A coalition of aviation groups, including the American\nAssociation of Airport Executives (AAAE)\/U.S. Contract Tower Association\n(USCTA) and the National Association of State Aviation Officials (NASAO), today\nwrote leaders of the Senate and House Appropriations Committees to reassert the\nvital role that contract air traffic control towers play in improving safety\nand saving taxpayer dollars. In a letter sent today, the aviation groups made a\nsimple request that language be included in a Federal Aviation Administration\n(FAA) appropriations bill to ensure contract towers can continue to operate without\ninterruption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe FAA Contract Tower Program has provided cost-effective\nand essential air traffic safety services for over three decades. Currently,\n256 smaller airports in 46 states participate in the program,\u201d wrote USCTA\nExecutive Director J. Spencer Dickerson and the leaders of eight other aviation\ngroups. \u201cTogether these 256 towers handle approximately 28 percent of all air\ntraffic control tower (ATCT) aircraft operations in the U.S. but only account\nfor about 14 percent of FAA\u2019s overall budget allotted to ATCT tower operations\nand save FAA and taxpayers approximately $200 million per year. More\nimportantly, the safety and efficiency record of the FAA Contract Tower Program\nhas been validated numerous times by the DOT Inspector General, as well as by\nFAA safety audits.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are numerous benefits of the Contract Tower Program, a\nsuccessful 37-year partnership of government and the aviation industry. Among\nother benefits, contract towers:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Save taxpayers approximately $200 million each year;<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Enhance aviation safety at airports that otherwise would not\nhave a control tower;<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Help airports in retaining and developing commercial air\nservice and general aviation;<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Connect smaller and rural airports to the national air\ntransportation system;<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Provide significant support for military readiness and\nnational security operations (47 percent of all military operations at civilian\nairports in the United States occur at FAA contract towers); and<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Play an essential role in relief and recovery efforts during\nand after hurricanes, wildfires and other natural disasters in the United\nStates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the House and Senate Appropriations Committees work on an\nFAA appropriations bill that will set the agency\u2019s funding for FY 2020, the\nletter requests language ensuring that the contract towers are fully funded at\n$170 million. That proposal, which has strong bipartisan support in both\nchambers of Congress, simply ensures contract towers are fully funded from\nexisting accounts and does not require an additional appropriation of limited\ntaxpayer dollars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The letter was sent today to the Republican and Democratic\nleaders of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees and the respective\nTransportation, Housing and Urban Development and Related Agencies\nSubcommittees. Thanks to the efforts of these leaders, the program has enjoyed\nstrong bipartisan support and funding in previous fiscal years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In addition to USCTA, the letter was signed by leaders of\nthe Regional Airline Association, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association,\nthe National Business Aviation Administration, the National Air Transportation\nAssociation, Airports Council International\u2014North American, the Air Traffic\nControl Association and the Cargo Airline Association.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A coalition of aviation groups, including the American Association of Airport Executives (AAAE)\/U.S. Contract Tower Association (USCTA) and the National Association of State Aviation Officials (NASAO), today wrote leaders of the Senate and House Appropriations Committees to reassert the vital role that contract air traffic control towers play in improving safety and saving taxpayer dollars. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[115],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-national-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12139"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12139\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12140,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12139\/revisions\/12140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}