Union seeks to block FAA contract proposal

With the clock ticking, National Air Traffic Controllers Association officials are scrambling for legislative action to keep the Federal Aviation Administration's final offer for a new labor contract from becoming official in early June.

Contract negotiations ground to a halt Wednesday after the agency declared that it could not resolve the $600 million difference between the two sides, sending its final proposal to Congress as required by law. Lawmakers have 60 days to intervene before the offer becomes final.

In a joint statement released Thursday two senior Republican members of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee argued that a unilaterally imposed contract could result in a mass employee exodus and said that another 30 to 90 days of negotiations toward binding arbitration would be preferred.

"[T]his is not a time for Congress to sit idle and simply allow a 60-day window to elapse so the FAA's final offer is imposed," Reps. Steven LaTourette, R-Ohio, and Frank LoBiondo, R-N.J., wrote. "This could put the safety of the flying public at jeopardy."

FAA's final proposal, which includes $1.9 billion in savings over five years, was submitted to Congress late Wednesday, giving the agency 60 days before it is legally permitted to impose the conditions of the offer.

Identical legislation in the House (H.R. 4755) and Senate (S. 2201) would amend the law governing the negotiations and prohibit FAA from implementing a new contract without authorizing legislation from Congress. If the bill clears both lawmaking bodies and is signed by President Bush by June 5, negotiations would go to binding arbitration should Congress fail to authorize FAA's offer.

While the bill has gained the support of the Democratic leadership in both legislative bodies, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., just more than a quarter of the House bill's 181 co-sponsors are Republicans. The Senate bill has received support exclusively from 28 Democrats.

The air traffic controllers union, with a final proposal offering the agency $1.4 billion in savings, maintains that FAA never intended to negotiate a collective bargaining agreement. The union also plans to file a lawsuit forcing the agency to take the feud to the Federal Service Impasses Panel, which normally handles such deadlocks.

FAA Administrator Marion Blakey said on Wednesday that an employee at the end of the agency's proposed five-year contract would be receive an average of $187,000 a year, including pay and benefits, up from the current $166,000 average.

Over the five years of the contract, incentive pay for controllers working in areas that are difficult to staff would be eliminated along with controller in charge pay, which gives controllers acting as supervisors a 10 percent premium in pay, Blakey said.

The proposal would allow new hires to make $127,000 a year in salary and benefits after five years, Blakey said.

Agency officials said it is unfortunate that a voluntary agreement was unreachable and are chagrined at accusations that they copped out of negotiating by declaring an impasse.

FAA spokesman Geoff Basye said the agency does "not support changing the rules at the 11th hour" and the proposed legislation sending the contract dispute to binding arbitration without congressional intervention would have significant budgetary implications.

Basye also disputed that there would be a mass flight of the agency's air traffic controllers over the next five years -- as alleged by the union and some members of Congress -- if the agency's contract proposal is imposed unilaterally.

He acknowledged that many of the air traffic controllers hired by the agency after President Ronald Regan fired more than 10,000 in 1982 for striking are approaching retirement age, but maintained that the agency has a clearly defined workforce plan for replacing those workers.

"We do not expect a mass exodus," Basye said. "Where are they going to go to get the kind of money they are getting paid right now?"

In a related matter, FAA has filed an unfair labor practice complaint against its second-largest union, the Professional Airways Systems Specialists. The union sent an agency offer to its members for ratification.

The union does not expect the offer to be accepted. The agency alleged that there was no discussion on the proposal and it was presented to the union members as a take it or leave it agreement, constituting an unfair labor practice.