• If You Are Having Trouble Logging In with Your Old Username and Password, Please use this Forgot Your Password link to get re-established.
  • Hey! Be sure to login or register!

New FAA guy

oldbaldguy

Registered User
AOPA is reporting that the Obama admin is going to name the former head of the airline pilots' union as the new head of the FAA. I'm ambivalent about this, I think, because at least this guy has some knowledge of civil aviation, unlike the last several who were in the job because of their campaign work and/or contributions. However, because Obama supports user fees, as do the airlines, this guy may not be our friend in the long run. At the very least, we should be wary and not expect much from him for the little guys like us.
 
I do not believe the airlines support user fees - they are heavily subsidized as it is, and if we charged them for what they use, they would be screaming.

On the other hand, user fees might equalize the burden - railroads even pay taxes on their right-of-way and terminals.

I would have to give up flying if user fees were instituted - I am heavily subsidized, and there are no private airports around here for me to go to. I like things the way they are, fee-wise. But shouldn't good conservative thinkers be in favor of privatizing the whole mess?
 
Bob

AOPA has had the lead on opposing user fees for general aviation for quite a while. Their issue with the proposal is that GA is not the problem with the national airspace. They hold that the commercial airlines hub system is the issue, exacerbated by everyone wanting to arrive and depart at the same time, causing massive air traffic jams at many major airports. In that sense and because the commercials are the loudest complainers, they are their own worst enemy but we are the ones they blame. When user fees last came up, the airlines supported them because they hoped to dump much of the cost of operating an airways system devoted almost entirely to them onto us in general aviation. We already pay huge amounts of money by way of fuel taxes into a fund that is supposed to take care of running the airways. However, it is either used to offset the deficit or is used for other projects, depending on who you talk to. As to the effectiveness of user fees, please allow me to point out that general aviation pays usurious user fees throughout Europe and for that reason is all but dead over there. The airlines have never been our friends on this issue and having one of "theirs" run the agency may not be in GA's best interests. On the other hand, he can be no worse than the appointees we've already suffered through.
 
Babbitt is a union guy - maybe not a liberal, but surely looking out for the "little guy." I have been wrong before, but I bet he would inform the airlines of their fair share of user fees, and they would back off.

I am sure I pay some tax money on my fuel - but not enough to offset my use of the local airports. If they charged me a fee for use of the tower, the taxiways, the runway, and the actual commercial value for the two hangar spots I control, I would be broke by June. Two days ago, I had the undivided attention of three controllers while I landed on a total of six different runways multiple times. We all had great fun, but I could not even afford to joke about sending them that portion of their paychecks. So I offer them jumpseat rides.

And I would support AOPA 100% if they would quit calling at dinner time and make a special membership so I am not paying for $150 worth of hats, books, coffee mugs, and continuous solicitations. I even asked a VP to get them to back off, but they couldn't.
 
I'm not sure I'm following you, Bob. Maybe I had too much vino with my supper, but it sounds like you are against user fees because you can't afford 'em, but at the same time don't think you're paying your fair share? I'll bet you're paying a lot more than you think already. You also might want to rethink your premise that the airlines would be happy to pay the lion's share of user fees. If you get a chance and are interested, you might want to look up the details of the user fees Bush proposed when he was in office -- they were pretty onerous. I'm not sure we have as many friends in Congress now as we did then, so we may be more at risk. We're also likely to get caught up in the carbon credits/energy tax thing coming down the pike. That will be a triple whammy: the current fuel tax, user fees and an energy tax.
 
Bob, I'd be happy if they called at diner time. They called me last at 11:45PM.
 
I'm all for user fees. But to be fair lets put the whole government on a user fee basis. If you are using a government service you should pay for it. Sounds fair. So.....everyone on welfare pays for welfare, everyone who is unemployed pays for unemployment, everyone who is incarcerated pays for room and board,....oh wait ....that won't work.

So what we have with user fees is a back door tax increase selectively applied. No THANKS. I'm paying more than enough for services I don't receive already.

No user fees on ANY GOVERNMENT PROGRAM unless you are going to do it for ALL GOVERNMENT PROGRAMS.

Just my opinion

Bill
 
The problem with user fees, and the reason that the airlines for the most part would really like to see user fees implemented is that THEY currently ARE paying user fees, in many different forms. If user fees were applied across the board, as opposed to as they currently are (generally related to size of aircraft and type operation) it would put a LOT of the fee load onto General Aviation, and thus remove much of the fee load from the airlines.

