Fired Controllers Want First Dibs At ATC Jobs

On Monday,air traffic controllers from all three major New York airports, the New York Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) -- the nation's second-busiest -- and New York Air Route Traffic Control Center -- the nation's fourth-busiest - - will meet with reporters to talk about both the serious controller shortages facing their facilities and the potential travel and safety concerns associated with having too few eyes handling planes.

The Federal Aviation Administration itself anticipates a controller shortage nationwide of up to 50 percent in the next 10 years. Timing is particularly critical given upcoming votes in the House and Senate Appropriations Committees authorizing funding for the FAA and other transportation-related agencies. A bipartisan group of Senate committee members have asked their colleagues to give $14 million to FAA to begin the critical hiring process.

What About PATCO?

But Ron Taylor says the answer is in plain sight: Rehire PATCO controllers. In fact, Taylor, president of the fired controllers' union, says he has 3,500 highly qualified air traffic controllers ready to go back to work with a minimum of training. And Taylor says he plans to file an injunction against hiring any other controllers until all the PATCO members are offered their old jobs back.

"We're not lepers," Taylor told Aero-News. "They've already rehired 846 PATCO controllers."

Taylor said he's fed up with complaints that there aren't enough controllers to go around when his members are languishing in jobs outside aviation. "These guys and NATCA are crying the blues, but they won't even ask us [to return]."

Taylor said he would file for an injunction in one of two class action suits involving fired controllers -- one in Tennessee and one in Texas. There are several hundred smaller suits still pending from the mass firing of controllers in the 1980s, most of them accusing the FAA of age discrimination in failing to hire them back.

FMI: www.patco81.com