Big sis strikes again: TSA shuts door on private airport screening program

[East_TN_Patriot]

TSA shuts door on private airport screening program - CNN.com

TSA shuts door on private airport screening program

A program that allows airports to replace government screeners with private screeners is being brought to a standstill, just a month after the Transportation Security Administration said it was "neutral" on the program.

TSA chief John Pistole said Friday he has decided not to expand the program beyond the current 16 airports, saying he does not see any advantage to it.

Though little known, the Screening Partnership Program allowed airports to replace government screeners with private contractors who wear TSA-like uniforms, meet TSA standards and work under TSA oversight. Among the airports that have "opted out" of government screening are San Francisco and Kansas City.

The push to "opt out" gained attention in December amid the fury over the TSA's enhanced pat downs, which some travelers called intrusive.

Rep. John Mica, a Republican from Florida, wrote a letter encouraging airports to privatize their airport screeners, saying they would be more responsive to the public.

At that time, the TSA said it neither endorsed nor opposed private screening.

"If airports chose this route, we are going to work with them to do it," a TSA spokesman said in late December.

But on Friday, the TSA denied an application by Springfield-Branson Airport in Missouri to privatize its checkpoint workforce, and in a statement, Pistole indicated other applications likewise will be denied.

"I examined the contractor screening program and decided not to expand the program beyond the current 16 airports as I do not see any clear or substantial advantage to do so at this time," Pistole said.

He said airports that currently use contractor screening will continue to be allowed to.

Pistole said he has been reviewing TSA policies with the goal of helping the agency "evolve into a more agile, high-performance organization."

Told of the change Friday night, Mica said he intends to launch an investigation and review the matter.

"It's unimaginable that TSA would suspend the most successfully performing passenger screening program we've had over the last decade," Mica said Friday night. "The agency should concentrate on cutting some of the more than 3,700 administrative personnel in Washington who concocted this decision, and reduce the army of TSA employees that has ballooned to more than 62,000."

"Nearly every positive security innovation since the beginning of TSA has come from the contractor screening program," Mica said.

A union for Transportation Security Administration employees said it supported the decision to halt the program.

"The nation is secure in the sense that the safety of our skies will not be left in the hands of the lowest-bidder contractor, as it was before 9/11," said John Gage, president of the American Federation of Government Employees. "We applaud Administrator Pistole for recognizing the value in a cohesive federalized screening system and work force."

Advocates of private screeners say it is easier to discipline and replace under-performing private screeners than government ones.

But Congress members have differed over the effectiveness of private screeners.

Mica said tests show that private screeners perform "statistically significantly better" than government screeners in tests of airport checkpoints. But the Government Accountability Office says it "did not notice any difference" during covert checkpoint testing in 2007. Both groups failed to find concealed bomb components, the GAO said.

Test results are not publicly disclosed.

On Friday, Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the ranking member on the House Homeland Security Committee, lauded Pistole's decision.

"Ending the acceptance of new applications for the program makes sense from a budgetary and counter-terrorism perspective," he said in a statement.

[mav]

This has nothing to do with counter-terrorism. Gotta protect those government union jobs.

[leroy]

This has nothing to do with counter-terrorism. Gotta protect those government union jobs.

Bingo!!! You hit the nail exactly on the head. The biggest problem "sis" and company may have for the next two years is keeping "em on the job if the congress starts budget cutting. My guess is that they will be unemployed after the 2012 election and that contractors, will, indeed take their place. I see that as a good thing.

Keep up the good work.

leroy

[daddyo]

The government KNOWS it can't compete with the private sector, so the only thing left is for them to strong-arm free enterprise into submission.

[East_TN_Patriot]

I agree. It's not just union jobs, though. It's also about power - maintaining it and expanding it. Anytime you get a new government agency, you see a consistent effort to expand the authority of that agency, which makes it a larger part of the government bureaucracy. This helps assure its permanence. Government agencies are literally like parasitic creatures that are born, grow, try to climb the food chain, and fight for the ability to survive. This is the reason Jefferson said, "The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground."

A couple of other quotes:

"There is in the nature of government an impatience of control that disposes those invested with power to look with an evil eye upon all external attempts to restrain or direct its operations. This has its origin in the love of power. Representatives of the people are not superior to the people themselves." - Alexander Hamilton - Federalist Paper No.15, 1787.

"Since the general civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpation." - James Madison - 1788

I won't go into the social theories of Max Weber or Talcott Parsons and their discussions of bureaucracy, but they said pretty much the same thing in a very long drawn-out academic format.