Prepared Statement of Administrator Kip Hawley
Assistant Secretary of the Transportation Security Administration
Before the U.S. Senate
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, The Federal Workforce, And The District of Columbia
March 5, 2007
Good afternoon Chairman Akaka, Ranking Senator Voinovich, and members of the Committee.
I have submitted testimony for the record. Since time is short, I will be to the point.
There will be a serious negative security impact if the labor provision adopted by the Committee, or the alternative pending amendment, becomes law.
Both proposals would dismantle the innovative human capital authorities given to TSA by the Congress after 9/11 and replace it with a 1970’s-era personnel system that is unsuited to TSA’s real-time security mission.
Therefore, the President’s senior advisors will recommend a veto if these or similar provisions are presented in the final bill.
While the human capital issues are significant, the security issues are urgent and must be addressed first.
TSA operates in real-time, high-intensity environment where seconds matter and the stakes could not be higher. We count on our TSOs, among other things, to deter and stop an attack that may be in preparation or in progress.
Our people face these scenarios at over 400 airports across the nation everyday.
In this world, the so-called dots referred to by the 9/11 Commission are not obvious and connecting them in time is not assured.
When the safety of the public is on the line, taking an old, rejected solution and putting a new cover on it and then making it law without full examination can have alarming unintended consequences in the real world.
That is the case with these provisions and why I must speak out clearly about the uncomfortable reality of increased risk brought on by them. I briefed Senators last week on classified specifics of these concerns.
In a bill that uses the name of the 9/11 Commission, security must come first.
Security does come first at TSA, and all of the improvements we have implemented in the last 18 months for our workforce acknowledge the capability we already have in our TSOs and seeks to prepare and engage them as security professionals.
TSOs reported for work on August 10th and, without prior notice, trained for, and implemented the most extensive security changes rolled-out since 9/11 – and TSOs did it in real-time, literally live on TV.
Proponents of collective bargaining for TSOs point out that any labor agreement would include provisions for emergencies. But it is not just about emergencies, it is about what they do every day.
TSA’s mission requires that its officers be pro-active, that TSOs constantly change what they do and where they do it. They are required to flex to different places in the airport to meet suddenly changing security and operating needs.
A system that sets up outside arbitrators to review these constant changes after the fact – without the benefit of classified information that explains the rationale – sets up a morass of wasted time that detracts from the focus on security.
Today, if a TSO is not making the grade, that individual can be taken off the checkpoint immediately.
Under collective bargaining, that person could be screening passengers for months before the process finally runs its course.
TSOs are tested frequently on their bomb-detection skills and those who do better, get paid better.
We all know that incentives drive performance.
It doesn’t make sense to drop that for a system that carves out our front-line TSOs and then eliminates their incentive to excel.
How does it benefit passenger security to make the TSO not accountable for the security outcome?
We all wish 9/11 never happened. We all wish the threat of terror would go away. We all wish we could go back and jump on airplanes the way we used to.
But 9/11 happened, and we know it did not start in 2001, nor will it end there, nor in our lifetimes.
That is the uncomfortable truth.
- We know of terrorist interest in attacking the U.S. aviation system,
- We know of attack planning, we know of attack training, and
- We know of terrorist movement, including in our direction.
That is the uncomfortable truth.
Taking our TSO’s, who today flex and adjust to meet real-time needs, and force-fitting them into a creaky old system, would have far-reaching negative security consequences.
That is the uncomfortable truth.
Going backwards to a system that adds bargaining, barriers and bureaucracy to an agency on whom travelers depend for their security can be characterized as many things, but it does not improve security.
And that is the uncomfortable truth.
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