. We have five
different engine manufacturers involved.
The airframe manufacturers are working together with other
parts of the industry to develop technologies that burn less
fuel. We are ahead of our goal of reducing fuel consumption 2
percent annually. We are ahead of that thanks to the
partnership we have.
Alternative fuels fall into that same area. We have got a
couple of kinds of considerations. One is the quest for
renewable fuels. So biofuels, areas like that.
We also have the problem of existing fuels that are going
to be phased out. The EPA wants to eliminate lead from all
fuels. We have a 100 low lead octane that we burn in a number
of our general aviation aircraft.
I just recently signed an aviation rulemaking committee to
put an arc together, this committee, to find a suitable drop in
replaceable fuel as quickly as possible so that we can move to
this fuel. The issue is that we don't want to have lead
additives outlawed before we have the alternative fuel to
replace it with, and I am pretty comfortable that working with
the industry and our constituents we will find it.
We have a number of fuels today. One of the problems,
without getting too technical, lead in and of itself is a
lubricant and so you can replace it with nickle and get the
same octane. The trouble is the engine life is cut in half, and
nobody wants that.
Also, we need these fuels to be drop-in. You need to be
able to put it in the same tank, pump it through the same hose,
through the same carburetors, and not have some unintended
consequence come from corrosion or leakage or things like that.
Mr. Lankford. Terrific. Thank you.
Could I just ask one thing? If I could get a formula from
the FAA for how they make decisions on consolidation. If that
is in print somewhere, just to be able to go through and review
some sort of metric to say this is how we decide when we
consolidate TRACON facilities or whatever it may be, this is
our plan on how we make that strategy.
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir. We have a pretty thoughtful analysis
that we use, and we look at the geography. If we find an area
where it seems--
Think about it in simple terms. If we had within, say, a
200-mile range, we had four or five TRACONs, each one of those
has back-up facilities, back-up generators, back-up IT, all of
that, could we consolidate that efficiently into one area?
One of the things that I am real pleased that we have been
able to do recently is to get with our colleagues, whether it
is the members of PAS or NATCA, and sit down and say, look,
this is the business case. We want to sit down. Does this make
sense to you? And I am pleased to say that we have enjoyed
pretty good success. We recently consolidated eight different
facilities to achieve savings and did it with a consensual
agreement, so it is working.
Mr. Lankford. Thank you.
My time is expired. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Petri. Mr. Southerland.
Mr. Southerland. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Babbitt, thank you very much for coming today. I was
here--my plane came in a little later, and so I wasn't able to
be here for the whole time.
Mr. Babbitt. I hope it wasn't our fault.
Mr. Southerland. No. Actually, it was on time. It was just
I couldn't get one out of Panama City earlier.
I was reading through your comments that you had shared
earlier and some very impressive numbers. I want to commend
you. It talks about approximately 750 million people through
the system on an annual basis, and 50,000 flights are operated
on any given day. That is an enormous success, and I commend
you and your staff for working to create that record.
I want to ask--I was born and raised in a home where mom
always taught us that an ounce of prevention is better than a
pound of cure, and that saying sticks with me the older I get.
I want to ask some questions regarding--as far as your
controllers, and really in light of what I have seen and just
the general public. So the questions that I ask are questions--
just my own curiosity. I do not come from an aviation
background, so I just want to ask some questions.
How many air traffic controllers does the FAA employ
throughout your entire system?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, right now, we employ, in round numbers,
about 15,500 air traffic controllers.
Mr. Southerland. So, obviously, in order to do the numbers
that you stated in your comments, I am sure the majority of
them are blowing and going and doing a great job.
In light of what we saw in the papers--and, again, you made
reference to sending a team up to New York, and I commend you.
You are going to do your due diligence and gather all the
facts, as anyone in your position would do. I am just wondering
what kind of scenario as far as the disciplinary action if your
findings are that what we read about is true, that people were
away from their stations, that they had responsibilities, one
person was carrying on the workload of three. What do you--I
mean, under what condition is there a zero tolerance? I mean,
we have got to be ahead of the curve to make sure that that
wonderful success ratio continues going forward. I mean, is
there a zero tolerance because their position is so critical to
the safety record?
Mr. Babbitt. Yes, sir. We have taken some pretty severe
actions in cases where the people have not performed to what
they should have been doing. And the relationship we enjoy
today with NATCA, more often than not they agree. They are no
more tolerant of unprofessional behavior than we are. They have
their own professional standards, and that is an improving area
for them. I applaud them for it.
