NATCA Bookshelf

FULL BACKGROUND ISSUE Air traffic controller staffing has been a concern for many years. It reached a crisis level in 2015 and despite recent progress, it remains a crisis. The National Airspace System (NAS) has reached a 29-year low in the number of certified professional controllers (CPC). Controller staffing has fallen nearly 10 percent since 2011, and a significant percentage of the certified controller workforce remains eligible to retire (more than 17 percent). Stop-and-go funding for the FAA has made this problem worse, with sequestration forcing the FAA to suspend hiring and shutter its training Academy for most of 2013. If this staffing crisis continues, the FAA will be hard-pressed to maintain current capacity, let alone modernize the system and expand it for new users, such as commercial space and Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS). MESSAGE NATCA believes the FAA must take a holistic, collaborative approach to resolving the staffing crisis. We are committed to working with all stakeholders to develop a permanent, sustainable solution. NATCA would be deeply concerned with any action that could impede efforts to properly staff the NAS with CPCs, including the potential for future furloughs or another closure of the training Academy. Two years ago, we took a step in the right direction to resolving this staffing crisis when Congress passed the FAA Extension, Safety, and Security Act of 2016, which improved the FAA's hiring process by streamlining the hiring of controllers who have prior experience, as well as veterans and CTI students. Additionally, as part of the government funding bill passed on March 23, NATCA was able to work with members of Congress to secure two important provisions: (1) a provision that allows the FAA to reinstate its Retired Military Controller (RMC) program; and (2) a provision that helps address the staffing crisis at New York TRACON (N90) and New York Air Route Traffic Control Center (ZNY) by allowing the FAA, after consultation with NATCA, to post vacancy announcements for these two facilities within the local commuting area. Both of these provisions take a step in the right direction, but there is much work still to be done. NATCA recommends the following actions to continue alleviating the staffing shortage: • The FAA should routinely post vacancy announcements for experienced air traffic controllers and should continue to hire as many experienced controllers as are qualified. • The FAA should continue posting, at least annually, an all-sources open announcement for non-experienced candidates, many of whom come from CTI schools, the military, and other aviation-related professions. • The FAA should hire as many employees as maximum throughput would allow at the FAA Academy in Oklahoma City. • The FAA should continue to streamline the hiring process, specifically easing the bottlenecks and bureaucratic delays in HR, security, and medical. • The FAA should discontinue its use of finance-driven staffing numbers and replace them with the operationally- derived CPC staffing targets, as reflected in its Priority Placement Tool, for the FAA's annual Air Traffic Controller Workforce Plan (CWP) and all future reports. In addition to these hiring improvements, after many years of advocacy by NATCA, the FAA has finally put in place a less bureaucratic and more expeditious transfer policy for current FAA controllers that encourages experienced controllers at lower level facilities to voluntarily move up (at their own expense) to busier, more complex facilities. While this alone continued on next page 45

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