DRAFT

April [ ], 2008                                                                                         

The Honorable James Oberstar
United States House of Representatives
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Mr. Chairman,

We the undersigned travel industry buyers, suppliers and distributers write to applaud your leadership in investigating the effectiveness of Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) oversight of air carriers and in conducting a critically important hearing today. We believe aircraft maintenance lapses recently reported do not represent an airline problem per se, but rather, the issue is grounded in a culturally dysfunctional FAA that has lost its regulatory and oversight bearings.

When exposed to an increasingly unforgiving marketplace, some airlines will subordinate passenger safety to other commercial priorities, just to survive. That’s why there is a federal regulator.

Aircraft maintenance and passenger safety were never “on-the-table” in past airline cost-cutting environments. The recent explosion of aircraft maintenance outsourcing to third-world countries demonstrates there are now no “sacred cows” in many airlines’ Board Rooms. The FAA’s staffing levels and oversight model have not kept up; its culture has blinded it to its true mission to protect the flying public.

In 1996 Congress ordered the FAA to abandon its duel mission of regulating the industry and promoting it. As U.S. Transportation Secretary Federico Pena said at the time in support of this change, "I am urging that Congress change the FAA charter to give it a single, primary mission, safety and only safety."  

More than a decade later, FAA has failed to implement what Congress directed it to do. “Exhibit A” is FAA administrators’ current practice of referring to airlines as their “customers.” “Exhibit B” is FAA’s official Mission and Vision Statement. It reads, “Our vision is to improve the safety and efficiency of aviation, while being responsive to our customers and accountable to the public.”

It is said that 99.9% of all mission statements are so bland and uncontroversial that it's hard to argue with them. In most cases, particularly with government entities, it's about not living up to the mission statement. This is one of the rare instances in which a government agency's mission statement itself is part of the problem.

Mr. Chairman, this issue is so very serious, as we are dealing with lives. Even the soundest FAA reform legislation could be rendered hollow if implementation is turned over to what is often referred to in government and travel industry circles as a “failed agency.” We believe it is imperative at this time that a top-down review of the FAA be undertaken to review its mission, organizational structure, funding, culture and systemic problems. We encourage your Committee to consider a directive to the National Academy of Sciences, Transportation Research Board, to perform such a thorough review of the FAA.”

Sincerely,

[Signatory]
[Signatory]
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