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Speech

Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing & Urban Development

Good morning, Madam Chairman [Murray]. I am pleased to testify before you, Senator Bond, and the members of the subcommittee regarding our budget request for 2009.

As the operators and regulators of the National Airspace System, we believe that our 2009 budget request of 14.6 billion dollars will provide adequate funding to support all our critical priorities — the priorities on which the flying public and the taxpayer depend. Especially in light of the activity we’ve all witnessed in the past several weeks, we take very seriously our role to instill public confidence in the system. I empathize with the flying public about delays and congestion. The sheer inconvenience of an unreliable experience remains a focus for us. I believe that this budget submission will help us address these very needs.

Madam Chairman, this committee has rightly maintained that safety must be the FAA’s primary concern, and we are being particularly aggressive in doing so, on our runways especially. Last year, only eight runway incursions involved commercial aircraft. That’s eight in more than 61 million operations. Even though the numbers are small, we are pushing to make a small number even smaller still. Just six months ago, I issued a Call to Action, a challenge to our industry partners that we need to step up our actions to make runways safe. Together, using the partnerships that are critical to the backbone of safety on which this relies, we are answering that call.

We’ve had an incredibly positive response. The airlines and the airports have really stepped up to the plate in terms of focusing on quick turnaround solutions that have the potential to significantly improve safety. The call to action starts with things as simple as improving the markings and paint on taxiways at hundreds of airports around the country. That’s already taken place at 74 of the 75 large airports that were mandated to do so, with more than 300 other smaller airports committed voluntarily to making the upgrades.

We also are using technology, specifically, runway status lights, to make a difference as well. We’re testing them at DFW, San Diego, Los Angeles and Boston. The technology is intuitive — a series of lights positioned strategically that tell the pilot or the driver of a ground vehicle that it’s safe to proceed. Red means stop, and it means safety. The bottom line:  they work. They’ve already averted one potential tragedy at DFW. Our ’09 request includes funding for a national rollout, and I hope you will support this program.

We also are pushing forward with another area that is of special interest to you:  NextGen. In many ways, the linchpin for NextGen is the buy-in from stakeholders — industry and our employees. There will be no surprises as new technology and procedures are put in place. As far as the critics who’ve been saying, “There is no NextGen” are concerned, that couldn’t be further from the reality of it. We have a plan in place and participation from stakeholders and at all levels from seven different governmental organizations, including the White House. We have regular meetings to make sure that participation and collaboration are still in operation.

To be ready as our controller workforce retires, we have a major recruiting effort under way. Our most recent job posting drew more than 4,500 applications. We hired more than 1,800 controllers in ’07 and we’ll hire over 1,800 more in ’08.

I must underscore that our 2009 request provides strong support for our staff hiring goals, safety and capital programs and NextGen activities. With respect to AIP, I understand the concerns about the funding level, but our program proposal is designed to strategically target federal dollars to the airports where they will have the most impact. Further, the proposed PFC increase will make another potential revenue source of 1.2 billion dollars available to the airport community.

I’d also like to take the opportunity to provide this subcommittee with some observations on the activities of the last several weeks. As I said at the outset, the delays that have inconvenienced the flying public are of great concern to me.

With that said, critics of the FAA rightfully hold us accountable for safety lapses, as in the case of Southwest Airlines. But now it seems critics berate us for doing the job, as in the case of American’s MD-80s.

What is being lost in the rhetoric is that the system does depend on collaboration and partnership with industry to get the job done. The benefits of partnership between regulatory agencies and those they regulate were pointed out and promoted by a Commission on Aviation Safety and Security led by then Vice President Gore.

The critics who push to abandon partnership and voluntary disclosure programs are shortsighted. It is the oversight and partnership approach that has delivered us the safety record we enjoy today. But we know that the system is not perfect. We are not being complacent about it. Our challenge is to improve continuously upon our safety record, and to do it with industry. If we return to the gotcha approach of decades past, we risk driving safety issues underground. Hidden data obscures trends. Undiscovered trends are the precursor to accidents. Silence breeds catastrophe. And I’m not willing to accept that.

I sympathize and apologize for the stress last week’s cancellations caused the flying public. It's my job to ensure they are safe in the air, and that’s what our agency did. That said, we are going to look at all aspects of what occurred last week to try and minimize the chances of such a wholesale disruption of services.

Thank you for your time, and I’d be pleased to answer any questions you may have.