And Another One Bites The Dust At TSA…

Well, late last week Erroll Southers withdrew his name from consideration as President Obama’s pick to head the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). This really does not come as much of a surprise considering the increased political and media scrutiny surrounding airline security in the wake of the Northwest scare at Christmas and the fact that Republicans continued to pound away at Souther’s experience as a top lieutenant, not the top dog, while at LAWA. So, one of the most important positions within the federal government is once again without its chief. Now the question is, who will take over the reigns. Current Acting Administrator Gail Rossides, who was the deputy under Kip Hawley, continues to steer the TSA ship until a new nomination is offered and confirmed by the Senate. Rossides has quietly done a good job, a view shared by many D.C. insiders, during this transition and will surely be considered for the permanent position. But who President Obama selects to replace Southers as his nominee is still very much up in the air.

NATA will certainly be pushing for a nominee that has at least some, hopefully more, experience with general aviation. This is always a tough request since TSA handles security for all modes of transportation, let alone one subset of one sector, aviation. But, the fact is TSA spends a considerable amount of time and resources on aviation, including GA, so it is certainly fair to advocate for a leader familiar with GA and its breadth of operational activity. The White House is already quickly churning the nomination machine at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue so I do not expect a long wait for a new nominee to be announced. 

As soon as we found out who, NATA will certainly alert its membership and provide some feedback as to the impact this nominee could have on America’s aviation businesses.

Have a great week! — ERB

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