THAT is what scares the hey outta me about an airline type in charge of the FAA. I sure hope this guy has his act together, and doesn't turn out to be an enemy of GA. We'll see, I reckon.

MTV
 
I have never met Randy Babbitt so, what I have to say is not directed at him personally. I flew for a major airline for more than 34 years. Randy is an airline pilot first and a major union person second. Being the president of ALPA is a full time job on top of his airline responsibilities. He would have been a MAJOR consumer of the COOL AID. He is unlikely to have had much time to devote to general aviation flying as most of us on this forum have. I doubt very much if he would have any clue whatsoever to our side of flying. The airlines spend lots of money lobbying congress to get us peons to pay waaaay more than our fair share. We have been paying in accordance with the amount of fuel that we consume for years. This seems to me to be the fairest method of all. Actually I believe that even with this method, we pay more than we consume. I for one very rarely use any of the services that the guvmnt supplies.

Keep your eyes and ears open and both hands over your behind! We have a rough 4 years ahead of us.
 
The last guy was a airline guy.

Robert A. Sturgell

After his military career, he became a flight operations supervisor and line pilot for United Airlines, flying Boeing 757s and 767s on domestic and international routes. He also practiced aviation law in the Washington, D.C. area, and served as senior policy adviser at the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).[1]

Gee, ex military, a lawyer and a airline pilot. That's great for GA.

Before him

Marion Blakey

Blakey has held four previous Presidential appointments, two of which required Senate confirmation. From 1992 to 1993, Blakey served as Administrator of the Department of Transportation's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). As the nation's leading highway safety official, she was charged with reducing deaths, injuries, and economic losses resulting from motor vehicle crashes. Prior to her service at NHTSA, she held key positions at the United States Department of Commerce, the United States Department of Education, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the White House, and the United States Department of Transportation.[2] For instance, in 1989 she was appointed as a Member of the Commission on Presidential Scholars. Prior to that, she was Deputy Assistant to the President for Public Affairs and Communications Planning at the White House. Prior to this she was director of public affairs and special assistant to the Secretary at the U.S. Department of Education. From 1982 to 1984, she was Director of Public Affairs at the National Endowment for the Humanities. Previously Ms. Blakey served as director of that agency's youth programs and in its Office of Planning and Policy Assessment.

Yep, Im sure she had the interest of GA.

In 2007, Blakey described the current National Airspace System saying, "We are at a breaking point,"[4] and throughout her tenure she pushed for the Next Generation Air Transportation System, said to improve future air traffic capacity. It was to be funded by a controversial new FAA funding structure based on user fees,

More user fee talk by the Bush Administration.......


So she leaves gov service

She became president and Chief Executive Officer of the industry trade association, Aerospace Industries Association, on Nov. 12, 2007.[13][14]

She came under criticism for accepting the job as head of the trade group which frequently lobbies for the aviation industry on government spending and policy. Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) represents firms her agency oversaw and awarded contracts to during her five-year tenure

Their the people pushing the Next Gen stuff.



So they way I see it he cant be any worse than what weve had.
 
Seems like every time they get a new head of the FAA the EAA gets them to Oshkosh somehow and rides them around in a golf cart shaking hands etc. then the new head of the FAA goes back to washington and screws G.A. a little more.
 
Personally... I think the main problem with the airlines is that they just don't charge enough.

Flying from point A to Point B should not cost less than driving a car!

Tim
 
Airline pricing is driven by whichever airline happens to be the most irrational player at the time. The deregulated airline model forces them to compete on price, (not service) to the point that they price below their cost to keep market share.

"Captain" James Randolph Babbit was actually NOT an airline pilot when he was the President of ALPA. His airline (Eastern) shut down in 1989, but that fact was lost on most people. He actually showed up at my airline when a group of us were threatening to sue ALPA for "Duty of Fair Representation" (airline types will know what that is, if you don't it doesn't matter) over a contract issue.

He offered to supply us with an attorney, paid for by ALPA. We were smart enough to tell him to go pound sand for offering the plaintiffs an attorney paid for by the defendants....After that he capitulated on behalf of the union and the contract issue was resolved.

Anyway, the story illuminates in my mind what it is we'll have if he's confirmed. He is a political type with his own agenda, and I'll bet GA isn't really a part of that. You trust him as far as you can throw him.

Something to keep in mind is that the FAA Administrator is NOT in charge of mandating user fees---it's the Presidential Administration that gives a budget proposal to Congress. The battle will be fought at that level. The FAA guy is the chief whiner with regards to budget, the guy who gets to wring his hands over a 'stable funding stream.'

