Phil Boyer, president
of the 404,000-member Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, will
tell members of the House Aviation subcommittee tomorrow that user
fees are the wrong way to fund the Federal Aviation Administration
(FAA). He’ll tell them that user fees could undermine
aviation safety, that the “funding crisis” at the FAA
is artificial, and that the current practice of charging an excise
tax on fuel is the best way for general aviation pilots to pay
their share of air traffic control costs.
General aviation is coming off of its safest year since
record-keeping began in 1938. Yet, Boyer will tell Congress,
adopting user fees could cause pilots to avoid the many safety
services offered by the FAA. “For years, AOPA has worked with
the FAA, through our Air Safety Foundation to continually lower the
accident rate for general aviation. A piecemeal system of fees and
charges gives pilots a direct financial incentive to avoid using
the safety features and programs provided within the National
Airspace System.”
In his prepared remarks, Boyer will remind the lawmakers that
the air transportation system is vital to the U.S. economy, and
make the case that at least 25% of the costs to operate the FAA
should be supported by general tax revenues.
“When Congress
created the Airport and Airway Trust Fund in 1970, it did not
expect the trust fund to finance FAA’s entire budget,”
Boyer will tell Congress. “In the 1980s, the general fund
contributed about 45% of the FAA’s budget. By the end of the
1990s, this had decreased to 29%. For the last five years, the
general fund support as ranged from 0% to 24%. Considering the
importance of a healthy aviation system to the nation and the role
FAA plays in national security, this wide variation in support
should not be allowed to continue and a 25% general fund
contribution to the FAA’s spending should be
established.”
He will also tell the members of Congress that individual
general aviation pilots who use aircraft for personal or business
use are the only segment of aviation to pay for the aviation excise
taxes out of their own pockets. And he’ll remind the
subcommittee members that excise tax is a very efficient way for
the government to collect revenue for the Aviation Trust Fund
– much more efficient than collecting user fees would be.
“Collecting the current aviation excise taxes is extremely
efficient with a low cost of collection. During the last debate on
aviation taxes and fees in the late 1990s, the Internal Revenue
Service reported that in only cost $1.7 million to collect over
$5.5 billion in excise tax revenue – a mere .001% cost by the
government to collect. Collecting user fees would require a huge
new accounting bureaucracy with a much higher cost to collect the
bees because of the complexity of such a system. The reality of
such a system is more money would need to be collected simply to
break even.”
An AOPA member quoted in Boyer’s remarks goes even
further. “I believe that this excise tax is a win-win
situation – it is efficient for the federal government to
administer, it helps pay for the NAS even on those flights when I
don’t use any of its services.”
Another AOPA member
quoted notes the dampening effect user fees could have on small
businesses that use light aircraft to support their business.
“If additional costs were imposed on the use of my airplane
through a user fee-based system, it would limit severely our
ability to grow and ultimately our ability to survive.”
“AOPA has shown a commitment to reducing the costs
of services utilized by the general aviation community and at the
same time looked for ways to improve safety by enhancing the
quality of FAA services,” Boyer’s testimony says,
citing the competitive sourcing for flight service stations,
elimination of redundant ground navigation aids, nighttime closure
of low-volume control towers, and transition to the space-based
GPS/WAAS navigation system, which ultimately will cost much less to
operate and maintain than current ground-based navigation aids.
And Boyer will point out that general aviation is not what
drives FAA’s costs, noting that, “A National Airspace
System designed solely for general aviation would look vastly
different and cost much less than the current system.”