During Wednesday’s House Appropriations Committee hearing, Rep. Stephanie Bice (R-OK) questioned Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy about the FAA training process.
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00:00And thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being with us. And I want to take a moment to reiterate
00:03Chairman Womack and Chairman Cole's condolences to the Lilly family. Thank you for being here
00:09and working with us to ensure that we continue to have the safest guys in the world.
00:15I, as Chairman Cole, also represent portions of the Oklahoma City area, and I'm proud to represent
00:21thousands of FAA employees in my district who work at the Mike Monroni Aeronautical Center.
00:27I want to thank you for your recent visit in February, and I'm glad you're able to see the
00:32critical facility and the great work that's being done there. I want to share with you a quick story
00:38because I think it is an example of how broken things have been. After I was elected, I tried to
00:44get into CFA, Mike Monroni Aeronautical Center, for quite some time, and the former Secretary of
00:51Transportation made it very difficult for the staff to allow me in. I finally got in in October of
00:5722. And keep in mind, the White House was open in August of 22 for visits again. But it was when I
01:04arrived to the facility, I was required to answer COVID protocol questions. Secretary Buttigieg still
01:11had these protocols for certain facilities in place, and it was pretty shocking to have to answer those
01:17questions. So it's refreshing to have someone come in and focus on the mission and actually what needs
01:23to be done to improve the safety of our skies. The FAA workforce in Oklahoma is crucial, and the
01:30Academy is a national asset that prepares our air traffic controllers for the rigors of a very
01:35difficult job. Mr. Secretary, as you know, the Academy relies on timely medical and security screenings,
01:42as well as capacity in field training facilities to move candidates through that pipeline in a timely
01:48fashion. I have a particular concern with the lengthy delays of the medical screening process and
01:54the field training, but I was excited on your recent actions to address the factors as part of the
01:59supercharge initiative. And I'd like you to talk a little bit more about that and how we can move
02:04these folks through the pipeline faster. I appreciate the question. Yeah, so by the way, if you all haven't
02:08been to the Academy, it is amazing. You should all go. It's really remarkable how we train up air traffic
02:14controllers. But yeah, we were having this issue where it was taken up to a year and a half once
02:19you apply to become a controller to actually get a spot in the Academy. And the issue with that is if
02:25you're 25 years old and you're waiting a year and a half, you're going to go find a different job. You
02:28can't wait for a potential seat at the Academy. And so one of the holdups was the medicals, the medical
02:35exams. And so we've worked with our doctors, which by the way, it seems like it would be easier than it
02:41actually was. We've incentivized them with additional pay to take our applicants earlier so we get our
02:50appointments scheduled faster. And then it was taking months to get the reports back. And so we're
02:57going to give them a bonus to get those reports back to us in two weeks. And sometimes this comes
03:03down to money. By the way, we have that in the current we're moving dollars around at the FAA that
03:08you've given us the grace to do. But we're moving dollars around to pay for it with the existing
03:14money that the FAA has. But again, that is allowing us to get these students who take the test, get the
03:22medical, do the background check. And we're taking those top scores and putting them into the Academy
03:28first. So it's moving faster, which is merit based, which is incredibly important because that hasn't been
03:33the case in the past, correct? Yes, right. So if you get a 98 on your test, we're going to put you in
03:39before someone who got an 82. I just think that makes sense. And the opportunity to not have that
03:47student washout is way better. So I think because the washout rate becomes a real issue and the best
03:52qualified students will give us a lower washout rate. So thank you for recognizing the hard work it
03:57took to try to figure this out. Well, I appreciate the focus on that. And I do want to touch on technology,
04:02but I also want to make one quick note. You mentioned in your testimony, testimony grants
04:07and the number of grant programs that and processes that you're having to deal with. And that's a focus
04:13for me because it's obvious to me if it's happening at your agency, it's happening across government.
04:18And so many grants are being duplicated in many ways to the same entities. So I want to work with you
04:25to streamline that in any way that we can. Last, I just want to quickly ask you to touch on the
04:29technology upgrades. You had a great visual when you did your press conference showing floppy disks.
04:36I'm of the age that I know what a floppy disk is, but my 24-year-old does not.
04:42What are we going to do to invest in technology to get our air traffic infrastructure up to really
04:47snuff up to the 21st century quickly? Yeah, I appreciate the question. We have a whole problem.
04:52And if you look at the infrastructure around air traffic control, I don't think there's anything
04:58there to save. If there's some scraps you could offer a junkyard, that's possible. But really,
05:03this is 80s. Our radar is from the 70s. We have a couple new ones from early 80s. I mean,
05:12that's how old the stuff is. But if I'm really honest with you, I don't think it's been done
05:17because it is really hard. We're going to update the telecom moving from copper to fiber. By the way,
05:25that's really fast. We actually have to slow down the fast speed of fiber to then make the equipment
05:31that we use in the facilities make it think it's as slow as copper. Otherwise, because it can't take
05:38the high speed. It's so old. And so as we think about how we're going to do that with fiber, slowing
05:45it down, and then at the same time, building the infrastructure inside the TRACONs or the towers
05:50or the centers, and also keep planes in the air and doing it safely, it's not going to be an easy
05:57task. Newark has to be addressed and has to be addressed first. My preference would be that we start
06:04at lower volume airports. And we go through that process and learn as we go how we choreograph
06:11the build. But again, if we can put a man on the moon, we can actually build this and build it well
06:19and truly have the state of the art best in the world system. My airport manager back home may not
06:25like this, but I'm happy to let you experiment on the Oklahoma City Will Rogers International Airport
06:30because I think it's crucial to ensuring safety across the nation moving forward. So with that,
06:36Mr. Chairman, I yield.