AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2008 - (Page 14) AOPAACTION Compiled by Kathy Dondzila What AOPA is doing to keep you flying FAA FUNDING DEBATE UP IN THE AIR C ongress passed and President Bush signed a $14.6 billion appropriations bill for the FAA for fiscal year 2008. But that doesn’t mean the FAA funding battle is over. Far from it. That’s because the Senate has yet to pass an FAA authorization bill that would set aviation taxes—and possibly user fees—for the next four years. The way things sit right now, the government’s authority to collect aviation taxes—and spend from the aviation trust fund—will expire at the end of February. And even though Congress appropriated $3.5 billion for the Airport Improvement Program, it did not give the FAA the authority to issue new contracts to actually spend any of that money on airports. “The Senate must put FAA funding at the top of its agenda this year,” said AOPA President Phil Boyer. “We can’t begin to resolve the issues of airport congestion and air traffic control modernization until the Senate passes an authorization and tax bill to complement the House FAA funding bill (H.R.2881) passed last September.” The FAA appropriations bill was rolled into the socalled omnibus funding bill for all federal agencies. Congress resorted to the omnibus bill because of disputes with the White House over the size of the budgets for various agencies and funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. As part of the omnibus appropriations bill, Congress extended the existing FAA authorization until February 29, 2008. If Congress doesn’t act by then, the federal government would have to stop collecting aviation fuel taxes and passenger ticket taxes. No new money would flow into the aviation trust fund. The FAA wouldn’t shut down, but would likely have to scale back to its core functions. U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) said that, in his opinion, “user fees are dead.” In a videotaped address to more than 400 pilots attending a recent AOPA Pilot Town Meeting in Fort Lauderdale, Nelson said that the Senate is working hard to reach final agreement on the issue of FAA funding. He reminded pilots that he had coauthored an amendment to strip user fees from S.1300, the Senate Commerce Committee bill to reauthorize the FAA budget and spending. Although the Nelson-Sununu amendment failed by just one vote, Nelson said it “signaled that user fees are dead and it signaled that they are going to be out of the final FAA reauthorization bill. When this bill gets to the floor, I don’t expect that I’ll have to offer the amendment again.” “While it’s encouraging to hear Sen. Nelson’s assessment, in politics it isn’t over until the final vote,” said AOPA President Phil Boyer. “The airlines haven’t given up on user fees and more taxes on general aviation, and you can bet their lobbyists will be buttonholing senators as soon as they’re back in Washington. “AOPA will be working even harder on Capitol Hill, and when the timing is right, we’ll be asking all of our members to weigh in with their senators.” NATIONAL ACTION FAA, Lockheed need to hear about glitches T hey’re listening, but pilots aren’t reporting. The FAA and Lockheed Martin created the toll-free hotline (888-FLTSRVC) to discover glitches pilots are experiencing with flight service and then use the information to fix them. The problem is that pilots are not AOPA PILOT • 14 • MARCH 2008 reporting their complaints or compliments through the hotline. “Last summer, calls were topping 130 to 150 a week. Now the number of complaints ranges from 10 to 30 a week, on average,” said Melissa Rudinger, AOPA vice president of regulatory affairs. “As Phil Boyer heard at a recent Pilot Town Meeting in Florida and from calls coming direct- ly to AOPA instead of the hotline, we know more than 30 pilots a week are experiencing problems with flight service. “We demanded this tollfree number as a way to help fix the flight service station (FSS) system, but it won’t be effective unless pilots start reporting what’s working and what’s not. The FAA and Lockheed can’t fix glitches they don’t know exist.” Lockheed and the FAA have assured AOPA that they are working to improve the system and want to know what problems pilots are experiencing—dropped calls, long hold times, poor briefer knowledge, or other snags. In addition to reporting on your telephone briefing experience, you can take another step to smooth the process. Download AOPA’s AFSS Tele-
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