What the Trump administration's plan to privatize air traffic control might mean for Alaska

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump's pledge to privatize the nation's air traffic control system Monday stoked long-held Alaska anxieties over the impact such a change could have on the state's noncommercial flyers.

Any official change to move air traffic controllers from a federal agency to a private corporation would have to come from Congress. But the idea of creating a nonprofit board to oversee the 30,000 federal workers, instead of the Federal Aviation Administration, has been around for decades, and support from the president could bolster its likelihood of moving through Congress.

Trump's announcement Monday gave rise to some long-held Alaska fears: that privatizing the program would give too much control to commercial airlines, leading to untenable costs, long lines and lessened safety for other pilots.

Alaska's sole congressman, Republican Don Young, was involved in the committee passage of a bill to privatize the air traffic control system in early 2016, pushing to carve out Alaska from several provisions. Alaska would be more affected than any other state by a major overhaul in the FAA's air traffic control system, Young has said.

The House bill made it out of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, under Chairman Bill Shuster, R-Pennsylvania, but did not advance to the House floor. Shuster was at Trump's White House announcement Monday and was thanked by the president for his efforts.

Shuster is expected to introduce a new bill soon, according to Young's spokesman Matt Shuckerow. The House and Senate will hold hearings on FAA reauthorization this week, and the House plans to move the new bill through the transportation committee at the end of this month, Shuckerow said.

"We can't become complacent. While other countries now have aviation systems that feature the most modern technology, America's air traffic controllers still have to manage airplanes with paper strips and WWII era technology," Shuster said in a statement Monday. Shuster touted support for Trump's reform recommendations and said that he would continue working with the administration to "continue moving forward with a transformational FAA reform bill."

In a hearing last month where House transportation committee members discussed reform of the FAA, Young said he doesn't generally support privatization but he's willing to consider recommendations for change.

"As long as Alaska is taken care of and their need for general aviation and not being run by larger airlines, then I'll be somewhat interested in what we're doing," Young said.

As far as he is concerned, Young said, the air traffic controllers are the best part of the FAA, which is otherwise beset by unnecessary bureaucratic layers.

Currently, the air traffic control system is largely funded through taxes on aviation gas and jet fuel. That system allows costs to be distributed based on time and weight in the air. The new system would eliminate taxpayer funding (and tax collection) and focus on an as-yet-undetermined user fee.

Trump's announcement Monday gained broad support: Passenger advocates, pilot unions and airline and cargo companies are all on board with the plan. The president said Monday that his plan would "maintain support for rural communities and small airports."

But some in Alaska worry it won't be enough.

Adam White, who manages government and legislative affairs for the Alaska Airmen Association, said the announcement was no surprise but he was still disappointed.

White agreed that the system needs modernization. Controllers still organize flights using little strips of paper that come out of a dot matrix printer, he said.

But he cautioned that not all privatization stories are positive. He pointed in particular to systems across Europe and in Australia, where he said the general aviation communities were negatively affected by programs that focused on commercial air travel.

Elsewhere, noncommercial pilots end up at the end of the line, considered last in airport efficiency.

White said that the makeup of the privatized air traffic control system's board of directors would be too heavily "weighted towards the airline interests."

The White House's plan did make changes to previous plans for the nonprofit board that would govern air traffic controllers. Instead of seats assigned to airlines, unions and general aviation, "no group should have even the appearance of influence over the board," according to the White House.

The secretary of transportation would select eight members from lists provided by five nominating groups, including airlines, unions, general aviation, airports and the Transportation Department.

Though the National Business Aviation Association would have a place in picking board members under the White House proposal, the group is still firmly opposed to the plan, said CEO Ed Bolen.

"We are deeply concerned with the president's call for ATC privatization — a concept that has long been a goal of the big airlines. No one should confuse ATC modernization with ATC privatization — the two are very different concepts," Bolen said.

John Parrott, manager of the Ted Stevens International Airport in Anchorage, said he was heartened to see changes to the makeup of the board in the president's plan, which he felt was less weighted toward commercial airlines than efforts in the past. The president's plan includes a representative for airports.

Changes are necessary, Parrott said: The FAA has struggled to implement the "Nextgen" air traffic control system upgrade. But the manager said he wasn't sure that privatizing the system would necessarily solve that problem.

White, meanwhile, argued against the White House plan to replace a fuel tax-run system with one based on user fees. White and others expressed concern that a per-contact fee could encourage pilots to fly without using air traffic control guidance, lessening the safety of air travel.

Under Shuster's bill last year, Young secured provisions to save the Essential Air Service and exempt air taxis in Alaska and Hawaii from paying user fees.

Unions were assured their contracts would remain in place under Trump's plan.

"A lot of Alaskans are rather paranoid, but that doesn't mean somebody's not out to get us," White said, noting concern that the union no longer seemed bothered by the recommended makeup of the privatized board.