We need to direct our attentions away from the speeches he gives at OSH and toward our US Senators and Representatives, when it becomes clear how they want to try to fund the FAA. The user fee idea is DOA if they think it will provide stable funding.

Andrew
 
I agree with Bill above. No user fees. Aviation as we know it would die if user fees of any type were to be instituted. There are a number of good reasons to subsidize general aviation.

Bald has me cold. He correctly interpreted my opinion. I do not feel that I pay for what I get from the government in terms of services - I do not use very many of them, but I use enough that I can see the value in what I get. Fuel taxes in a J-3?

Airline pilots are a strange breed. At the risk of oversimplification, I think that airline pilots are the most conservative (as in the government should be very small and not run anything) and the most anti-union group of folks I have ever worked with. I loved working with them, but never understood how they could be so completely unionized and so completely anti-union. Let's wait and see what Babbitt can do for us - in fact, let's wait and see what Obama is going to do before we panic.

The key to all this is to envision what would happen if we privatize all aviation services, and tax them as corporations are taxed. This may not work if you picture your big city airport as a grass field in West Virginia, which would surely be cheaper than a big city paved and regulated airport.

We could do the same with our highways. Eliminate the fuel tax and just charge tolls. Wow!

All just opinion. That's what makes this fun.
 
Now I remember who Randy was. It was a requirement that the president of ALPA work for an airline. When Eastern went west ALPA made a special change to the rules so that Randy could remain as president. You are correct Bob T. in that airline pilots are strange. I could never figure out why, as a group, they were conservative yet so pro union. I think that in general they were at both extremes. Yes, it does not matter whether the president is either republican or democrat, the objective is to screw the general aviation folks because they do not have many voices. Imagine what would happen if user fees were imposed on passenger automobiles?
 
FAA

The original idea behind collecting taxes was to pay for commonly used, essential services - like a postal system, the militia, transportation system, etc., etc. I think it was during the Nixon era that someone got the bright idea to also charge anyone who used these services . Well maybe
not the military, but certainly the postal system (no more penny postage), Amtrak raised it's prices, etc..

Of course no one pressed for doing away with the Federal or State taxes and we ended up with what was a second level of taxation. So, new user fees, if they are implemented, would be a third level of taxation, because we already pay into a general aviation fund every time we buy a gallon of avgas. And separate fees for CBP services, radio licenses and the many private services that supply our XmWx, approach plates, keep the GPS up-to-date, etc. etc. In a way that's a fourth level of user fees.

In view of all these separate charges and some people's belief that privatization is the answer - well then lets do away with Federal Taxes, give up on the idea of the government providing certain common services and pay for whatever we use when we use it. A single charge system rather than a combination of taxes and multiple layers of user fees.

On the other hand, if you think there is a need for a Federal and State governments to provide essential services, well then they should raise taxes if necessary, and do away with all user fees. The ones we are paying now and new user fees we are being threatened with.

Do I think either will happen? Not really and I believe we will see more levels of cost rather than fewer and eventually many of us will be regulated (Homeland Security comes to mind) and priced out of the game. Far as I'm concerned the tipping point is getting closer every day. Anyone on Wall street interested in a Piper Cub?
 
Dude, if the guys on Wall Street bought your Cub, they'd probably use bailout dollars and then congress would call you in and yell at you and Acorn would bus people to your house. It occurred to me tonight that it won't be long before the only people who will be allowed to amass wealth will be actors and athletes. Everybody else will have to be satisfied with what the government allows us to have.
 
Ultimately, we will regulate Wall Street, and the rest will continue down the moderate road. There will always be taxes, and some of your money will go to others.

I see GA dying, but more from the expenses of ownership and liability than from regulation/strangulation. We were very close right after 9/11, but somehow the forces of moderation got the upper hand, except for Manassas, etc.

I truly loved the guys I flew with on the airlines - but we were miles apart, philosophically. I knew we were labor, but most thought we were management. I had to listen to Limbaugh just to keep a good conversation going on those interminable BOS turns. Most pilots hated ALPA, and were quite sure we would be paid like upper management without a union. ALPA did me no favors, work-rule wise, but they are indeed the reason pilots have their own hotel room on overnights and also the reason that past airline retirees had it so good. Management has now figured out how to beat ALPA, and you now see pilots making less than school teachers, and depending on Social Security.
 
Back
Top