Professional airline pilots have a very similar type
program. We are seeing that coming out in mechanics where you
discipline with your peers. We can't watch everything. They
can.
Mr. Southerland. You know, everyone seems to be talking
about the need to get a dollar out of a dime. I mean,
obviously, the fiscal mess that we are in as a country it is
going to take everyone rowing and everyone doing their part. As
far as going forward, are air traffic controllers--are they
subject to the President's pay freeze that is in place for all
Federal employees?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, they are subject in the sense that if we
had an open agreement with them, yes, we would have to live by
it. What the controllers have in place was a contract that was
negotiated several years ago, and by obligation by both
contract law and statutory requirement we are obliged to live
up to that agreement.
Mr. Southerland. Are there any other employees in your
agency that are under any current labor contracts that the pay
freeze stated by the President would not apply to?
Mr. Babbitt. Well, we entered a new agreement with another
section, the noncontroller section of NATCA. But because the
pay freeze was in effect we limited them to no more than
anybody under the pay freeze would get, and they have agreed to
that. That is the difference. This was negotiated in an earlier
time prior to and therefore is immune from.
Interestingly, the actual--without getting into details,
what was proposed for them in terms of a series of step raises
was somewhere in the ballpark of what government employees
would be getting anyway. So it wasn't like it was dramatically
different than what a standard person under the GS scale would
have gotten.
Mr. Southerland. And, again, I know it is going take
everyone to row to get us out of this mess we are in, OK,
because we are in a mess, and financially. So I guess my
question--and not to pick on them, or I am just saying going
forward I would say that someone in your position you want to
make sure that it is fair and equitable and that everyone is
doing their part. So that is really the angle I was coming at.
Mr. Babbitt. Sure. And I appreciate it. I mean, we have
billions of dollars of contracts with contractors, too. I would
love to go back to them and say, have you heard about the
President's pay freeze? But I don't think they would be any
more receptive than the rest of the world.
Mr. Southerland. Mr. Chairman, I yield the balance of my
time. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Petri. Thank you.
Thank you all. It has been a good hearing, and we
appreciate the participation of all of the members of the
Subcommittee.
Just one quick question. I would be remiss basically if I
didn't ask if you could comment briefly on any of the
opportunities and challenges for the general aviation community
of the NextGen deployment.
Mr. Babbitt. Sure. Well, I think that is one of the areas
that I think we have to do a better job of explaining the
advantages.
But one of the things that we really look forward to is the
opportunity for people in general aviation to absorb
information on board the aircraft that would otherwise never be
available to them. We broadcast weather information that would
give them a depiction of whether it is better than you would
get with airborne weather radar, textural information that they
simply could not achieve.
But the most important, we have tens of--not tens of but
thousands of airports around the country where general aviation
operations go in and out every day. Those airports don't have
the volume of traffic that could justify putting in an
instrument landing system, a VAR approach or anything like
that. We would have to maintain the ground equipment to do it.
But with NextGen all we need to do is design the approach once,
there is nothing to maintain, and we can give literally
thousands of airports guidance, both vertical and horizontal
guidance, to make safer approaches for a very, very minimum
cost.
So we are talking about the smallest airports. We are
talking about airports that are just below the size that could
command that. Where someone with a business jet who won't keep
their airplane there or might have to go there to deliver parts
or something now has an approach to that airport. They can
provide services to that town that they otherwise couldn't, and
they will get that with NextGen.
The ability to--the helicopter example is a great one. They
can fly and see the other helicopters out over the Gulf. They
had no ability to do that before. And so they can sequence
themselves visually with digital help. So all of these things
are great aids for general aviation.
A good example is what goes on down at Embry-Riddle. All of
those aircraft safety training areas are very complicated for
us in general aviation, where you have students literally
sometimes 30 and 40 aircraft into a training area and they are
maintaining separation visually and they are doing maneuvers.
That is very complicated. With NextGen they have on board, they
can see where the other airplanes are. A tremendous improvement
in safety for them.
And that is just the tip of the iceberg. There is a lot of
safety enhancements that come from general aviation, and I
think as time goes on they are seeing more and more the
benefits. Our obligation is to explain it to them better, and I
think once they appreciate all the benefits they are going to
appreciate the acceleration a lot more.
Mr. Petri. Well, again, thank you very much. I will be
holding another hearing tomorrow.
This hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:58 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
[Prepared statements supplied for the record follow:]