FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012
Floor Speech
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Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I wish to thank the distinguished chairman of the Commerce Committee for all that he said. I really appreciate working with him. Clearly, because of 23 extensions, you know this was a hard bill to pass.
Since 2007, we have been trying to reauthorize the FAA and particularly increase aviation safety and put our NextGen air traffic control system in place. That has been the primary moving force. But, as is often the case, it is other issues that have come to the forefront and caused the delay after delay after delay process in passing this bill. We did pass it through the Senate and now have come out with a conference report between the House and Senate.
So I really first have to say thank you for the leadership of Senator Rockefeller, which has been quiet and effective and letting the different Members with different interests, of which there were many on this bill, have their say--and he was very calm throughout the process--because in the end we all know that none of us are dictators, none of us are the sole arbiters of what comes out of the Senate. We are a body of 100. We have colleagues on the other side who are 435. So obviously some people are going to have to give in certain areas. But what is good about the bill before us today is that the major principles have been addressed and the people who were most affected by those have been able to see the big picture that we needed to address in this bill, that we give our airports the ability to grow, expand, and repair with the aviation trust fund, which the passage of this bill will do. It will be in a stable environment because we have 4 years after this bill is passed.
I thank the chairman and all who have worked on this bill. As everyone knows, the repeated use of short-term extensions does not allow for the long-term planning that is needed on the big projects, such as NextGen, the air traffic control system that will be based on satellites or the airport improvements that are so important for our smooth aviation system to function.
So what we are doing today is asking the Senate to pass the conference report the House has already passed. When we pass it, which is my hope today, it will go to the President for signature, and it will provide that clear, stable way forward for our airports and the FAA to operate and make the sound fiscal investments in ensuring that we have a good and seamless system.
First, the bill does improve aviation safety, including the development of a plan to reduce runway incursions and operational errors, along with significant safety improvements for helicopter emergency medical service operators and their patients.
The bill modernizes our antiquated air traffic control system and moves us one step closer to a more efficient and effective use of our national air space. Specifically, it focuses on advancing the next-generation air transportation system that we call NextGen, and it improves the management practices and oversight of the agency in the modernization effort.
When fully implemented, NextGen will fundamentally transform air traffic control from a ground-based radar system to a satellite-based system that uses global positioning navigation and surveillance digital communications and more accurate weather services. It is our belief that most of the other countries in the world have NextGen already, but America has the biggest aviation transportation system in the world, and therefore, when we come up to speed, it will make the seamless air traffic control system globally better.
Some people will say: Well, NextGen--what does it mean? Well, it is going to open more airspace for our airplanes' use, both scheduled and general aviation. It will reduce delays because we are going to have better scheduling. We are going to have more accurate capabilities to schedule, and therefore it will open more airspace for use by our general aviation as well as our scheduled carriers. As we know, our scheduled carriers will be growing in the future. They are restructuring and trying to accommodate us. But more and more people and bigger populations are going to produce more need for aviation traffic.
Special attention is given to the acceleration certification planning and implementation of critical NextGen technologies. We have established in the bill clear deadlines for the adoption of technology and navigational procedures which will allow for a more precise and fuel-efficient use of our national airspace.
This conference report also moves forward initiatives associated with the integration of the unmanned aircraft system--the UAS--into the national airspace. We are seeing now more and more applications of unmanned aircraft, and it is going to increase.
We are looking at border security using UAV research, law enforcement, firefighting, just to name a few. There are going to be more and more uses for unmanned aerial vehicles to be able to do the surveillance and photographing that have taken helicopter pilots and small general aviation and even large aircraft to do in the past. So our bill begins to have a process for our air traffic control system to accommodate these UAVs.
Finally, the bill finds compromise in several difficult areas. Chairman Rockefeller has mentioned several of those. The Ronald Reagan Washington National Perimeter Rule, the air carriage of lithium batteries, and small-community air service are among the compromises that were reached in this bill.
It is time that we finally create some stability in the aviation sector. This bill will do that. I encourage my colleagues to support its passage.
I would like to go ahead, since we do have time--actually, I do see someone waiting to speak. Since we will be on the floor until the vote, I will yield the floor at this time and finish the rest of my statement later.
I yield the floor.
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Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, we will be voting in an hour and a half, but I would like to take this opportunity to thank so many of the people who brought this bill together, which we hope will come to a good conclusion in about an hour and a half.
Obviously, I have talked about Chairman Rockefeller. This has been a long process, clearly--23 extensions and it has been since 2007 that we had the last authorization. I think the fact we are now going to have a 4-year authorization is one of the more important elements. Now our airports are going to be able to start their building projects. They are going to be able to increase their runway space or do repairs or whatever the priorities are that are decided by the FAA are the most important priorities for our Nation because the funding source from the highway trust fund will now be known for 4 years. I think that is a very important step in the right direction.
I wish to thank the House managers of this bill as well, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman Mica and Ranking Member Rahall and the respective Aviation Subcommittee chairs in the House, Representatives Petri and Costello. Their work and input on their bill was certainly critical, and the ability to come to conference and hammer it out was critical as well.
In the Senate, I wish to thank all our conferees, Senators Hatch, Isakson, and DeMint on our side and, additionally, Senators Cantwell and Thune, the respective chair and ranking member of the Commerce Committee's Aviation Subcommittee, for their work on the bill.
The staff, of course, are the ones who work long hours, and though we never see them, they are there. Senator Rockefeller and I were having telephone calls at 10 o'clock at night, then we would call our staffs and then call back to determine what was happening and what needed to be happening. So I thank the person who runs the Commerce Committee on the majority side, Ellen Doneski, who is wonderful to work with, James Reid, Gael Sullivan, Rich Swayze, and Adam Duffy, who worked on this bill and the negotiations for all these years that we have been trying to pass this; on Representative Mica's staff, Jim Coon, Holly Woodruff Lyons, Bailey Edwards, and Simone Perez; on Representative Rahall's staff, Jim Zoia, Ward McCarragher, Giles Giovinazzi, and Alex Burkett; and on my staff, the Commerce Committee minority side, Todd Bertoson, Richard Russell, and Jarrod Thompson.
I wish to especially mention Jarrod Thompson, who is the one I know the best, because he is the Aviation Subcommittee ranking member's staff leader. He knows the history of the aviation bills. He knows the subject matter. There was never a time when I would ask a specific or technical question that Jarrod didn't know the answer, and I so appreciate his being on our staff and helping us through this very important time.
With that, I yield the floor, and I thank all my colleagues and our House colleagues and staff for their work on this bill that I hope we will be able to pass when the vote comes at 5:30 this afternoon.
I yield the floor.
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